Rob Knop is blogging about the difficulties in getting tenure — his difficulties in particular, not the issue in some vague degree of abstraction. Very worth reading for a candid look at the kind of thing that goes on.
On a meta level, it’s interesting to contemplate how hiring and tenuring will ultimately be effected by blogs. Scott Aaronson is blogging at least some occasional facts about his job search. The proliferation of online rumor mills has already taken a lot of what used to be quasi-private information, shared among the old-boy network but invisible to outsiders, and put it out there for everyone to see. I can imagine a similar kind of effect if we ever get to the point that a critical mass of job- and tenure-seekers are blogging about their progress.
In the short term, I worry that the most obvious effect will be a deleterious one for the bloggers. For the most part, I don’t think that hiring/tenure committees care if you have a blog, occasional anonymous scare-mongering notwithstanding. (It might even help.) But blogging about the process might be the kind of thing that makes committees nervous. Personally, I would never blog about a major occupational transition while it was going on; when it’s all set up and the ink is drying, it makes sense to let people know, but in the middle of the process I would be (with good reason) worried about stepping on people’s toes. (Same thing with getting engaged.)
So, blogging about tenure and job searches: crazy or courageous? Or is there a difference? I guess we’ll see.
No offense to anyone who does it, but completely crazy.
I just finished reading Rob’s post, and my heart really goes out to him – I truly hope things work out.
Personally I would not blog about something like this. There are things about one’s job – the details of faculty meetings, contract renewals, promotion and tenure details, retention negotiations, committee deliberations, etc. that I think are conducted under at least the assumption (and sometimes the explicit requirement) of confidentiality.
But in any case – best of luck Rob!
Rob, I recently clicked on your homepage link from one of your comments. It links to your old website.
Sean, as you can imagine, I’ve been struggling for months with the tension between (1) my usual openness about everything (bordering on clinically-insane exhibitionism) and (2) the requirements of a job search. I did come up with a few simple ground rules. For example, I won’t embarrass anyone by name (except myself). I won’t talk about my actual decision process, at least until it’s over. And of course, I won’t say anything likely to compromise an offer before that offer has been made. 😉
Crazy. Absolutely no upside to it.
Unlike Aaronson’s posts, which have struck me as general observations about process, salesmanship, and the usual friendly “how am I doing today” updates, Knop’s post strike me as having the tone of an angry, disillusioned scientist–someone who’s been recently burned by the system he’s put his faith in, and who is this close to burning his bridges. Which is also passing wisdom of a sort… but I think it’s much more dangerous than what Aaronson is doing.
Did you folks see Ivan Tribble’s Bloggers Need Not Apply column a few years ago?
My basic blogging rule of thumb: never put anything in a post that you wouldn’t be willing to say out loud in a crowded room of people.
He sounds fed up. His observation is well-taken though: there are more researchers than society is willing to support, even the ones who have made the cut at the graduate and post-doc levels.
If only the call to knowledge were as piercing as the call to everything else that seems much the lesser.
Knop’s post strike me as having the tone of an angry, disillusioned scientist—someone who’s been recently burned by the system he’s put his faith in, and who is this close to burning his bridges.
Yeah. That’s about right, except that it’s “repeatedly and recently” burned, not just recently.
Either that, or I really am just not good enough, and am a whiner for saying there’s anything wrong with the system. Either way, I’m very unhappy about the whole thing.
I spent a good fraction of this semester struggling to get out of bed in the morning. “What’s the point?” is the question. “Why the hell should I get up and go in to give my all to this University that has made it clear that it doesn’t give a small liquid shit what I do for my students if I squeeze money out of the NSF?” As you can imagine, when I’m behind already, those kinds of hits to my productivity are not helpful!
Going up to 225mg of Effexor helped with some of the acute levels of that, but all of these things are rational questions in addition to symptoms of depression….
I have had a one-year delay on my tenure clock due to family medical reasons. (My wife has had 2 major surgeries in the last two years– not accident recovery or anything, but the result of her having a chronic disease.) I spent a lot of time helping her recover from each one. When I realized that people who had kids were able to get stoppage of their tenure clock, I figured I had a legitimate case. It was approved. However, I delayed asking for it — because, in all honesty, it’s not clear to me if I’m really doing anything other than prolonging the agony. I would like to have the attitude that this is a great job and I’ll enjoy it as long as they let me keep doing it, but the knowledge that I have all but already been judged unworthy to keep doing the job after another year or two is something I’m having a hard time putting aside.
In any event, yeah, I probably shouldn’t say any of this. The alternative, though is for it to bubble and broil within me until I get so angry that I’m throwing my fist into concrete walls. (Again, I speak from experience.)
It also pisses me off that our deans explicitly said to several of our interviewing candidates this year that it is a “myth” that you are required to get funding to get tenure. I mean, I’ve been a faculty member long enough that I expect administrators to routinely lie, but when it’s so blatant…!
