On one hand, the fact that it was poorly advertised might indicate an inside candidate. On the other, the fact that the deadline is so late generally goes against that (positions with inside candidate in mind usually have only one month or less between announcement and deadline).
The fact that the ad has expired and is not found anywhere else might actually indicate that the search was cancelled, which is something that has been very common this year.
Our search this year received little fund support for buying ads, so we just paid ASA JobBank, posted on the free websites, and then e-mailed departments and faculty with our job ad.
Briefer paid ad runs may reflect less funding for conducting searches. With the oversupply of good applicants who are alert to opportunities, a department doesn't have to pay much to attract a sufficient pool.
I think we are increasingly moving towards the hard science model where grad school is followed by some period of transition and training, like a post-doc or VAP. The hard sciences are seeing such periods last longer too. In neurobiology, the average post-doc used to be 3 years and now it is 5 with post-docs lasting 6-7 years not unheard of.
I actually think the post-doc model works better as far as scholarship and helping people transition more smoothly. However, it is a royal pain to have to move twice, especially people who have families.
Has anyone given any thought to community colleges? Having been unsuccessful thus far with research universities and liberal arts colleges, and having seen that some in my area are hiring tt positions, the thought has crossed my mind. I really don't know much about them (I assume the teaching is 5/5 usually?) or what they're looking for in an applicant.
Community college tenure-track positions (which would be the only kind worth doing as a primary means of employment) would be 5/5 typically, although there may only be, say, 3 course preps depending on the position. In any case, don't apply unless you really like teaching.
Tenure decisions are based almost entirely on teaching, along with some service. For a hire they'll be looking for, you guessed it, teaching experience, evidence of teaching effectiveness, etc. Since community colleges are often a first step for students from lower-income households and/or entering college later in life they may also be particularly interested in experience with students of diverse student backgrounds along lines of class, race, age, etc. And if they are starting or increasing online course offerings they may be looking for educational technology experience.
Keep in mind that once you take a tenure-track community college position it may be fairly difficult to move out of that type of position - you could move into other community college positions or into secondary education, but may face barriers in trying to move into even a lower-tier "state school" or liberal arts campus.
Does anyone have a sense whether a postdoc or a VAP (Visiting Assistant Professor) position will hurt you more on the job market? I have to take one or the other because of financial reasons, but I still eventually want a TT job.
I think a postdoc would definitely look more impressive on your CV than a VAP. A lot of people from my program do postdocs and then move on to R1 jobs, while the people who apply ABD tend to get R2 jobs. Everyone I know who has gotten a really prestigious job (think: princeton, penn, harvard, wisconsin, etc), did a postdoc first. I don't know of anyone who did a VAP and then moved on to a R1 school (although I know many who moved on to jobs at lower ranked schools)
Think about it: a postdoc is research oriented, while VAP's usually requires a lot of teaching. As we all know, publications generically matter a lot more than teaching, at least to research oriented schools (and many other schools as well).
On the other hand, if you are looking for a job at a SLAC and/or don't have a lot of teaching experience and need to buff up that part of your CV, the VAP may be the way to go (but many postdocs can include teaching too if you want them too)
Either one is fine even if you intend to apply at an R1 as long as you continue to work on your publications and make progress with your research even if you are doing a VAP.
"Have to" take a VAP or post-doc? Uhm...have you been offered one? If not, don't assume that you'll get one. In fact, VAP aren't any easier to get than TT positions. Really, don't assume your so hot.
I'd take the post-doc if you're offered one, but they can be hard to come by in Soc. You probably need to already have arrangements in the works for a post-doc by now if its going to happen.
Also keep in mind that post-docs can be quite competitive too. Someone in my department turned down 2 good TT job offers to take a post-doc.
"Someone in my department turned down 2 good TT job offers to take a post-doc."
That takes serious chutzpah. I think one would have to be 100% certain of being the star of the market 2 years from now to turn down the security of a TT offer in hand. The soc job market is circling the drain right now; does anyone imagine it could possibly be better in 2 years. . .
Some postdoc programs, like the Michigan Fellows, the Society of Fellows at Princeton, or the Harper Fellows at Chicago, are so prestigious that it may be worthwhile to turn second tier TT offers. They often get up to 1000 applications. The people who get these postdocs usually go on to jobs at top tier R1s. Also some schools will allow you to do both -- basically to postpone your start date until you have finished the fellowship.
I would be reluctant to hire someone with no publications or even with fewer than the average number and quality among the applicants. Being reluctant to publish might signify a lack of creativity, a likely problem in faculty retention and tenure, and an inability to multi-task -- publishing while studying and teaching as a graduate student.
If nothing has ever struck an applicant's interest enough to write about it, and if it's asking too much to publish while doing other work as professors do, then that's a red flag bigger than Santa's suit.
Listen, publications are a nice accomplishment and certainly an indicator that a person will be a successful researcher, and kudos to all who get them, but to say that someone has no creativity or cannot multi-task if they don't have something published in graduate school (or "less than the average amount") is crap. I mean, really crap. If you have someone who has five or six manuscripts that are single authored, but at different levels of publication (in progress, submitted, R and R, yet none published as of yet), I think that shows more ability to multi-task and to be creative than some candidate who has pubished with her/his advisor or other professors four times while in graduate school. That may indicate you are a good scholar, but I think it largely shows you got someone to hold your hand in school. This may be a good thing in terms of receiving solid mentoring, but it certainly is not an indicator of creativity or multi-tasking compared to the first student. Not everyone has the same opportunities in grad school, but they may still have as much ability and intelligence (or more). Beyond that, publishing says nothing about your personal skills or teaching skills, both of which are still pretty important things to look for in an academic colleague (no matter at an R1 or SLAC).
Stop with the publications-are-everything bullshit. Some of the best things I've seen written in Sociology came from professors who I KNOW did not publish in grad school anyway.
agree 8:32. We also need to look at the time spent in grad school. SCs pushing for numerous publications is the reason we have people that take 8 years to finish. Is that really realistic?
I think there are two different issues here. There is a difference between saying that publications say something about who you are and what you are capable of, and saying that publications are used as a selection tool. They may be used, but that doesn't mean they are an accurate assessment tool. Think standardized tests. Does what you make on the SAT as a 17-year-old determine whether or not you will succeed in college? Probably not accurately, at least on average, but it is still used as an assessment tool, for better or for worse.
I think another issue is how to judge publications. Is it better to have one sole authored R&R or a fourth authorship on something your mentor wrote?
Some graduate programs seem to make sure that every graduate has a publication, but they are often 4th or 5th on the list of authors. In other graduate programs there are fewer opportunities for graduate students to publish with their mentors (I'm thinking especially about departments where faculty publish books instead of articles).
How do we accurately compare candidates coming from different situations?
Unlike the SATs publications are not standardized! And I won't even get into the quantitative/qualitative divide!
A search committee has to work with the available information allowing them to compare a range of applicants. No indicator is perfect, but it's a better risk to hire someone who can publish while multi-tasking than someone who didn't.
Yes, some applicants went to a graduate program with fewer opportunities or less pressure to publish, but the SC cannot speculate, "What if..." Better to hire the published scholar who also looks strong enough in teaching and other desired attributes.
But what if you want a teaching position and are not interested in an R1 position? Why are publications so important for small colleges that emphasize the quality of teaching? I get it - I need to have publications and my next year will be dedicated to that goal. But when did being a good teacher become so unimportant? When did the "craftsmanship" of teaching begin to matter so little?
My understanding used to be that there was clear divide between the requirements for an R1 or even R2 position, but that small liberal arts colleges wanted something else. It is clear that has changed - and I think that fact, more than anything else, indicates how competitive the job market is -
And finally, there are many factors that affect how many publications someone has when they leave graduate school, and only a few of those factors have to do with the ability to multitask.
