Conference RBOC

• I'm at a non-disciplinary conference in a city I love but have no time to enjoy it or see my friends.
  
  
• Went to a session this morning that makes me want to try something extremely politically risky on my campus. Why not? - I have tenure. To quote one of my favorite pinball machines: Big risk, big reward.
  
  
• About 10% of the faculty attendees were texting or answering e-mail on their laptops at one point or another during the morning plenary. The irony is that it was a plenary where students were doing the talking.^*
  
  
• One of my fellow attendees had too much wine and claimed that we were both smarter that 90% of the people here at the conference. I asked what he thought of the part of the evening plenary where the speaker mentioned that we academics are often arrogant and think we are better than everyone else.
  
  
• I know it is a discipline thing, and the speaker was from a discipline that does this, but I really, really, could do without being read to. How do people in these fields pay attention when the tone isn't conversational?
  
  

^*To be fair, the sound system was not ideal and I found the panel a little too scripted and the faculty facilitators a little too self-congratulatory.

Difficult Day

I removed this post because I think maybe it shouldn't be up here forever.

Still, I'm disappointed by the whole thing.

Advising notes

Me: How is your math class going?
C: Okay.
Me: Really?
C: Yeah.
Me: Because I have a midterm grade report that says F.
C: Yeah, but now we are on matrices and I know how to do those.
Me: Okay, so it is going better?
C: Yeah, I guess.
Me: So what did you get on your last test?
C: Uh, I don't know, because we just turned in the take home part of the test.
Me: What did you get on the other part?
C: Uh, I haven't gotten it back yet.
Me: Okay. Are you attending your math class as frequently as you are attending my class?
C:
Me: I'm actually hoping the answer is no, that you are attending math more frequently than my class.

E-mail

Last summer, I stumbled upon Inbox Zero after seeing a comment on this post over at the Angry Professor. I was inspired. I don't know why, exactly. I've never been a fan of productivity or organizing literature. The answer always seems to be "hey, just be organized" and "put stuff away where it belongs". If I did either of those things naturally or easily, I wouldn't be buying the book or reading the website.

But it was summer, I had about 2700 messages in my Inbox and I was really, really tired of being afraid of looking at my e-mail. The system spoke to me. So, I read all the info and committed myself to keeping my e-mail under one screen. I'm not Inbox Zero, but I had been Inbox < 20 for a year. It felt good.

It was some work at first - being disciplined about dealing with e-mail. After a few months it felt more natural. I only have to really work at it when things are insanely busy. Like now. A two weeks ago I gave myself permission to go up to 40 for a bit.

I'm thinking that this probably wasn't the best idea in the world. Twice this week I never even opened my e-mail.

In other news, it is fairly clear that my productivity and blogging have been negatively impacted by Facebook.

A conversation

Me: Wow, I had no idea there was an xfig port for the Mac

Dr. H: Um...

Me: Can you tell I don't want to work on these letters?

Dr. H: I wasn't going to say anything, but...

It's my party and I'll _____* if I want to.

Dr. H: What do you want to do for your birthday this weekend? Anything special?

Me: Well, we are going out to the theater the night before.

Dr. H: I know, but would you like to do anything special on your birthday? I'm offering to watch the kids by myself if there is something you would like to do.

Me: OMG, I could really use a day at the office.

 

^{* work}

Update RBoC

Just a few things that have been going on while I have not been blogging:

• I've become addicted to PackRat on Facebook. It's Addy's fault, really.
  
  
• I've also become obsessed with RealClearPolitics. I have only myself to blame.
  
  
• My mother was quite disappointed Hillary did not get the Democratic nomination. I was worried she was going to vote for McCain. She lived in Arizona from 1976 until May of this year, and generally felt positively towards McCain. Sarah Palin took care of all that. Yesterday, my mom voted for Obama. In Florida.
  
  
• My conservative cousin who is turning 36 this month voted for Obama a few days ago. He has never voted before. Ever. He lives in Texas, though, so no help there.
  