I really would like there to be more open discussion out there. For example, I’ve heard a lot of pre-tenure people talk about (a) the anxiety attacks, (b) going on anti-depressants, (c) the demoralizing effects of being unfunded and expecting not to get tenure. Is any of this really increasing our productivity in science? Or are we shooting ourselves in the foot by hanging a gigantic albatross around the necks of our young creative people? If my screaming from the rooftops helps shine a little bit of light into the cruddy morass that is the current academic tenure system, then perhaps it would be worth it.
Oops.. that should have been “…what I do for my students if I can’t squeeze money out of the NSF?”
And I’ve fixed my “website” link.
Here’s a question:
Some years ago, one of my undergraduate advisers wrote a column for a well-known science magazine. In one controversial edition, he argued that tenure should be granted in 10 year terms. His main point was that lifelong tenure makes the one-and-only tenure review a contentious, political process, and that older professors who are slacking piggyback on their untenured, overworked colleagues for both institutional prestige and funding.
The response was, as one might expect, vituperative — he was accused of seeking to reduce intellectual freedom, destroy diversity of thought in academia, etc. etc.
The economics of science has changed since 1900 — is it time for a rethink? Or do we need to change the economics?
Sourav: I like that 10-year-tenure idea!
I honestly don’t know the answer.
The notion of the older prof who no longer does anything, sitting back and enjoying the sinecure of tenure while being completely incompetent, is a stereotype. It does happen, but not as often as you might think, at least in my observation. I’ve known a couple, but only a couple. And the security that comes with tenure once you have it is nice.
The problem is that Universities have motivation to be real careful about who they tenure. Unfortunately, what they do is come up with a stringent set of criteria, and then look for reasons to turn you down. The right questions aren’t always asked. Sean’s case shows that weird things can happen, and people really should not be turned down for tenure under any reasonable metric, are.
What I’d really like is (a) a system where you’re judged by how well you’re doing, looking at everything, not just some arbitrary set of metrics (note that funding comes primarily from how good you are at saying what you will do, not at what you are doing), and (b) rational and reasonable people doing the judging who will judge wisely and, rather than rely on some set of numerical metrics and a one-size-fits-all template, and (c) judge without bias about a professor’s notoriety or political unsuitability. With those things in place, then five-year reviews or some such like any other job would be fine.
Obviously, we will need to achieve some sort of utopia before that sort of thing could be in place.
So, I really don’t know what one ought to do.
All I know is that I personally have serious issues with the current system…. Obviously, some of those issues are mine, but I think that some of the issues are issues with the system too.
If we are training ten times as many astronomers as there is room for, then it shouldn’t be a surprise that being a good teacher — and one who especially likes teaching advanced classes — isn’t that highly valued. If there are too many astronomers, then one reason is that there are too many good teachers!
What’s the point in training future hedge fund workers to do astronomy?
About tenure: I don’t see any good reason for switching to a ten-year plan. I agree with Rob Knap’s last post.
The ten-year tenure (catchy tune!) would give an incentive to be fresh and innovative. The staid tenured professor is a stereotype, perhaps, but with a grain of truth in some environments, and more than a grain of truth (it’s the reality) in other countries. In Italy, it is sure that the current university system will not change until those inert folks retire.
And while we are discussing possibly helpful employment times, please let’s seriously consider a 5-year grant proposal duration too. 🙂
There have been articles written about the plight of Academic “system”, see below (link from Princetonreview.com). People have been outspoken publicly, & unions have been formed. Websites (now blogs) have appeared. Rob is just an additional voice to the continuing stream of “Negative Reinforcement”. One of my ex-professors (Harvard alumni) led a campaign on getting his fellow professors unionized.
Professor of Desperation
Bad pay, zero job security, no benefits, endless commutes. Is this any way to treat PhDs responsible for teaching a generation of college students?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&contentId=A15182-2002Jul16
“There once was an unwritten deal. If you were smart and willing to devote up to 10 of your most productive years studying for a doctorate, certain things would likely happen. A college or university somewhere would hire you. And if you did well there, there was a full-time tenured job in your future. The money wouldn’t be great, but you’d be part of an academic community. You’d do research in your field. You’d live a life of the mind.
Then the deal changed.”
” “The very fact that we are here means that we mean business,” labor union organizer Scot Hamilton says to the group. “It’s ironic. Universities are supposed to be the bastions of freedom, but when you look behind the scenes, they’re very exploitative.” ”
“The last application responses eventually trickle in. By March they’ve all told her no. She tries to stay positive, but she can’t help but wonder sometimes if maybe, just maybe, she’s not good enough to make the cut. It’s been nearly two years since she graduated, and 38 places have said they don’t want her.