Generally, my observation has been that you are most likely to have publications if you got good funding when you came to graduate school, so that you had time to write up and add to papers outside of coursework and whatever work you had to do to support yourself. Another factor would be whether or not you were doing qualitative or quantitative work, and whether you were working with a professor on a research project that provided you with opportunities to publish.
If I were to run a model of "number of publications" against various factors, I would guess that the prestige of a student's undergraduate college, whether or not the student did quantitative research in graduate school, whether or not the student did work in aging/health/criminology, and the willingness of faculty to include students on published articles would explain some of that variable.
There will be exceptions to this - I have seen grad students work extraordinarily hard to get published and to get funding in circumstances that are much less than ideal. There are absolutely students from working class backgrounds who work really hard and triumph in the usual American mythical way. I have also seen students doing qualitative research publish brilliant research while in graduate school. But generally, my guess is that my above model will have some predictive power.
I'd actually be fascinated to see a study like this that looks at what contributes to the number of pubications a student has when they graduate - maybe I'm completely wrong.
I can respond to the 3:30 questions about value placed upon applicant publications even at a teaching-oriented university (where I am on SC). First, your model tries to explain why some grad students don't publish much but could nonetheless be entirely worthy teachers and researchers later on. I agree, but an SC's job is not to level the playing field and try to forecast latent talents. Rather, we find it wiser to focus on demonstrated ability rather than potential, even if there are plausible explanations for why that potential hasn't been manifested yet. (If you are grading students in a class, are you more impressed by the student who turned in a great paper or by the smart one who has excellent reasons for not so doing?)
The poster also asks why schools focused on teaching would appoint new faculty who are also accomplished researchers. It's difficult to ascertain great teaching through an application. Student evaluations can be manipulated. An outstanding syllabus could be crafted by a dreadful classroom instructor. A TA who wowed the privileged students and elite faculty at a posh R-1 university might be a mistake to hire for rowdy, underprepared, job-oriented nonintellectual students at State U. And when there's a horde of applicants for a position, there will be enough who look strong in teaching, such that the SC can also expect research and publication achievements -- and still have too many applicants to invite. There's no need to focus on the "Possibly Great Teacher -- Only" applicants.
Teaching hasn't become unimportant, but instead just isn't enough. Teaching schools like mine have faculty who publish and some who wished they had and still value an active research profile. Few professors want to resemble high school teachers -- transmitting knowledge developed only by other people. Hallway conversations are more interesting when the answer to "What are you working on?" is a research project pursued with enthusiasm, rather than some "innovation" in testing, lecturing, or advising students. Most of us became professors because we want to make discoveries about some fascinating topic, and so we want new colleagues who seem to be strong teachers but who also want to answer their own questions through research.
I do take your point that there are enough good teachers with publications - and that then does indicate how competitive the job market has become. If you are getting people who are demonstrated to be good teachers and who have publications, then you are most likely hiring people with more experience than was common in the past.
Ten years ago, you could still get a teaching intensive job without a publication. I doubt that is the case now.
I also understand the desire to have colleagues who are interesting and have interesting research - but how much labor are you demanding from faculty across all colleges? That is, not just the elite colleges, but the working class and comprehensive colleges where the needs of the students and the teaching loads are demanding?
It takes a lot of effort and energy to do a good job teaching 3/3 or 4/4 loads. It's hard to have much left over for research except in breaks and summers.
My concern is that the work load for graduate students and faculty is increasing across the board - and not everyone can work a 60 to 70 hour week. Should we be creating conditions in which that is the norm?
Can you teach a 3/3 or 4/4 load, do interesting research, and still have time for family, and any kind of balanced personal life? What kind of model do you then establish for sociology as a career? Do you then perhaps subtly select against people with children, or family obligations, or meaningful activities outside of academia. (Those things also make your colleagues interesting).
I know that trying to hire someone is a great deal of work (not from personal experience, but rather observation and hearsay), and you are working with what you have.
But the playing field isn't always level, and the current structures don't often work to make it level.
Well, I can definitely say that I learned a lot on this, my first year on the job market. Granted, this year is clearly a very bad year, but it seems safe to say that my advisor's continuing assertion that I can get a TT job with no pubs is well, uhm, bad advice. I really believed what they tell us here from day one, "with a degree from here, the doors are gonna fling open!" (or something to that effect). I feel a little lost and it has nothing to do with my inability to multi-task. I feel like I have rowed my boat out into the middle of the ocean and there is no land in sight. I wonder if all SCs feel the same way about people with no pubs? How would you know? I bet I could ask 25 SC members and get 25 different answers, most of them contradictory. That's not to denigrate this process in any way, just that there are so many opinions and so many variables involved in getting a job, that there seems no way to predict who gets what where. A little hard for us job seekers, to say the least. Big, deep sigh. Law school anyone?
Yes, it is becoming exceedingly rare to get a job without a publication or two.
on an unrelated note: when I look at the schools on the wiki that have confirmed a hire, I do not see many top schools. So we likely have a number of candidates who got jobs below where they would have in a normal year. At least some of them are going to be looking to move in a couple years, which means that students on the market 2-3 years from now may be competing with a larger than normal number of assistant profs. So things might be tough for grad students even after we begin to see a normal number of openings. Ugh.
Quote: "If nothing has ever struck an applicant's interest enough to write about it..."
Huh. Who knew the dissertation doesn't count? It's, I don't know, a 250-500 page manuscript reviewed extremely closely by up to five different "peer reviewers", on a topic of interest, which takes years to complete -- all while living on $15K a year, teaching, RAing, and barista-ing (but not, apparently, multi-tasking, because you didn't turn chapter three into a published article, which these days takes a year and a half start to finish because dufus here is too busy "multi-tasking" to read that article s/he agreed to review).
Look, publishing is important, but this person has gotten it completely, entirely wrong. What, may I ask, is the point of a six year credentialing process culminating in a massive, polished project of new research if it signifies nothing to this idiot -- who should never, ever serve on a search committee -- about "an applicant's interest" in the topic?
At some point -- due entirely to oversaturation of the labor market -- the dissertation went from a necessary and sufficient condition for employment to a trivial necessary one. We know this because 10 years ago you didn't need publications to show intellectual curiosity to an SC. Now, post-docs and early assistants are applying to the same assistant level positions ABD applicants target (leaving aside all those jobs this year that specified "advanced assistant" -- how many of those existed 10 years ago?), so only the few ABDs who have publications can compete. It's that simple. No one should complain about that -- go get a post-doc, or an adjunct position at Tribhuvan U. in sunny Nepal, publish, then screw the next set of ABDs! It's the way of the world now -- it takes a long time to get a faculty position for most PhDs.
But the genius who posted this is so myopic that s/he decided to go a-historically from the outcome to made up cause -- i.e., if you haven’t published, then nothing has ever interested you enough to write about, forgetting both that you've done your dissertation (!!!) and that until very recently it was the norm to go on the market with chapters. You know, those two sets of 40 pages that come with applications, with words on them that are ordered in such a way as to constitute WRITING!! Yeah, the ones you don't read. I knew you would remember.
P.S. Why is it tough for grad students to “publish while doing other work as professors do” (other than lack of intellectual curiosity, of course)? Let’s go through the biggest hurdles to publishing: Is it the year long review process? No, that’s just patience, during which time you can do other things. Is it the writing process? No, that’s just six months of hard work, which we all do every day. Is it the data collection and analysis underlying published work, which takes years and resources? YES. And what’s the single largest source of data from which assistant professors write and publish? Their clean, analyzed DISSERTATION DATA!!
Yes, you can devote yourself to your dissertation and publish nothing else, but do understand that many applicants will have publications or research underway on topics other than their thesis.
From an SC standpoint, the desired candidate should be able to teach a variety of courses and to do research beyond their dissertation topic. Better to take the proven polymath than to take a chance on the other applicant who is obsessed with what is essentially a student requirement. Obviously the more experienced applicants have an advantage in demonstrating a wider range of qualifications.