  
• My mom is a victim of the mortgage crisis. More on this later.
  
  
• I went to a CUR (Council on Undergraduate Research) workshop as a member of a team from my institution. It was fantastic.
  
  
• We hired fabulous adjuncts this year. Awesome.
  
  
• Three comics I like about work, life and woo.
  
  
• A little vignette from my house, while trying to convince the kids to get dressed:
  
  

  
  Dr. H: Hey, who don't you both wear your kitty shirts? Then you can be twins!
  
  Curie: We're ALREADY twins.

  
  

  
  
  

Two Institutions, Two Sets of Students

I decided during my senior year of college that I wanted to be a professor at a small liberal arts college. I expected to get married to another academic once I was settled into an academic job. I expected to have twins, a house near campus, and a dog, once I got that tenure thing out of the way.

Instead:
1) got TT job at regional master's level institution (loved it)
2) got cats after going to shelter "just to look around" (awesome, no regrets)
3) found a partner who was also an academic (in another city...oops)
4) got tenure (yea!)
5) got married (yea!) (also acquired 3rd cat by marriage)
6) took a leave and went into administration near husband's new TT job (missed teaching)
7) got a job at a small liberal arts college (same metropolitan area, woo hoo!)
8) bought a house (over 25 miles from both our colleges)
9) got another cat (yes, that is four for those keeping track)
10) had twins (Clomid)
11) got tenure (again!)

The first deviation from my original plan was taking a job at a regional master's level (public) institution. When I was considering my options in college, the truth is, I had no idea such institutions existed. In my world there were (1) larger public or private research universities (2) small private colleges and (3) community colleges. It was only in graduate school that I learned about M.S. granting mixed teaching/research institutions. A woman from one of these institutions was doing a sabbatical leave at my graduate school. She was asked to speak to a small group of grad students who were interested in teaching at primarily undergraduate institutions. She was shocked that "small group" turned out to be packed room of more than 20 (mostly women). I liked what I heard there. When applying for jobs, I found a job announcement at one such institution that seemed written for me. To make a long story short, I liked the place, they liked me, and I took the job.

It turned out to be a great fit, in ways that surprised me. The student body consisted of a wide range of students. Some were quite weak, coming in needing remedial work in math and writing. Some students were hard working, some were distracted with other responsibilities, many were both. A few were absolutely brilliant. (Really.) What was remarkable and rewarding about this job was that I made a difference. And moreover, I made a difference to all those groups of students. I developed teaching techniques that "raised up the bottom" while still challenging the top. I rarely had to fail students - yet students often reported my class was the hardest they'd ever taken. I sent students to excellent grad schools. I also got to teach graduate courses in my specialty areas more than occasionally.

Leaving was hard, especially after attaining tenure. I did so to solve my two-body problem. That is a whole bunch of other posts in itself - which I will save for another time.

Today, I find myself at a small, private, liberal arts college, just as I always imagined. My students at SLAC, on average, are much better students than my students were at Regional U. This is nice for a number of reasons. I have to worry less about compliance on homework and class attendance. I also have to spend a lot less time working on basic math skills. These are all good things that make my life easier. On the other hand, the range of abilities demonstrated by my students is considerably narrower when I compare them to the students I had at Regional U. Here's one issue: this means that I don't feel like I make that much of a difference. These students are reasonably good students who will do okay with or without me. I would not have thought I would miss weaker students, but there you go. Something else unexpected: the narrower distribution at SLAC also means that while I have many strong students, I have yet to encounter any truly brilliant students. Maybe Regional U. was an anomaly, but I had two students in my short time there who blew my mind. (Cleverly, I sent one to my undergraduate institution to do an REU, and sent the other to my grad school to get a Ph.D., thus instilling in my former mentors a deep belief in my sound judgment.) My explanation for this is that some really incredible students chose Regional U. because of financial concerns - not something that is going to get such students to choose my SLAC over, say, Prestigious SLAC or Ivy U.

