The Philosophers' Cocoon

Should candidates have a personalized website?

In our most recent "Ask a search-committee member" thread, Anon asked, "Would an academia.edu count be considered a legitimate web site? Are these sites frowned upon?". My answer in that thread was as follows:

This is just my own sense (but I’ve heard others say it too), but my guess is that just having an academia.edu site can come across as pretty weak. First, a lot of people I know canceled their account with then, and I believe you need an account to log in and view other people’s stuff. But second, my sense is that it can just come off a bit lazy. I’m not sure having a website or not is likely to make the difference when it comes to deciding to interview or hire someone. And there are probably some search committee members who don't care at all. But I think search committee members do visit them quite a bit and that having a good one might make a difference. And here, as elsewhere, my guess is that the difference it is likely to make may be less about your accomplishments and more of what it might seem to indicate about you as a *person* (viz. “this person is conscientious, has their act together, and knows how to present themselves” vs. “Wow, this person didn’t even bother to set up a decent website for themselves?”).

This, again, is what I think too many job candidates just don’t seem to get: that hiring committees are just as interested in the kind of person you are as what kind of philosopher you are. And make no mistake about it: your non-philosophical skills and personal qualities are job relevant. My department has dramatically increased our major numbers. Why? Well, we have faculty members who are motivated enough to put together, design, and distribute attractive and informative materials about the major. And we also have a faculty member who runs our department webpages. These things—not just philosophy—are a part of this job. So it can be important to show that you are the kind of person who is conscientious enough to design a good webpage...

In brief, while I suspect one's having or not having a website, or merely having an academia.edu site, is probably unlikely to be a deciding factor of whether one is interviewed, I think it may impact how search-committee members think about the person, perhaps playing a non-negligible role in how the search committee member 'ranks' the candidate in their mind relative to other candidates. However, 'Publish, please' then weighed in with dissenting advice:

You would be far better off on the market if you spent your time publishing a paper in a good journal, than grooming and updating a website. You will never get a job if all you have is a nice webpage, and no publications. But people get jobs with publications and no webpages. Stay focused. Too many people are spending too much time on really trivial things, like webpages, when what people really want to see is that you can do (and publish) philosophy.

Amanda seemed more persuaded by my position. However, I'm curious to hear what others think, particularly people who have served on search-committees. Although I know it is hard to reliably introspect our own decisionmaking processes, what is your sense: does a candidate's website, or quality of website (a well-designed, personalized one vs. academia.edu), ever make any difference in how you evaluate a candidate?

Listing courses one can teach on a CV?

A reader wrote in yesterday:

Quick question: My placement adviser recommended including a list of courses I am prepared to teach directly on the CV after the list of courses I have solo taught. Is that something people do?

I replied as follows:

[O]ffhand my answer is that I think your placement adviser’s advice is strange. A candidate can say they can teach anything. But that is not what is relevant to a search-committee member. What is relevant is whether there is any evidence elsewhere in the CV that you actually are qualified to teach the relevant course. By my lights, that evidence comes only comes in the following forms:

1. 1. Your publications and professional presentations
   2. Your solo-teaching (and to, a lesser extent, TA) experience.
   3. Your graduate coursework.

I think it is a good idea for recent PhDs to list graduate coursework for this reason—but the point is, once this stuff is listed on your CV, the reader has all of the information they need to know. Explicitly listing the courses you are prepared to teach will either look redundant (if there is other evidence you can teach in the area), or it will look dubious (if there isn’t). Either way, it’s not clear to me that there is anything to be gained from it. 

However, I noted that this is just my sense, so I offered to share their query here for discussion. What do you all think, particularly those of you who have served on search-committees? Does it make sense for candidates to list courses they are prepared to teach on their CV?

Creating Collaborative Classrooms: Let them Eat Cake! (Guest post by Annie McCallion)

This is a guest post by Annie McCallion for our Unconventional Teaching Ideas That Work series.

Creating the right tutorial atmosphere
When I was an undergraduate, I was terrified of tutorials (or seminars - small group teaching classes). When I did dare to attend one, I would spend the majority of my time there concentrating on how best to avoid eye contact with the tutor in a manner which would most astutely convey just how much psychological trauma they would cause me if they were to call upon me to answer any questions. It is difficult to say explicitly what I found so off-putting about my undergraduate tutorials. It wasn’t the case that I had bad tutors – the vast majority of my tutors were dedicated teachers who worked hard to encourage student participation – moreover, I was fortunate enough to – for the most part – have perfectly friendly peers in my tutorials groups.