Is it fair? No, not when viewed from the perspective of invested effort in the degree or in terms of what graduate advisers may have promised or implied. But from an SC perspective, how would you handle the search process differently?
On the flip side, I have found that I am perceived by SCs as "unfocused" because I have published on 3 different sociology sub-fields that have nothing to do with each other. The reality is that I am interested in 3 different topics and I maintain an active research agenda in each area (publications, grants, etc). However, I keep hearing that SCs want to know how my research interests connect.
They "connect" because they are all sociology! Sheesh!! But apparently there is some advantage to being singularly focused...
Even if they aren't directly connected, surely you can find a thread that ties them all together? Otherwise you just come across as intellectually promiscuous, and it's hard to predict what type of scholar you will end up being. SCs want to categorize how they think you will develop, so sometimes you have to point them along with a more developed narrative.
Thats good advice but on interviews when you try to convey what courses you can teach and who you would collaborate with its hard to not sound like a soup bowl. I make it a point to find links but some concentrations still have great diversity in the research people are doing.
Our SC concern about a candidate with several apparently unconnected fields would be that he/she might be an opportunist who transiently follows whatever data-set or conference arises for the moment, or else a follower who pursues topics as directed by several graduate school mentors, but who lacks scholarly autonomy.
These problems sometimes appear when job candidates are asked "Who cares? Why do this?" about their dissertation. Some will say that the data-set was available and seemed convenient to do; others reply that they never thought of the larger significance, just that no one else seemed to have studied the topic or setting before.
As I said, I have no problem with the search process. And I certainly have no problem with people having multiple publications, sometimes outside of their dissertation, being favored. I think I wrote that in my post, and in fact I think the search process is (probably) quite fair. My problem is with the assumption that someone who has not yet published lacks intellectual curiosity.
What allows SCs to be so restrictive is that they're getting so many applications for entry level assistant positions from advanced post docs, other assistants, and people who've been delaying finishing for a while to bump up their qualifications (aside from the occasional superstar who publishes his or her first year term papers). It's the competition in the labor market that allows the high bar. But the person who sparked my post seems to be using that heightened competition to assume that anyone who isn't at or above average in publications is lazy or dull, rather than just earlier in the process. All of those people with multiple publications used to be people with none. And reading a dissertation chapter (or publication) is a much better, though more labor intensive, way to get a sense of an applicant's intellectual curiosity than examining the publications section of the CV. Hopefully, after the culling of applications down to a more reasonable number, assessments are made by reading.
"intellectually promiscuous" - i think i like that one!
i actually think it is a bad thing for sociology in general that we've become so specialized. can you picture it, "yes, yes, mr. goffman, we agree that all these things are interesting but what is your specific sub-field? race and ethnic relations? pan-asian studies? fertility?"
perhaps those of us who are "intellectually promiscuous" simply seem that way because we're interested in the big, broad questions. i do research in two totally unrelated areas because i happen to think both topics are interesting and important. i think you can (and maybe even should) be able to apply a way of thinking about society to a variety of unrelated topics. i'd like to see sociologists claim a theoretical identity rather than a topical one. knowing someone is a symbolic interactionist, marxist, or functionalist tells me a whole lot more about the type of research they'll do long-term than knowing that they study race, gender, or crime.
8:40 here - glad you like the intellectually promiscuous phrase :)
But I think you've hit on the point. Goffman had a clear theory that unified his research on diverse topics. That's what a good cover letter or research statement should accomplish: it should threat the seemingly unconnected parts of your research together towards a cohesive research plan. If the uniting force happens to be a theoretical orientation, own it!
A candidate who specializes in a theoretical orientation (e.g a devout Marxist or symbolic interactionist) poses an SC problem: will this applicant speak only to a niche of fellow true-believers in the profession? Some departments may want every species of theorist, each in his/her own corner, attracting loyalist students, and publishing through each theory's journal and annual meeting (e.g. SSSI).
Other departments, however, will want a new colleague who is an expert on a substantive subfield, not a theory, and who can communicate across theories and integrate research findings across theories. Courses are usually arranged by sociological topic, not particular theory. Departmental schisms and coalitions tend to arise around theoretical battles (e.g. Marxists vs. others; ethnomethodologists versus anybody) more often than battles between specialties (family scholars against stratification researchers).
None of the above is all that useful as information for position applicants, but it does reflect thinking within hiring departments about which candidate is most likely to meet the needs of the program and maintain harmony.
Does anyone have a sense of when visiting assistant positions will be posted? I'm surprised by how little there is on the job bank, and I wonder if that is likely to improve? Does it seem that schools are not even able to switch out tt positions for a one-year visiting?
I am also surprised how few visiting professor positions have been posted. I thought this was the time of year when many were mosted. Maybe this year some of the schools are waiting until they can analyze the number of enrollments this semester?
I do remember seeing new visiting positions become available into April. Those people who are currently asst. profs and are leaving for a new school will need to be replaced the following year.
Should I read anything into the fact that I'm not going to be fed on the evening of my arrival for an interview? It could just be my travel arrangements might get delayed, but I'm concerned about the possibility of an inside candidate. Any insights about how to tell what's up?
11:31, I did a postdoc at a leading Asian university, and I think it helped me get the job I will be starting in the fall. My experience is limited, but I did learn a few things. First of all, it depends on how much of a name the university has in the U.S. Some schools are definitely becoming well known among U.S. academics. Second, you need to make sure your research is relevant to ongoing discussions in American sociology (even if it's not about the U.S.), and even more important, you have to make sure to publish articles in top U.S. journals and/or a book with a top 10 U.S. academic press. I have definitely heard of cases in which people from top Asian universities were hired in U.S. departments. But at the university where I did my postdoc, I also saw that some people got "stuck." Asian universities often have high expectations for teaching and service (but good salaries and benefits), and these folks felt somewhat trapped by that, and also for various reasons, failed to publish in U.S. journals. I also found that what people at that university thought of as top publishers were often not what U.S. departments think of as top publishers. So you would have to go against the grain a bit in order to stay competitive in the U.S. job market. That said, if your research is in Asia, or if you have family ties there, these schools have a lot to offer. Governments in the region are investing in academia, so there is often good funding for research projects (even qualitative ones) and activities like conferences and workshops that bring scholars and students from overseas.
Re: dinner the night before. I don't have a large n of fly out interviews to use as a comparison, but I wouldn't take it as a sign. I don't think that it is a given to take a candidate to dinner the night before the job talk. Generally, you'll know by the middle of the first full day how they feel about you - a good department will treat you well even if you are not their first choice. But you'll get clues. A bad department will treat you with indifference. That will also give you information (as in - this might not be the right place, despite the job market).
You never know how the chips will fall after all the interviews - some candidates look good on paper, but don't turn out to be that great. The inside candidate may choose another job. You can only do your best, and assume that you have a good shot at the job. YOUR enthusiasm for the place might be the deciding factor.
You have now gotten a summary of all the advice I have gotten from professors and other students and my own limited experience.... Good luck!
Re dinner the night before: Depending on how much money has been allocated for the search and how many candidates the department is bringing in, more than one dinner for a candidate may not be an option. Often, faculty feel like they can have a better-quality conversation with a candidate after hearing the job talk and talking more formally during the day, and so they save dinner for the end of an interview day. It's certainly more welcoming to invite a candidate to a casual dinner upon arrival, but given faculty schedules and search budgets, it isn't always an option, especially in small departments.
Have some sympathy for SC members regarding candidate visits and dinners. The same small group of faculty are expected to go to job talks, interviews, lunches, dinners, and other events for 3-6 visiting candidates, usually within a period of several weeks -- in addition to their normal teaching, promotion committee work, and other obligations. Some members are not all that motivated; some don't get along with one another; some prefer a different candidate than the one visiting.