On the other hand, at SLAC, my students are really nice and I have a lot of freedom within the classroom. The faculty is 1/5 the size of Regional U, and the student body is 1/8 the size, which (often) means less bureaucracy. I have a lot more freedom to schedule classes, design new courses, even to pick textbooks, than I ever had at Regional U. I also feel I can make a big difference on campus. Lots of things on my campus are changing right now, and I feel very involved. Usually, that is a good thing. This is a different sort of making a difference than I mentioned before, but one that I also enjoy.

The last big difference between the two institutions is in research support. I had much more research support (time, money and students) at Regional U and consequently was able to do more research. Happily, however, my SLAC has started to put more resources into undergraduate research. I may be in a position to help direct how that happens. This is the last piece of the puzzle for me.

Now, if I could just find a way to shorten my commute....


scientiae-carnival

A Change of Plans

Tuesday: Dalton gets sent home early from Daycare with a fever. Dr. H. picks up both kids and comes home early.

Wednesday: Dalton stays home with me. He seems better but tired. I get some stuff done - cleaning my home office which has been collecting junk and toys since Thanksgiving. Unfortunately, I feel sick too, so I am not moving very fast.

Wednesday night: Curie has a fever, which somehow went undetected at daycare.

Thursday: Curie wakes up with a horrible cough and stays home with me. We go into my office in the afternoon because I had to check in on things for Friday, when we are interviewing a candidate for a tenure-track position. I discover the Nick Jr website has full length Dora episodes on line. Curie happily sits at a computer in the lab's alcove while I clean the lab. Her cough is infrequent, but sounds awful. The fever from the evening before seems to have broken.

Thursday night: Uneventful until the midnight when Curie begins to cough on and off, waking up Dalton and Dr. H. every half hour or so. I'm a sounder sleeper than Dr. H. Eventually, though, she wakes me up too and I convince her to sleep semi-upright on a few pillows. We finally all get a few hours of sleep.

Friday: Kids wake up happy. A quick hand check of foreheads results in a maybe/maybe not diagnosis on the fever end. Maybe/maybe not via the hand check usually means no via thermometer, so I decide not to tempt fate and investigate further. Kids go to daycare with Dr. H., I go to campus to participate fully in the interview and dinner.

Friday night: Dr. H reports that Dalton slept for 3.5 hours at daycare and remained listless afterwards. They called him to pick up the kids a little early. He begins to feel awful himself. Kids are restless, develop fevers. Curie can't stop coughing. Dalton is really uncomfortable and hot. Cough medicine for one, ibuprofen for the other.

Saturday: Kids continue to have fevers. General repeat of previous night, only now Dr. H. feels even worse.

Sunday: Curie wakes up on the upswing, but still tired. Dr. H. can't breathe, can't really think and has two nosebleeds. Dalton has three nosebleeds and his fever hasn't gone away, but he does start eating again, so we are optimistic. He has trouble sleeping, announces "My ear hurts!" Okay, this sucks, but it explains a lot. Dr. H. can't sleep at all.

Monday early morning: We get up, decide Curie is able to go to daycare. She wants to stay home or go to work with me because she thinks then she will get to watch Dora. I call the pediatrician. Yes, 1:30 is their earliest appointment. I quickly run the cat with the treated UTI to the vet for a post-treatment urine sample and return home. Dr. H. leaves with Curie.

Monday mid morning: Dalton's ear hurts. A lot. I give him ibuprofen. After that kicks in we do a floor puzzle together then he goes off to play on his own. I decide to clean and organize the kitchen, because everything else I have to do I can't do with a child interrupting me every three minutes. In cleaning the kitchen, I discover a plastic bubble sheet of pills and determine that the cat was supposed to have two weeks of antibiotics, not one. I call the vet.

Monday afternoon: Dalton and I head out to the pediatrician. Yes, ear infection, antibiotics. We drop the script off at the drive through pharmacy next to Trader Joe's. We go shopping until the prescription is ready. We start to drive home. Crap! Forgot the cat. Back to the vet to pick her up. Graciously, they don't charge for the urine draw (already done by the time I called, bummer) or make me feel bad about being an idiot. Back home, Dalton takes his antibiotics and falls asleep on the couch.