When I entered the final year of my undergraduate degree, I began running reading groups for marginalised genders in philosophy. These reading groups were held as part of the In Parenthesis Project, a research project which investigates the biographical and theoretical connections between a group of women philosophers – Mary Midgley, Elizabeth Anscombe, Iris Murdoch and Philippa Foot – who were friends in Oxford during the time of the Second World War. Through the process of running these groups, it came to my attention that I was not the only person who was struggling to participate in tutorials, in fact, far from it. During these reading groups, we began discussing the aspects of our course that we each –in various ways – were struggling with. Tutorials, were a central subject matter and it became increasingly obvious that we each shared similar fears of being called upon during them, sounding ‘stupid’ or being told that we were wrong about this or that.

Tailoring your job-market strategy to your situation

Long-time readers of the Cocoon may recall that I've wondered on a few occasions whether many academic job-candidates end up adopting a sub-optimal job-market strategy. First, last year I floated a hypothesis that job-candidates coming out of lower-ranked PhD programs may have a tendency to adopt a job-market strategy that fails to make them competitive for R1 jobs (since top-ranked programs fare best with those) while simultaneously 'pricing them out' of teaching-focused jobs. Second, I've often floated the idea that one fairly common piece of conventional wisdom--that publishing in low-ranked or no-name journals 'looks bad on the market'--is just false when it comes to jobs at teaching schools. My clear sense, both as a job-candidate for many teaching jobs and (more recently) as a search-committee member at a liberal arts university, is that a lot of people at these kinds of institutions could really care less about journal rankings. And, as luck would have it, a recent study appears to bear out my skepticism: publications in 'weak journals' appear to help, at least if you publish in good places too.

Anyway, a recent exchange I had with a friend got me thinking this morning about a more general issue: namely, the potential importance of tailoring your job-market strategy to a realistic picture of your 'situation' . Allow me to explain.

Mentoring program: mentor feedback

Earlier this month, I shared feedback that Helen and I have received from mentees in last year's cycle of our Job-Market Mentoring Program. Today's post reports the feedback we have received to date and been authorized to share from this year's mentors. As a quick reminder, we will be running the program again this year. We will just be getting the program started a bit later than usual due to preexisting commitments that Helen and I both had. Our plan is to open new signups next Thursday, August 1st. Helen and I will then move forward with matches as quickly as we can! Also, as we normally hadvemore mentees sign up than available mentors, I'd like to encourage the blog's tenure-stream (and tenured) readers to consider whether to sign up given the feedback below. Our aim, as always, is to help as many job-candidates in need that we can (over the past three years, we have matched exactly 90 candidates with mentors). 

For now, here is feedback we received from this year's mentors (who we thank deeply for their participation, and know many of our program's mentees thank as well):

Question 1 - Types of mentoring provided?:

“review of materials, especially CV. Checked in during job search season to offer encouragement. Had brief exchange about it and got an update from [Redacted].” – David Hildebrand (Associate Professor & Chair, CU Denver).

“Dossier material review, interview tips, general advice.” – Jerry Green (Assistant Professor, University of Central Oklahoma)

“I looked at dossier materials and provided advice on topics like interviews, tactics.” – Robin McKenna (Lecturer, University of Liverpool)

“Dossier materials, general strategy, encouragement.”

“dossier materials, suggestions for adapting applications to US institutions.”

“Comments on job materials.”

“CV and cover letter feedback.”

“Mostly emails about strategy for solving the two body problem, which writing sample to use, and which (kinds of) jobs to apply to. I sent [redacted] my application spreadsheet from 2017, so he had an idea of the kinds and numbers of positions, and their approximate deadlines and application material requirements. I think this was useful to him, because it was a lot of information that normally takes a lot of effort to harvest. [Redacted] received a position very early (by September!), and so we didn’t not interact a great deal. We sent a fair number of lengthy emails. But it wasn’t a long-developing relationship. This contrasts with my experience with [Redacted 2] last year, where we skyped on several occasions over the course of almost a year, sometimes for hours, about research, work, job market strategy, work-life balance etc. etc. I have now job-market mentored for two years, with two mentors [sic] each year (one through the Women’s programme, one through Cocoon). Both times I have developed a lengthy and in-depth mentorship relationship with one of the two, and had relatively small amounts of contact with the other. All four were positive experiences, but with [Redacted] it was just “less” of a relationship. Last year I interacted a lot with [Redacted 2], through the Cocoon system. This year I interacted a lot with my women’s mentor programme mentee.“

“feedback on a variety of dossier documents, general advice, letters of rec”

“Reviewed and commented on multiple drafts of dossier materials, including CV, cover letter, syllabus, teaching statement, and writing sample. Also, conducted a mock interview.”

“I read all (or at least virtually all) of his dossier; no mock interview or anything like that, but I did try to send him some questions and sample answers.”