Some may suspect that a certain candidate really has no chance, but is a filler to bulk up the candidate visit quota. Some don't want to go to the same restaurant over and again (worse, yet, some will look at the menu and say "Let's see -- what haven't we tried yet...this was okay yesterday...") SC members have families or partners waiting for them after a long day on campus, not at some dinner. And not all meals are reimbursed to faculty.
So: none of this compares to the problem of not having a tenure-track position yet, but it may suggest why dinner arrangements for candidates don't always work out so well.
Other dinner tips: 1. Don't drink alcohol. 2. Order sparingly so you can talk. 3. Talk to everyone, and bring out the quiet, shy faculty 4. If you associate evening meals with romance, beware of unintended flirting. 5. Be concise in answering questions so that everyone gets a chance to ask their "major concern" question.
11:31, It is difficult but doable. I personally know several people who returned to the States after teaching for several years in Asia and Europe. If you decide to go to Asia, it is very important that you keep a close affiliation with a research center or a department in the States (maybe the place where you will graduate). Also no matter what, you have to get your papers published in top American journals. All of them graduated from top 10 programs and spent time as Visiting Scholar in the States when they were back on the job market. Good luck!
So...I guess we're pretty much done now as far as new job postings? I'm assuming this is partially a sign of how bad the economy is, but how does the spring usually look in this regard?
It's a good time to stay in school or go back and work on another degree. There might be better jobs -- as students -- on campus than elsewhere as graduates.
In bad economic times, don't more people return to school when laid off, thereby creating need for more campus advisers, teaching assistants, web-builders, and more to serve the student surge?
I think the situation at Arizona State University is showing the weakness of this idea. The problem is that state universities often highly subsidize the tuition for its students (hence the difference between in-state and out-of-state tuition rates). If the state government is in financial trouble (such as in Arizona, and from the sounds of it, California, among others), the state can't afford to subsidize the tuition for many additional students. So they either need to increase tuition (which will discourage enrollment) or consciously limit the number of students who can be admitted. Hiring additional adjuncts costs money; the more likely consequences is increasing class sizes/course loads and making existing faculty work harder.
State universities usually have some degree of budget autonomy from the larger state expenditures. Cutting classes puts direct pressure on legislators through angry families. Many legislators are graduates of big state universities; this is especially true in Caifornia, between the vast CSU and UC systems. Salary dollars are currently being saved in my big state U by reducing the number of course sections on esoteric topics and with small enrollments.
Prospects for hiring new tenure-track faculty won't be good however. One consideration is that senior faculty who might have retired, opening new positions, are now staying on because the dreadful economy weakened their retirement funds and plans. At the same time, though, student admission applications are soaring.
the problem is that state schools are seriously cutting eslewhere, changing the entire dynamics of the programs sometimes.
I know of (and interviewed at) several of the smaller state schools who are cutting master programs, firing all adjuncts, increasing class sizes and doing away with course releases for new faculty.
So in many cases people have applied to what they though were decent schools with the right mix of teaching and research. And then they find out that instead of an institution with graduates students(hence TA and RA support), small classes and research support they are now facing an institutions with large classes, no support, and a lot more preps and grading. In one school I interviewed at, minimum class sizes went from 12 to 20, and teaching load went from 2/3 to 3/3, and all graduate courses were done away with as the masters program was suspended.
Adjuncts are usually the first to go when salary is needed. That status was never intended to be a permanent career option. Originally adjuncts were doctoral students from nearby programs who wanted teaching experience or income for a year or two.
Yes, M.A, programs are expensive in student -teacher ratio, and are being reduced, especially when there are multiple programs at state universities in the same city. There's a debate in academic circles about the value of the M.A -- does it really provide a significant qualification for employment? If PhDs can't get jobs, of what use is the M.A. in sociology?
New faculty may find that their institution isn't what they had anticipated, but that's a trade-off in academia: certainty about longevity through tenure, but uncertainty about quality of the role.
Where will you work if you don't have a job in academia? Low-wage work? Isn't it weird having a stellar vita with first-authored pubs in good journals and finding yourself taking shit from cranky customers at a starbucks for (near) minimum wage?
Anyone recall what the research says about a society with a highly educated, restless and disgruntled youthful stratum, as a condition for revolution or at least creative social ferment? Europe has had this situation for years, producing more university-educated graduates than there are college-level jobs.
Was it Russell Jacoby who warned about U.S. intellectuals being co-opted by universities and corporate employment? No longer.
I'm curious what a good vita looks like to different people. I don't want to remove the anonymity of the forum; I'm just needing some sense of scale here - number of pubs, rank order of authors, which journals specifically. Sometimes I feel like I'm not getting a realistic picture of the market.
8:09 asked "Where will you work if you don't have a job in academia?"
There are a lot of good options besides low-wage service jobs. Especially given the amount of stimulus money going to basic research, a lot of research firms are actually finding the need to add staff as they take on new projects. I know several places that have great opportunities for PhDs and are hiring a lot right now.
Sure, you have to give up the ego gratification of being a professor. But if you're willing, I say go for it. You'll make more money too.
5:43: Can you tell me where I might find out about some of these opportunities (i suffer from academia tunnel vision and reality is giving me a swift kick :-)
Doctoral programs keep churning out new PhDs, even when the market is poor. Neil Smelser and Robin Content wrote a 1980 book "The Changing Academic Marketplace". They note that in 1975-76 the Berkeley Sociology Department recruited to fill four junior faculty vacancies, for which there were 285 applicants.
Many of today's senior faculty won their faculty positions in that competitive and almost hopeless market of the late 70s and early 1980s.
The point is that there's nothing new about an extreme position shortage in sociology, with a 70 to 1 applicant ratio even back in the 1970s. Has there ever been a market where there is really a PhD-level position for almost every new PhD?
We can't infer from a 70:1 application to job ratio that there was extreme shortage of jobs in the 1970's, or even today. Sure, departments like Washington might get 450 applications for one job, but let's not forget that applicants send out more than 1 application. A department might get 200 apps for one position, but those people each applied at 100 other places. We can't know about the true seekers:jobs ratio without looking at the number of graduating PhD's and the number of Assistant Professor jobs.
If the logic of the above posts were true, 1 person would get the Washington job and 449 people would be unemployed at the end. That's not what happened. Many of those 449 people got jobs elsewhere because they applied many other places. Looking at the applicant-to-job ratio tells us almost nothing about the supply of job seekers, which is the more important number.
The correct inference is that there would be many, many disappointed job-seekers after every search. We need assume only that applicants wanted the position. They might have gotten another position but judging from the postings on this forum, many are not getting any. In earlier years, you might have gotten your 3rd or 7th choice -- still a disappointment unless you have hubris and are aware of it.
Next year should be worse -- with a new cohort entering the competition plus this year's residual repeaters.
Looking forward to ASA in San Francisco? is anyone going to raise questions about availability of positions for all those graduate programs that are still recruiting large entering cohorts?
Its very good blog side , It gives us a very good information about job search, Its may be very important for those people, who reallr are looking for job ====================================== jobs
475 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 401 – 475 of 475On one hand, the fact that it was poorly advertised might indicate an inside candidate. On the other, the fact that the deadline is so late generally goes against that (positions with inside candidate in mind usually have only one month or less between announcement and deadline).
The fact that the ad has expired and is not found anywhere else might actually indicate that the search was cancelled, which is something that has been very common this year.
I'd check with the SC chair.
Our search this year received little fund support for buying ads, so we just paid ASA JobBank, posted on the free websites, and then e-mailed departments and faculty with our job ad.
Briefer paid ad runs may reflect less funding for conducting searches. With the oversupply of good applicants who are alert to opportunities, a department doesn't have to pay much to attract a sufficient pool.
Maybe the new model of graduate education will be:
M.A. --> Ph.D. --> Post-Doc or Visiting Assistant --> Tenure Track
and less common will be
M.A. --> Ph.D. --> Tenure Track
What do you think?