Monday evening: Dr. H. finds NyQuil that expired in 2000. He decides to rummage further and finds some that didn't expire until 2006. He finally gets a decent night's sleep. The kids do too.

Tuesday morning: Smiles! Laughter! Running! Dr. H and I determine it is easier to get the kids dressed when they are sick. I get the leaking tire on my car fixed (nail) then finally get into the office around noon.

The problem? Call me crazy, but I was kind of planning on using this past week to prepare classes for the spring term. We start Monday. I still have three days of daycare this week. No problem.

Working Late, Trapped by Frat Boys

I'm in my office and cannot leave without calling "Bill" or "Anthony".

A fraternity is doing a "sacred ritual" in my building. My working late tonight is interfering with their plans. I graciously offered to stay in my office until I have to leave. After much consultation, the young men have decided that this is preferable to waiting for me to leave. I have two phone numbers to call when I want to leave, and one of the young men will come and escort me out of the building. So polite, students today.

[Seriously, they were actually very profuse in their thanks for my willingness to be so accommodating.]

What not to do if you are in a one-year position hoping to become tenure-track

* Announce to the department chair that your freshman students will be in his office tomorrow because you are going to ream them out in class today.

* Disappointed that the students don't know how to do something, get angry and tell them if they fuck up at their [health-related] jobs in the future, they will kill people.

* Use "fuck" four times in your rant, but never tell the students why you are mad. Do this dramatically enough that word gets around and other students start using "pulled a [your last name] on so-and-so" synonymously with "told so-and-so off". Bonus points if faculty in other departments hear about the rant and mention it to the department chair.

* Ignore all advice/course materials/handouts given to you by others who have taught the courses you are teaching. Instead, change your materials, style and approach daily, doing the first thing that comes into your head.

* Make fun of a senior level student for not knowing a conversion factor. Do this when the student is the only one available to be your lab assistant for two different labs. Make sure to keep making fun of him for about 15 minutes in front of a room full of freshman women.

* Exclaim in a happy voice "Only 1/3 of my class is getting D's or F's!" without determining whether this is typical for the course you are teaching.

* Go through 9 chapters of a 24 chapter, two-semester text in the first three weeks of class.

* Assume the other faculty member who prepped your lab when you were behind was happy to do it.

Some Things Don't Change

My Ph.D. advisor was in my Big City giving a talk yesterday. I just spent four months back in his group at Sabbatical U (aka Grad School U). The experience was one long deja vu - I even had my old desk back.

Anyway, yesterday, I went to his talk, a well attended affair at a local university, hosted by a local section of the national professional organization. At dinner, my advisor sees me and rushes over. He gave me a big hug, and thanked me for coming, saying he had forgotten I might be there. He catches me up on the group, Amazing Chinese Guy just took a postdoc at Harvard, Really Nice post doc is expecting a baby, etc. I told him I just did a well-received presentation on my campus about what I did on my sabbatical.

"That's Great! Some day you'll have to tell me."

It's true, I owe him a draft.

Meetings

Nothing like spending the day in a series of college wide meetings! Today was a day chock full of:

1. breaking up into small groups
   
2. discussing things no one will agree on
   
3. reporting back to larger groups
   
4. repeating steps 1-3 n times
   

All the while with the growing realization that my UTI was not, in fact, cured by the week of antibiotics.

But actually, I am a glass half-full type of gal, so let me say there were three positive things about today:

1. The bathroom was right next to the afternoon meeting room and had an abundance of stalls.
   
2. I succeeding in arranging to have the committee empowered with forming other committees assign a mathematician to join me on the core curriculum revision committee
   
3. I'm now in possession of Cipro
   

Responsibility

So, it looks as though the committee charged with revising college core requirements has been appointed rather than elected.