“It’s frustrating because I would have thought at this point in my career, I would have at least gotten an interview.” ”
Wanted: Really Smart Suckers
Grad school provides exciting new road to poverty
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0417,kamenetz,53011,1.html
“But the Internet means no isolated community has to stay that way. A new group of tortured, funny, largely anonymous websites are providing an outlet for academics who feel like they’re getting spanked by their alma mater. They have names like Invisible Adjunct, (a)musings of a grad student, Beyond Academe, and Barely Tenured, and they address the emotional just as much as the practical consequences of competing in, and losing, the academic job-market lottery.”
Brain drain in tech’s future?
John Miano’s career course is the sort of thing to make tech industry leaders wince and worry about their future work force.
http://news.com.com/2100-1008_3-5299249.html
There is a solution out there, but it will only come after the current fiasco in Academia results in a crisis/catastrophe. Driving out competent people (“Brain Drain”) is self-defeating, as the above article shows.
“Is this anyway to run a University?”
“Stupidity is it’s Own Reward”, as the saying goes
For the most part, I don’t think that hiring/tenure committees care if you have a blog
“Anyone who is stupid enough to blog as junior faculty can’t be surprised when they are denied tenure.”
Actual quote from senior colleague at MIT.
I mean this in the best possible way, but if someone from RK’s tenure committee read either his recent blog post or his comment(s) here, I think his chances (which may still be non-vanishing) would vanish entirely. It just doesn’t feel right, or in the least professional, to provide those evaluating you this kind of insight into your personal life or psyche.
But maybe I’m part of the problem by thinking this?
Pingback: Cosmic Variance: Tenure, job searches, academic freedom, and the blogosphere « Identity Unknown
It’s taken a fellow grad school friend of mine almost fifteen years to land a tenure track appointment at a place he actually likes. In the meanwhile, he’s been poor as a churchmouse (literally; at one point he worked for the Episcopal archdiocese in Detroit) and snapped up just about anything that came along, including an overseas posting at which he stayed for only 18 months. It’s not because he’s not competent. He’s a great teacher and a dedicated and interesting scholar. But his path illustrates why I got out when I did: the Academy insists that the best job you could possibly aim for is a job in the Academy and they are blissfully unaware of any other type of employment. They project an air of deeming it unworthy of their students to even consider anything but an academic job, while helping to make it impossible for their students to support themselves (adjunct hell, anyone?) in that milieu. It is a Catch-22 of the most outrageous proportions.
The Academy is broken. It needs fixing. A dose of reality about job conditions would be a good place to start.
I guess that what you put on your blog is dependent in part on why you do it. If someone gets cathartic relief from posting this stuff, then it might be worth the potential harm it could do their tenure case.
Incidentally, I don’t entirely agree with Sean that general blogging might not do harm. Tenure review is essentially a human process and judging what might piss other people off isn’t always possible. Safer, perhaps, not to blog or else to do it with some anonymity, if minimising potential career damage is the aim.
But maybe I’m part of the problem by thinking this?
Yes, but the guy that Scott H. quotes is a much bigger part of the problem.
If those judging tenure cases want to stifle expression, then the justification for tenure in the first place is a complete and total sham.
So, Scott, what about grad students who blog?
I hate to say it but I have to agree with Scott H.’s source who said:
“Anyone who is stupid enough to blog as junior faculty can’t be surprised when they are denied tenure.”
There are people on tenure committees who will find SOME or ANY reason to criticize a candidate. It may have nothing to do with WHAT they say on their blog.. it is the simple fact that they BLOG in the first place. After all, they shouldn’t be wasting their time blogging and should be doing research (or teaching or…) instead, right?
There are people on tenure committees who will find SOME or ANY reason to criticize a candidate. It may have nothing to do with WHAT they say on their blog.. it is the simple fact that they BLOG in the first place. After all, they shouldn’t be wasting their time blogging and should be doing research (or teaching or…) instead, right?
Re: “you should be working instead of doing X”: I know that this attitude exists, and it is one of the stupidest and most hypocritical pieces of, well, you know, that is out there.
I’ve heard colleagues say that “grad student X should be reading ApJ instead of novels,” which makes me want to stand up and scream at them, “then how do you justify coaching your daughter’s softball team!?!? How do you justify flying planes for fun!?!?” Obviously, yes, grad student X should be reading ApJ. However, this notion that scientists, particularly junior scientists, are supposed to sacrifice all other vestiges of humanity towards being 100% drones working on research is poisonous and evil… and completely unrealistic.
Re: people on tenure committees looking for reasons to shoot people down: this is one of the biggest broken things about tenure. Tenure isn’t like proposals, where no matter what you might like, you can only grant a subset of them. (I have experience with this on the NOAO TAC.) With tenure, the question should be whether or not this person is making the kind of contributions to the university that warrant a permanent job, not whether or not this person has never shown any flaws.
-Rob