I think we are increasingly moving towards the hard science model where grad school is followed by some period of transition and training, like a post-doc or VAP. The hard sciences are seeing such periods last longer too. In neurobiology, the average post-doc used to be 3 years and now it is 5 with post-docs lasting 6-7 years not unheard of.
I actually think the post-doc model works better as far as scholarship and helping people transition more smoothly. However, it is a royal pain to have to move twice, especially people who have families.
Has anyone given any thought to community colleges? Having been unsuccessful thus far with research universities and liberal arts colleges, and having seen that some in my area are hiring tt positions, the thought has crossed my mind. I really don't know much about them (I assume the teaching is 5/5 usually?) or what they're looking for in an applicant.
Community college tenure-track positions (which would be the only kind worth doing as a primary means of employment) would be 5/5 typically, although there may only be, say, 3 course preps depending on the position. In any case, don't apply unless you really like teaching.
Tenure decisions are based almost entirely on teaching, along with some service. For a hire they'll be looking for, you guessed it, teaching experience, evidence of teaching effectiveness, etc. Since community colleges are often a first step for students from lower-income households and/or entering college later in life they may also be particularly interested in experience with students of diverse student backgrounds along lines of class, race, age, etc. And if they are starting or increasing online course offerings they may be looking for educational technology experience.
Keep in mind that once you take a tenure-track community college position it may be fairly difficult to move out of that type of position - you could move into other community college positions or into secondary education, but may face barriers in trying to move into even a lower-tier "state school" or liberal arts campus.
Does anyone have a sense whether a postdoc or a VAP (Visiting Assistant Professor) position will hurt you more on the job market? I have to take one or the other because of financial reasons, but I still eventually want a TT job.
I think a postdoc would definitely look more impressive on your CV than a VAP. A lot of people from my program do postdocs and then move on to R1 jobs, while the people who apply ABD tend to get R2 jobs. Everyone I know who has gotten a really prestigious job (think: princeton, penn, harvard, wisconsin, etc), did a postdoc first. I don't know of anyone who did a VAP and then moved on to a R1 school (although I know many who moved on to jobs at lower ranked schools)
Think about it: a postdoc is research oriented, while VAP's usually requires a lot of teaching. As we all know, publications generically matter a lot more than teaching, at least to research oriented schools (and many other schools as well).
On the other hand, if you are looking for a job at a SLAC and/or don't have a lot of teaching experience and need to buff up that part of your CV, the VAP may be the way to go (but many postdocs can include teaching too if you want them too)
Either one is fine even if you intend to apply at an R1 as long as you continue to work on your publications and make progress with your research even if you are doing a VAP.
"Have to" take a VAP or post-doc? Uhm...have you been offered one? If not, don't assume that you'll get one. In fact, VAP aren't any easier to get than TT positions. Really, don't assume your so hot.
I'd take the post-doc if you're offered one, but they can be hard to come by in Soc. You probably need to already have arrangements in the works for a post-doc by now if its going to happen.
Also keep in mind that post-docs can be quite competitive too. Someone in my department turned down 2 good TT job offers to take a post-doc.
"Someone in my department turned down 2 good TT job offers to take a post-doc."
That takes serious chutzpah. I think one would have to be 100% certain of being the star of the market 2 years from now to turn down the security of a TT offer in hand. The soc job market is circling the drain right now; does anyone imagine it could possibly be better in 2 years. . .
In two years? Maybe. Next year? Hell no!
Some postdoc programs, like the Michigan Fellows, the Society of Fellows at Princeton, or the Harper Fellows at Chicago, are so prestigious that it may be worthwhile to turn second tier TT offers. They often get up to 1000 applications. The people who get these postdocs usually go on to jobs at top tier R1s. Also some schools will allow you to do both -- basically to postpone your start date until you have finished the fellowship.
Hey, did anyone apply for a Kellogg fellowship? Any idea what is the usual n of applications? Thanks.
publications aren't everything.
We're a good dept and just hired someone who virtually had none. But, they had an r&r at a good journal, they were/are a great fit, and we are happy!
4:37 - i think your department is the exception to the rule, if my lack of interviews is any indication...
it may be possible to land a job without publications, but its not likely. if you don't have 'em, you better be lucky...
I would be reluctant to hire someone with no publications or even with fewer than the average number and quality among the applicants. Being reluctant to publish might signify a lack of creativity, a likely problem in faculty retention and tenure, and an inability to multi-task -- publishing while studying and teaching as a graduate student.
If nothing has ever struck an applicant's interest enough to write about it, and if it's asking too much to publish while doing other work as professors do, then that's a red flag bigger than Santa's suit.
Listen, publications are a nice accomplishment and certainly an indicator that a person will be a successful researcher, and kudos to all who get them, but to say that someone has no creativity or cannot multi-task if they don't have something published in graduate school (or "less than the average amount") is crap. I mean, really crap. If you have someone who has five or six manuscripts that are single authored, but at different levels of publication (in progress, submitted, R and R, yet none published as of yet), I think that shows more ability to multi-task and to be creative than some candidate who has pubished with her/his advisor or other professors four times while in graduate school. That may indicate you are a good scholar, but I think it largely shows you got someone to hold your hand in school. This may be a good thing in terms of receiving solid mentoring, but it certainly is not an indicator of creativity or multi-tasking compared to the first student. Not everyone has the same opportunities in grad school, but they may still have as much ability and intelligence (or more). Beyond that, publishing says nothing about your personal skills or teaching skills, both of which are still pretty important things to look for in an academic colleague (no matter at an R1 or SLAC).
Stop with the publications-are-everything bullshit. Some of the best things I've seen written in Sociology came from professors who I KNOW did not publish in grad school anyway.
agree 8:32. We also need to look at the time spent in grad school. SCs pushing for numerous publications is the reason we have people that take 8 years to finish. Is that really realistic?
sorry--meant 8:52
I think there are two different issues here. There is a difference between saying that publications say something about who you are and what you are capable of, and saying that publications are used as a selection tool. They may be used, but that doesn't mean they are an accurate assessment tool. Think standardized tests. Does what you make on the SAT as a 17-year-old determine whether or not you will succeed in college? Probably not accurately, at least on average, but it is still used as an assessment tool, for better or for worse.
I think another issue is how to judge publications. Is it better to have one sole authored R&R or a fourth authorship on something your mentor wrote?
Some graduate programs seem to make sure that every graduate has a publication, but they are often 4th or 5th on the list of authors. In other graduate programs there are fewer opportunities for graduate students to publish with their mentors (I'm thinking especially about departments where faculty publish books instead of articles).
How do we accurately compare candidates coming from different situations?
Unlike the SATs publications are not standardized! And I won't even get into the quantitative/qualitative divide!
A search committee has to work with the available information allowing them to compare a range of applicants. No indicator is perfect, but it's a better risk to hire someone who can publish while multi-tasking than someone who didn't.
Yes, some applicants went to a graduate program with fewer opportunities or less pressure to publish, but the SC cannot speculate, "What if..." Better to hire the published scholar who also looks strong enough in teaching and other desired attributes.
But what if you want a teaching position and are not interested in an R1 position? Why are publications so important for small colleges that emphasize the quality of teaching? I get it - I need to have publications and my next year will be dedicated to that goal. But when did being a good teacher become so unimportant? When did the "craftsmanship" of teaching begin to matter so little?
My understanding used to be that there was clear divide between the requirements for an R1 or even R2 position, but that small liberal arts colleges wanted something else. It is clear that has changed - and I think that fact, more than anything else, indicates how competitive the job market is -
And finally, there are many factors that affect how many publications someone has when they leave graduate school, and only a few of those factors have to do with the ability to multitask.
Generally, my observation has been that you are most likely to have publications if you got good funding when you came to graduate school, so that you had time to write up and add to papers outside of coursework and whatever work you had to do to support yourself. Another factor would be whether or not you were doing qualitative or quantitative work, and whether you were working with a professor on a research project that provided you with opportunities to publish.