Number of people on the committee: about 13

Number of science and math people: 1

Just say no

Classes start the week after next. So far, I've been asked/assigned to do the following:

• be on a search committee for another small (related) department
  
• replace a retired colleague on the technology committee
  
• stay on the committee that runs faculty programs and decides who gets internal research grants
  
• organize faculty brown bag discussions
  
• run for an elected task force charged with revising college degree requirements
  

So much for feeling rested from sabbatical.

Update

Two things I forgot about:

• advise a new student organization
  
• run a four week book discussion for honors students
  

And another request just today:

• Will I be on the (really really high level) administrative search committee?
  (answer: no)
  

Unfortunately, I have agreed to the rest.

August Scientiae Carnival: Balance Questions and Answers

Here it is, finally! The August Scientiae Carnival. Happy reading! If I missed something, let me know. I will again blame Harry Potter. The next carnival is scheduled for September 1st at Zuska's.


Balance? Hmm, let's discuss.

Flicka Mawa at A Cat Nap has a blogosphere discussion about balance complete with reading list.

Propter Doc weighs up all the things that must be done and considers a few strategies for coping with it all. Hypoglycemiagirl provides some suggestions for traveling when your life is happening in three different countries and discusses how getting enough exercise is a challenge.

Amelie wonders whether hanging out with scientists all the time is good or bad and Veo Claramente now at Cool Immunology wonders if life in academia can be balanced.

Balance? Smalance! Let's see some science fun!

A carnival reader nominated these posts by Keet Leibowitz at
The Keet and Nini Show with Keet's drawings of girls doing science, along with discussions of burning magnesium and the all important difference between the word organism and a word that is spelled in a similar fashion.

Pat at Fairer Science Weblog decides: Balance No. Oobleck Yes.

Balance? First, can we all agree that academia has some serious problems?

Bug Girl lays out a persuasive argument that academia is a cult. Rob Knop at Galactic Interactions writes an amazing and frank post about leaving academia when he found that his career was interfering with his life. And this older and quite provocative Bitch Ph.D. post about kids, academia and life is very interesting and will likely provoke discussion.

Balance? Perhaps that's not the precise word we're looking for.

Dr. Free-Ride at Adventures in Ethics and Science writes about how her life involves juggling, not balance. Zuska wonders how one balances nothing and talks about what happens when health interferes with your career plans.

Balance? Yes? We think. Maybe.

Rebecca at Adventures in Applied Math describes how she tries to balance by finding a work schedule that works for her and I worry about how and where I choose to do my work influences how others perceive me.

Bug Girl writes about balancing her desire to do one thing for the good of the many with the strategic thing for the good of the one.

MrsWhatsit at I Love Science, Really discusses how you don't think about balance until it is absent and how to balance mental health and career.

Balance? Yes!

Dr. Shellie suggests running for improved balance. Estraven at Proving Theorems finds that balance is easier when you like your colleagues.

Flicka Mawa discusses how having a really full plate helps her achieve balance along with the attitude that grad school is not her everything.

Balance? In progress.

New mom Jane at See Jane Compute shares with us some of her insights and questions from taking Baby Jane to a conference. Among them, she wonders whether people finding out she has a new baby will make her appear less professional and wonders whether men even consider this question.

Two women starting tenure track jobs in the fall Skookumchick and Tenure Track Newbie find themselves already being drafted for committees and other service tasks months before they can expect their first paychecks.

And last but not least, Science Woman writes an incredibly inspiring post about how she will not be a foregone conclusion in her attempts to balance life and career as she begins her new tenure-track job this fall.

***********

A big thank you for all of you who submitted and nominated posts and encouraged others to do so!

Face Time

In my previous position at Regional State University, I was told early on that it was fortunate that I did not have a family or children, as I would be able to work nights and weekends. I was annoyed and also concerned that somehow more would be expected of me because I was single. In my current position, I find I have the opposite problem. People assume I work less because I have a husband and children, regardless of what the reality is.

The first situation turned out to be no problem. I was around as much as my active colleagues on average, and they cared about results, not appearances. So, taking weekends off to visit my friends in Cool City, or taking a weekend to visit my fiance in another city was no problem.