If I were to run a model of "number of publications" against various factors, I would guess that the prestige of a student's undergraduate college, whether or not the student did quantitative research in graduate school, whether or not the student did work in aging/health/criminology, and the willingness of faculty to include students on published articles would explain some of that variable.
There will be exceptions to this - I have seen grad students work extraordinarily hard to get published and to get funding in circumstances that are much less than ideal. There are absolutely students from working class backgrounds who work really hard and triumph in the usual American mythical way. I have also seen students doing qualitative research publish brilliant research while in graduate school. But generally, my guess is that my above model will have some predictive power.
I'd actually be fascinated to see a study like this that looks at what contributes to the number of pubications a student has when they graduate - maybe I'm completely wrong.
I can respond to the 3:30 questions about value placed upon applicant publications even at a teaching-oriented university (where I am on SC). First, your model tries to explain why some grad students don't publish much but could nonetheless be entirely worthy teachers and researchers later on. I agree, but an SC's job is not to level the playing field and try to forecast latent talents. Rather, we find it wiser to focus on demonstrated ability rather than potential, even if there are plausible explanations for why that potential hasn't been manifested yet. (If you are grading students in a class, are you more impressed by the student who turned in a great paper or by the smart one who has excellent reasons for not so doing?)
The poster also asks why schools focused on teaching would appoint new faculty who are also accomplished researchers. It's difficult to ascertain great teaching through an application. Student evaluations can be manipulated. An outstanding syllabus could be crafted by a dreadful classroom instructor. A TA who wowed the privileged students and elite faculty at a posh R-1 university might be a mistake to hire for rowdy, underprepared, job-oriented nonintellectual students at State U. And when there's a horde of applicants for a position, there will be enough who look strong in teaching, such that the SC can also expect research and publication achievements -- and still have too many applicants to invite. There's no need to focus on the "Possibly Great Teacher -- Only" applicants.
Teaching hasn't become unimportant, but instead just isn't enough. Teaching schools like mine have faculty who publish and some who wished they had and still value an active research profile. Few professors want to resemble high school teachers -- transmitting knowledge developed only by other people. Hallway conversations are more interesting when the answer to "What are you working on?" is a research project pursued with enthusiasm, rather than some "innovation" in testing, lecturing, or advising students. Most of us became professors because we want to make discoveries about some fascinating topic, and so we want new colleagues who seem to be strong teachers but who also want to answer their own questions through research.
another sc member here...
it's not that we don't value teaching. It is just that there are more than enough great teachers WITH publications to fill all the good (non R1) jobs.
That being said, a colleague of mine at a top 50 SLAC just hired a candidate with only an encyl. entry. Go figure.
3:30 here..
I do take your point that there are enough good teachers with publications - and that then does indicate how competitive the job market has become. If you are getting people who are demonstrated to be good teachers and who have publications, then you are most likely hiring people with more experience than was common in the past.
Ten years ago, you could still get a teaching intensive job without a publication. I doubt that is the case now.
I also understand the desire to have colleagues who are interesting and have interesting research - but how much labor are you demanding from faculty across all colleges? That is, not just the elite colleges, but the working class and comprehensive colleges where the needs of the students and the teaching loads are demanding?
It takes a lot of effort and energy to do a good job teaching 3/3 or 4/4 loads. It's hard to have much left over for research except in breaks and summers.
My concern is that the work load for graduate students and faculty is increasing across the board - and not everyone can work a 60 to 70 hour week. Should we be creating conditions in which that is the norm?
Can you teach a 3/3 or 4/4 load, do interesting research, and still have time for family, and any kind of balanced personal life? What kind of model do you then establish for sociology as a career? Do you then perhaps subtly select against people with children, or family obligations, or meaningful activities outside of academia. (Those things also make your colleagues interesting).
I know that trying to hire someone is a great deal of work (not from personal experience, but rather observation and hearsay), and you are working with what you have.
But the playing field isn't always level, and the current structures don't often work to make it level.
Well, I can definitely say that I learned a lot on this, my first year on the job market. Granted, this year is clearly a very bad year, but it seems safe to say that my advisor's continuing assertion that I can get a TT job with no pubs is well, uhm, bad advice. I really believed what they tell us here from day one, "with a degree from here, the doors are gonna fling open!" (or something to that effect). I feel a little lost and it has nothing to do with my inability to multi-task. I feel like I have rowed my boat out into the middle of the ocean and there is no land in sight. I wonder if all SCs feel the same way about people with no pubs? How would you know? I bet I could ask 25 SC members and get 25 different answers, most of them contradictory. That's not to denigrate this process in any way, just that there are so many opinions and so many variables involved in getting a job, that there seems no way to predict who gets what where. A little hard for us job seekers, to say the least. Big, deep sigh. Law school anyone?
Yes, it is becoming exceedingly rare to get a job without a publication or two.
on an unrelated note: when I look at the schools on the wiki that have confirmed a hire, I do not see many top schools. So we likely have a number of candidates who got jobs below where they would have in a normal year. At least some of them are going to be looking to move in a couple years, which means that students on the market 2-3 years from now may be competing with a larger than normal number of assistant profs. So things might be tough for grad students even after we begin to see a normal number of openings. Ugh.
Late response to Dec 21, 6:51pm:
Quote: "If nothing has ever struck an applicant's interest enough to write about it..."
Huh. Who knew the dissertation doesn't count? It's, I don't know, a 250-500 page manuscript reviewed extremely closely by up to five different "peer reviewers", on a topic of interest, which takes years to complete -- all while living on $15K a year, teaching, RAing, and barista-ing (but not, apparently, multi-tasking, because you didn't turn chapter three into a published article, which these days takes a year and a half start to finish because dufus here is too busy "multi-tasking" to read that article s/he agreed to review).
Look, publishing is important, but this person has gotten it completely, entirely wrong. What, may I ask, is the point of a six year credentialing process culminating in a massive, polished project of new research if it signifies nothing to this idiot -- who should never, ever serve on a search committee -- about "an applicant's interest" in the topic?
At some point -- due entirely to oversaturation of the labor market -- the dissertation went from a necessary and sufficient condition for employment to a trivial necessary one. We know this because 10 years ago you didn't need publications to show intellectual curiosity to an SC. Now, post-docs and early assistants are applying to the same assistant level positions ABD applicants target (leaving aside all those jobs this year that specified "advanced assistant" -- how many of those existed 10 years ago?), so only the few ABDs who have publications can compete. It's that simple. No one should complain about that -- go get a post-doc, or an adjunct position at Tribhuvan U. in sunny Nepal, publish, then screw the next set of ABDs! It's the way of the world now -- it takes a long time to get a faculty position for most PhDs.
But the genius who posted this is so myopic that s/he decided to go a-historically from the outcome to made up cause -- i.e., if you haven’t published, then nothing has ever interested you enough to write about, forgetting both that you've done your dissertation (!!!) and that until very recently it was the norm to go on the market with chapters. You know, those two sets of 40 pages that come with applications, with words on them that are ordered in such a way as to constitute WRITING!! Yeah, the ones you don't read. I knew you would remember.
P.S. Why is it tough for grad students to “publish while doing other work as professors do” (other than lack of intellectual curiosity, of course)? Let’s go through the biggest hurdles to publishing: Is it the year long review process? No, that’s just patience, during which time you can do other things. Is it the writing process? No, that’s just six months of hard work, which we all do every day. Is it the data collection and analysis underlying published work, which takes years and resources? YES. And what’s the single largest source of data from which assistant professors write and publish? Their clean, analyzed DISSERTATION DATA!!
Yes, you can devote yourself to your dissertation and publish nothing else, but do understand that many applicants will have publications or research underway on topics other than their thesis.
From an SC standpoint, the desired candidate should be able to teach a variety of courses and to do research beyond their dissertation topic. Better to take the proven polymath than to take a chance on the other applicant who is obsessed with what is essentially a student requirement. Obviously the more experienced applicants have an advantage in demonstrating a wider range of qualifications.
Is it fair? No, not when viewed from the perspective of invested effort in the degree or in terms of what graduate advisers may have promised or implied. But from an SC perspective, how would you handle the search process differently?
On the flip side, I have found that I am perceived by SCs as "unfocused" because I have published on 3 different sociology sub-fields that have nothing to do with each other. The reality is that I am interested in 3 different topics and I maintain an active research agenda in each area (publications, grants, etc). However, I keep hearing that SCs want to know how my research interests connect.
They "connect" because they are all sociology! Sheesh!! But apparently there is some advantage to being singularly focused...
Even if they aren't directly connected, surely you can find a thread that ties them all together? Otherwise you just come across as intellectually promiscuous, and it's hard to predict what type of scholar you will end up being. SCs want to categorize how they think you will develop, so sometimes you have to point them along with a more developed narrative.
Thats good advice but on interviews when you try to convey what courses you can teach and who you would collaborate with its hard to not sound like a soup bowl. I make it a point to find links but some concentrations still have great diversity in the research people are doing.
Our SC concern about a candidate with several apparently unconnected fields would be that he/she might be an opportunist who transiently follows whatever data-set or conference arises for the moment, or else a follower who pursues topics as directed by several graduate school mentors, but who lacks scholarly autonomy.
These problems sometimes appear when job candidates are asked "Who cares? Why do this?" about their dissertation. Some will say that the data-set was available and seemed convenient to do; others reply that they never thought of the larger significance, just that no one else seemed to have studied the topic or setting before.
to 11:33am
from Jan12, 12:30pm
As I said, I have no problem with the search process. And I certainly have no problem with people having multiple publications, sometimes outside of their dissertation, being favored. I think I wrote that in my post, and in fact I think the search process is (probably) quite fair. My problem is with the assumption that someone who has not yet published lacks intellectual curiosity.
What allows SCs to be so restrictive is that they're getting so many applications for entry level assistant positions from advanced post docs, other assistants, and people who've been delaying finishing for a while to bump up their qualifications (aside from the occasional superstar who publishes his or her first year term papers). It's the competition in the labor market that allows the high bar. But the person who sparked my post seems to be using that heightened competition to assume that anyone who isn't at or above average in publications is lazy or dull, rather than just earlier in the process. All of those people with multiple publications used to be people with none. And reading a dissertation chapter (or publication) is a much better, though more labor intensive, way to get a sense of an applicant's intellectual curiosity than examining the publications section of the CV. Hopefully, after the culling of applications down to a more reasonable number, assessments are made by reading.
"intellectually promiscuous" - i think i like that one!
i actually think it is a bad thing for sociology in general that we've become so specialized. can you picture it, "yes, yes, mr. goffman, we agree that all these things are interesting but what is your specific sub-field? race and ethnic relations? pan-asian studies? fertility?"
perhaps those of us who are "intellectually promiscuous" simply seem that way because we're interested in the big, broad questions. i do research in two totally unrelated areas because i happen to think both topics are interesting and important. i think you can (and maybe even should) be able to apply a way of thinking about society to a variety of unrelated topics. i'd like to see sociologists claim a theoretical identity rather than a topical one. knowing someone is a symbolic interactionist, marxist, or functionalist tells me a whole lot more about the type of research they'll do long-term than knowing that they study race, gender, or crime.
8:40 here - glad you like the intellectually promiscuous phrase :)
But I think you've hit on the point. Goffman had a clear theory that unified his research on diverse topics. That's what a good cover letter or research statement should accomplish: it should threat the seemingly unconnected parts of your research together towards a cohesive research plan. If the uniting force happens to be a theoretical orientation, own it!
A candidate who specializes in a theoretical orientation (e.g a devout Marxist or symbolic interactionist) poses an SC problem: will this applicant speak only to a niche of fellow true-believers in the profession? Some departments may want every species of theorist, each in his/her own corner, attracting loyalist students, and publishing through each theory's journal and annual meeting (e.g. SSSI).
Other departments, however, will want a new colleague who is an expert on a substantive subfield, not a theory, and who can communicate across theories and integrate research findings across theories. Courses are usually arranged by sociological topic, not particular theory. Departmental schisms and coalitions tend to arise around theoretical battles (e.g. Marxists vs. others; ethnomethodologists versus anybody) more often than battles between specialties (family scholars against stratification researchers).
None of the above is all that useful as information for position applicants, but it does reflect thinking within hiring departments about which candidate is most likely to meet the needs of the program and maintain harmony.
Is it possible for a junior scholar taking a starting position in top Asian university to return to top-20 departments in the U.S. few years from now?
Does anyone have a sense of when visiting assistant positions will be posted? I'm surprised by how little there is on the job bank, and I wonder if that is likely to improve? Does it seem that schools are not even able to switch out tt positions for a one-year visiting?
I am also surprised how few visiting professor positions have been posted. I thought this was the time of year when many were mosted. Maybe this year some of the schools are waiting until they can analyze the number of enrollments this semester?
I do remember seeing new visiting positions become available into April. Those people who are currently asst. profs and are leaving for a new school will need to be replaced the following year.
Should I read anything into the fact that I'm not going to be fed on the evening of my arrival for an interview? It could just be my travel arrangements might get delayed, but I'm concerned about the possibility of an inside candidate. Any insights about how to tell what's up?
11:31, I did a postdoc at a leading Asian university, and I think it helped me get the job I will be starting in the fall. My experience is limited, but I did learn a few things. First of all, it depends on how much of a name the university has in the U.S. Some schools are definitely becoming well known among U.S. academics. Second, you need to make sure your research is relevant to ongoing discussions in American sociology (even if it's not about the U.S.), and even more important, you have to make sure to publish articles in top U.S. journals and/or a book with a top 10 U.S. academic press. I have definitely heard of cases in which people from top Asian universities were hired in U.S. departments. But at the university where I did my postdoc, I also saw that some people got "stuck." Asian universities often have high expectations for teaching and service (but good salaries and benefits), and these folks felt somewhat trapped by that, and also for various reasons, failed to publish in U.S. journals. I also found that what people at that university thought of as top publishers were often not what U.S. departments think of as top publishers. So you would have to go against the grain a bit in order to stay competitive in the U.S. job market. That said, if your research is in Asia, or if you have family ties there, these schools have a lot to offer. Governments in the region are investing in academia, so there is often good funding for research projects (even qualitative ones) and activities like conferences and workshops that bring scholars and students from overseas.
Re: dinner the night before. I don't have a large n of fly out interviews to use as a comparison, but I wouldn't take it as a sign. I don't think that it is a given to take a candidate to dinner the night before the job talk. Generally, you'll know by the middle of the first full day how they feel about you - a good department will treat you well even if you are not their first choice. But you'll get clues. A bad department will treat you with indifference. That will also give you information (as in - this might not be the right place, despite the job market).
You never know how the chips will fall after all the interviews - some candidates look good on paper, but don't turn out to be that great. The inside candidate may choose another job. You can only do your best, and assume that you have a good shot at the job. YOUR enthusiasm for the place might be the deciding factor.
You have now gotten a summary of all the advice I have gotten from professors and other students and my own limited experience.... Good luck!
Not having dinner is better than having you for dinner...with fava beans and a nice chianti. Mwahahaha.
Re dinner the night before: Depending on how much money has been allocated for the search and how many candidates the department is bringing in, more than one dinner for a candidate may not be an option. Often, faculty feel like they can have a better-quality conversation with a candidate after hearing the job talk and talking more formally during the day, and so they save dinner for the end of an interview day. It's certainly more welcoming to invite a candidate to a casual dinner upon arrival, but given faculty schedules and search budgets, it isn't always an option, especially in small departments.
Have some sympathy for SC members regarding candidate visits and dinners. The same small group of faculty are expected to go to job talks, interviews, lunches, dinners, and other events for 3-6 visiting candidates, usually within a period of several weeks -- in addition to their normal teaching, promotion committee work, and other obligations. Some members are not all that motivated; some don't get along with one another; some prefer a different candidate than the one visiting.