Here, at SLAC however, I do have a problem. I have a chair who values face time above all else. He does little work at home, as far as I can tell, so does not believe anyone else does. I have some reason to believe he tells people behind my back that I really should be around more.

One semester recently I taught a new prep. Two to three times a week, we put the kids to bed around 8 or so, then I would start working on class prep for the new class. I would stay up until 1 or 2 in the morning, finishing what preparation and grading I had to do for the new class. This is something I'm sure many academics do regularly, or at least on occasion, depending on assignment patterns, grant deadlines, and the like. My other classes were ones I had taught before, and I found that I usually had enough time at my office in between teaching, to take care of those, but there was no way to fit the new one in. The result: sleep deprivation, and the assumption among my colleagues that it is due to childcare, not work.

The problem, you see, is that I leave between 4:30 and 6 pm almost every evening. It does not matter to anyone that I do work at home. It is not visible, I'm not around, therefore I'm not working. Right. Without children, I would simply leave the office later and spend less time at home, as would my husband. With them, the extra time one of us spends working in our offices on the nights or weekends means an additional burden for the other. It is preferable to got home early and stay up late. But it doesn't count as face time. It isn't working to spend hours gossiping with students, doing on-line shopping, or having coffee in the faculty lounge, but somehow those seem to count. Go figure.

In the balance between my family, my work and being seen, I seem to have chosen the first two.

Constructing the Syllabus

I enjoyed this recent Chronicle column by Monica D'Antonio entitled "If Your Syllabus Could Talk." She was somehow assigned the task of proofreading the syllabi of her colleagues - loads of fun, no? She shares her take on what these documents told her about the teaching styles of her colleagues.

I'm not sure that I would agree with D'Antonio that all instructors with an uninspired syllabus would rather not be in class, but she makes a number of good points.

I suspect that my first few syllabi were the 1-2 page variety. I would say this is because (a) most of the syllabi I received in college were like this, (b) I was naive and didn't know I'd need so many different policies and (c) in my case, I really didn't know what I was doing.

I'm now the 15-page syllabus type. I don't know how long it took me to put learning goals into my syllabus, but it is a distressingly recent development. I say distressing because I spent over a year on leave working in a teaching center. (Partially because of my two-body problem.) One thing we always talked about in workshops is what I'll call from-the-ground-up course development. Start with learning goals: What do you want your students to be able to do as a result of taking your course?

Too often, I think those of us in the sciences are content focused. "I want students to know X" as opposed to "I want students to be able to do X." Of course, we actually do want them to do X, we just assume that will come as they learn the content. And content is about coverage. It worked for us. Right? When I added my goals to the syllabus, I found it helpful. It made me more cognizant of what I was trying to do. Am I really doing anything that supports this goal, or am I assuming students will just pick it up somehow?

My 15-page syllabus is also fairly rigid in terms of course policies. This is actually because I like to be flexible in the classroom. For me, this means both responding to the needs of the class as a whole (by being willing to toss out my own plans for the class period if the students need something different), and to respond to individual situations and difficulties when possible. However, I then run the risk of being inconsistent and disorganized. Having a detailed syllabus helps. If I modify plans for the day, that is okay, because tests and things still happen on schedule. When I'm faced with a student request I respond by referring to the policies set out in the syllabus. It lets me feel more comfortable being firm when I need to. It's not me! I'm not mean! Really! It's the syllabus! I am not trying to remove my responsibility, as of course I understand I am the one creating the policies in the syllabus. However, in the face of a student in distress, I might be tempted to give more leeway than I should.

The other reason I feel need such a syllabus is that I am actually completely disorganized. I used to have a fabulous memory, but no longer. As a result, I never developed any skills for dealing with memory issues - like writing things down. So, I can't remember when I said we'd do what if it wasn't all worked out ahead of time. Nor will I remember what I told student X three weeks ago, when faced with student Y today who is asking the same thing. Now I know that I told student X whatever the syllabus says about his situation, so I know exactly what to say to student Y in response to her request.

This all seems obvious, but every time I teach, I find another policy I need to add. Weird stuff too. Recently I developed a policy for denying participation in class trips for problematic classroom behavior. I did this because I had a situation in which I felt my liability would be too high if I allowed the student to participate. The powers that be thought I was most likely covered anyway, because the behavior was probably sufficient to remove the student from class, but there were threats of a challenge. Now my syllabus covers such things.

Perhaps as a result of all this, I have syllabus stress dreams. You know those student stress dreams where you find out you need to take a final in a class you didn't know you were taking? Well, I never had those. Instead, once I started teaching I started having dreams in which I find out 10 minutes before class that I haven't put together a class syllabus. Hurriedly, I try to put something together from an old one, but computer and/or copier issues ensue, and 10 minutes into class I'm still trying to get something together. Eventually, I go to class anyway, apologize, but the students are like "This is SO lame!" and other such things. It is always a relief to wake up.

When it rains....

It's been a good day:

• The college powers that be asked if we want to keep Retiring Colleague's 1 year old Mac with OS 10something. I claimed it for my lab. It will potentially be useful for my research students and one small upper division lab course.
  
  
• The college approved my request for a "special configuration" replacement desktop . I'm up in the rotation, but you get Generic Very Noisy PC with Windows XP and no monitor unless you ask nicely and give 47 reasons why you are special. Somehow, I convinced them to by me a Dell Precision Workstation with Linux and a 20" flat screen monitor - largely by arguing it is simply a replacement for my current Dell Precision Workstation with Linux and a 20" flat screen monitor and giving only about 29 reasons why I am special.
  
  
• My new MacBook (personal purchase) arrived today! Amazing, you plug it in and everything works. This summer, the education discount includes a free iPod. Assuming Apple honors the rebate, this will be my second free iPod. I won one in a promotional give away last year. I told my Windows using husband "We'll never know what life is like on the other side unless we take the plunge and buy a Mac." So far the grass IS greener. (compared to WinDoze, of course)
  

Adjunct Hiring

I'm back from sabbatical and adjunct hiring season is upon us. Our small college often has trouble finding adjuncts in the sciences.

Things that work in our favor:
* Large metropolitan area = lots of Ph.D.'s
* Large metropolitan area is pretty cool = people living here want to stay here

Things that work against us:
* Large metropolitan area = lots of industry jobs for scientists
* We pay crap

In a bad year, we only get those people who have not been rehired in their previous adjunct gigs for one reason or another. This usually doesn't go so well. Don't get me wrong, there are fantastic adjuncts around - we just don't usually pay enough to attract this group.

In a great year, we get wonderful people that are "stuck" here for one reason or another. They come to us because of timing. We just plain luck out and are in the right place at the right time to sign them up. This situation is great for us - we get awesome people who are enthusiastic and wish to use the opportunity to improve their teaching. Unfortunately (for us anyway) this happens only by random chance and is not something we can count on. We shouldn't expect anything different when we are offering crappy pay and only one semester contracts, of course. In fact, what bothers me the most about this whole situation is this exploitation. I am extremely uncomfortable about the idea that we are getting great adjuncts for very few $$ just because, say, scientists often marry scientists and two body problems suck. (A victim of the two body problem myself, I feel some kinship here.)

Fortunately, all of our terrific adjuncts of this sort have found tenure track jobs in the year following their employment with us. Our chair credits himself with this, as if he has somehow paved their way to the promised land. This make him feel better about the crappy pay. The truth is, these people were good before they came to us. They got good jobs because they were good, not because they were with us. We were lucky to have them.

Today we interviewed someone really energetic and enthusiastic about teaching who is making his way back into academia. Tomorrow we are scheduled to interview two candidates who look great on paper. I believe both are halves of academic couples stuck in the area by virtue by spousal/partner employment.

This may be a good year.



p.s. You may be relieved to know I'm also currently advocating for better pay for adjuncts.