Some may suspect that a certain candidate really has no chance, but is a filler to bulk up the candidate visit quota. Some don't want to go to the same restaurant over and again (worse, yet, some will look at the menu and say "Let's see -- what haven't we tried yet...this was okay yesterday...") SC members have families or partners waiting for them after a long day on campus, not at some dinner. And not all meals are reimbursed to faculty.
So: none of this compares to the problem of not having a tenure-track position yet, but it may suggest why dinner arrangements for candidates don't always work out so well.
Other dinner tips:
1. Don't drink alcohol.
2. Order sparingly so you can talk.
3. Talk to everyone, and bring out the quiet, shy faculty
4. If you associate evening meals with romance, beware of unintended flirting.
5. Be concise in answering questions so that everyone gets a chance to ask their "major concern" question.
11:31, It is difficult but doable. I personally know several people who returned to the States after teaching for several years in Asia and Europe. If you decide to go to Asia, it is very important that you keep a close affiliation with a research center or a department in the States (maybe the place where you will graduate). Also no matter what, you have to get your papers published in top American journals. All of them graduated from top 10 programs and spent time as Visiting Scholar in the States when they were back on the job market. Good luck!
So...I guess we're pretty much done now as far as new job postings? I'm assuming this is partially a sign of how bad the economy is, but how does the spring usually look in this regard?
It's a good time to stay in school or go back and work on another degree. There might be better jobs -- as students -- on campus than elsewhere as graduates.
In bad economic times, don't more people return to school when laid off, thereby creating need for more campus advisers, teaching assistants, web-builders, and more to serve the student surge?
I think the situation at Arizona State University is showing the weakness of this idea. The problem is that state universities often highly subsidize the tuition for its students (hence the difference between in-state and out-of-state tuition rates). If the state government is in financial trouble (such as in Arizona, and from the sounds of it, California, among others), the state can't afford to subsidize the tuition for many additional students. So they either need to increase tuition (which will discourage enrollment) or consciously limit the number of students who can be admitted. Hiring additional adjuncts costs money; the more likely consequences is increasing class sizes/course loads and making existing faculty work harder.
State universities usually have some degree of budget autonomy from the larger state expenditures. Cutting classes puts direct pressure on legislators through angry families. Many legislators are graduates of big state universities; this is especially true in Caifornia, between the vast CSU and UC systems. Salary dollars are currently being saved in my big state U by reducing the number of course sections on esoteric topics and with small enrollments.
Prospects for hiring new tenure-track faculty won't be good however. One consideration is that senior faculty who might have retired, opening new positions, are now staying on because the dreadful economy weakened their retirement funds and plans. At the same time, though, student admission applications are soaring.
the problem is that state schools are seriously cutting eslewhere, changing the entire dynamics of the programs sometimes.
I know of (and interviewed at) several of the smaller state schools who are cutting master programs, firing all adjuncts, increasing class sizes and doing away with course releases for new faculty.
So in many cases people have applied to what they though were decent schools with the right mix of teaching and research. And then they find out that instead of an institution with graduates students(hence TA and RA support), small classes and research support they are now facing an institutions with large classes, no support, and a lot more preps and grading.
In one school I interviewed at, minimum class sizes went from 12 to 20, and teaching load went from 2/3 to 3/3, and all graduate courses were done away with as the masters program was suspended.
Wow -- these are sad developments not just for future faculty but for education in this country in general.
Adjuncts are usually the first to go when salary is needed. That status was never intended to be a permanent career option. Originally adjuncts were doctoral students from nearby programs who wanted teaching experience or income for a year or two.
Yes, M.A, programs are expensive in student -teacher ratio, and are being reduced, especially when there are multiple programs at state universities in the same city. There's a debate in academic circles about the value of the M.A -- does it really provide a significant qualification for employment? If PhDs can't get jobs, of what use is the M.A. in sociology?
New faculty may find that their institution isn't what they had anticipated, but that's a trade-off in academia: certainty about longevity through tenure, but uncertainty about quality of the role.
Just out of curiosity, what do people think were the best tenure track jobs on offer this year?
Where will you work if you don't have a job in academia? Low-wage work? Isn't it weird having a stellar vita with first-authored pubs in good journals and finding yourself taking shit from cranky customers at a starbucks for (near) minimum wage?
Anyone recall what the research says about a society with a highly educated, restless and disgruntled youthful stratum, as a condition for revolution or at least creative social ferment? Europe has had this situation for years, producing more university-educated graduates than there are college-level jobs.
Was it Russell Jacoby who warned about U.S. intellectuals being co-opted by universities and corporate employment? No longer.
Re: March 10, 2009 8:09 AM
I'm curious what a good vita looks like to different people. I don't want to remove the anonymity of the forum; I'm just needing some sense of scale here - number of pubs, rank order of authors, which journals specifically. Sometimes I feel like I'm not getting a realistic picture of the market.
A few people posted their qualifications in the "New Hires" section starting on February 20.
8:09 asked "Where will you work if you don't have a job in academia?"
There are a lot of good options besides low-wage service jobs. Especially given the amount of stimulus money going to basic research, a lot of research firms are actually finding the need to add staff as they take on new projects. I know several places that have great opportunities for PhDs and are hiring a lot right now.
Sure, you have to give up the ego gratification of being a professor. But if you're willing, I say go for it. You'll make more money too.
5:43: Can you tell me where I might find out about some of these opportunities (i suffer from academia tunnel vision and reality is giving me a swift kick :-)
there is a comment section right here on this blog about non-academic jobs, and they list quite a few companies that hire soc. PhDs.
Doctoral programs keep churning out new PhDs, even when the market is poor. Neil Smelser and Robin Content wrote a 1980 book "The Changing Academic Marketplace". They note that in 1975-76 the Berkeley Sociology Department recruited to fill four junior faculty vacancies, for which there were 285 applicants.
Many of today's senior faculty won their faculty positions in that competitive and almost hopeless market of the late 70s and early 1980s.
"In 1975-76 the Berkeley Sociology Department recruited to fill four junior faculty vacancies, for which there were 285 applicants."
This strikes me as significantly less competitive than today's academic market in sociology.
yeah, didn't Washington get 450 applications for one opening this year?
looks like the emperor lost his/her argument
The point is that there's nothing new about an extreme position shortage in sociology, with a 70 to 1 applicant ratio even back in the 1970s. Has there ever been a market where there is really a PhD-level position for almost every new PhD?
We can't infer from a 70:1 application to job ratio that there was extreme shortage of jobs in the 1970's, or even today. Sure, departments like Washington might get 450 applications for one job, but let's not forget that applicants send out more than 1 application. A department might get 200 apps for one position, but those people each applied at 100 other places. We can't know about the true seekers:jobs ratio without looking at the number of graduating PhD's and the number of Assistant Professor jobs.
If the logic of the above posts were true, 1 person would get the Washington job and 449 people would be unemployed at the end. That's not what happened. Many of those 449 people got jobs elsewhere because they applied many other places. Looking at the applicant-to-job ratio tells us almost nothing about the supply of job seekers, which is the more important number.
The correct inference is that there would be many, many disappointed job-seekers after every search. We need assume only that applicants wanted the position. They might have gotten another position but judging from the postings on this forum, many are not getting any. In earlier years, you might have gotten your 3rd or 7th choice -- still a disappointment unless you have hubris and are aware of it.
Next year should be worse -- with a new cohort entering the competition plus this year's residual repeaters.
Has anyone created a new version of this blog yet, for this year's market?
Looking forward to ASA in San Francisco? is anyone going to raise questions about availability of positions for all those graduate programs that are still recruiting large entering cohorts?
Its very good blog side , It gives us a very good information about job search, Its may be very important for those people, who reallr are looking for job
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