“Reviewing and commenting on dossier materials.”

 

Job-Market Boot Camp, part 29: common mistakes with CVs

Now that we have discussed some common mistakes candidates can make with teaching statements, teaching portfolios, and research statements, let's talk about CVs. It might seem pretty hard to mess up a CV, and to a certain extent I think this is right. Insofar as CVs basically just list a person's accomplishments, there may not that much to mess up. Still, allow me to share what I take to be a few common mistakes, and then open things up for discussion:

Listing papers under review as 'publications': I haven't seen many candidates do this, but seemingly every year I hear of candidates who do it (either because they say so on a blog somewhere, or from other search committee members). So I think it is important to discuss. Here is my general sense. There are a few 'kisses of death' that job-candidates can make--things that can potentially sink their candidacy immediately. This is one of them. Articles under review, or even in revise-and-submit, are not publications, and should under no circumstances be listed under that heading in a CV. Even if you note in parentheses that the article is "under review" or in "revise-and-resubmit", lising them under Publications can still come across either as misleading or obtuse, or both. Neither one of these things is a good look for a job-candidate. The only things that should be listed as publications are actual or forthcoming (i.e. accepted) publications. Finally, athough maybe some might disagree, I imagine that 'conditional acceptances' are okay to list as publications--but in that case it sure as heck better be a real conditional acceptance, not a revise-and-resubmit with minor revisions (there is a huge difference!), and you had better note explicitly that it is a conditional-accept. Job-candidates should stay away from putting anything in a CV that has even a whiff of dishonesty. Which brings me to...

Should more journals do 'targets and replies'?

In the comment section of my recent post on citation rates and journal rankings, Anon writes:

AJOB's journal structure is a main article and reply structure. There is one or two main ("target") articles, and then the other articles are replies to the main one. I actually think this is a cool format for a journal, as it motivates engagement.

I wasn't aware that AJOB does this, but I agree: it sounds like a really cool idea. As I've mentioned before, I think our current publishing model creates serious and unnecessary barriers to philosophical discussion. For example, many journals only permit 'replies' to articles published in their own pages. The result is that many published papers are never engaged with at all, and academic philosophy ends up more akin to a series of loosely connected monologues than a discussion. 

AJOB's 'target and replies' model seems to me a healthy antidote to this: a way of incentivizing greater engagement with published work. It would also make finding responses to published articles easier, as a journal might continually publish new replies to a given article on an ongoing basis below the original target article, enabling anyone who visits the article at the journal to see what other people have written on it in response (at least in that journal). 

What do other people think? Would it be good for the profession if more journals adopted this model? I suppose there might be logistical challenges, as it would probably significantly increase the number of reply submissions to journals, some of whose editors already report being overwhelmed with too many submissions. Still, given that AJOB evidently pulls it off, it seems like there is some way to handle these issues. Any ideas? Anyone know how AJOB does it?

Job-Market Boot Camp, part 28: common mistakes with teaching portfolios

In my previous two posts in this series, I presented what I take to be some common mistakes in teaching and research statements. I hope some more search-committee members weigh in, so that job-marketeers can hear other perspectives. But in any case, in today's post I'd like to discuss some common mistakes in teaching portfolios. For those less well-acquainted with teaching portfolios (e.g. new or future job-candidates), teaching portfolios are perhaps the most open of all job-market materials. Although they standardly include things like student evaluations and sample syllabi, some portfolios including much more, ranging from examples of assignments to sample lectures.

I myself don't have any settled views about exactly what teaching portolios should include--so I'm very curious to hear in the comment section below from other search committee members about what they think should or shouldn't be included, or how long teaching portfolios should be (particularly given that I've heard some people have teaching portfolios upwards of 50 pages, which seems to me too long). But, for now, let me offer a short list of what I take some 'common mistakes' to be:

Portfolios that look hastily thrown together: which can result from several converging sources of evidence...

1. 1. No table of contents.
   2. Inconsistent formatting.
   3. Overly-short, uninformative syllabi: although I've heard it can be a good idea to provide several course outlines (consisting merely of a course title, course description, and reading schedule), I think it is probably very important to include one full syllabus in a teaching portfolio, and for the syllabus to be detailed regarding course policies, assignments, and so on.
   4. Merely including raw student-evaluation reports: As people have noted on this blog before, search-committee members can be really strapped for time. They typically have hundreds of applications to wade through--so anything that makes their job easier is, prima facie, good to do. Further, as I am sure many people who have served on search-committees can attest, raw student-evaluation reports can be confusing to wade through. They can be full of all kinds of numbers and unfamiliar questions (my own university's student evaluations have 36 separate items!). Consequently, although I think it is good to provide some raw reports (so as to, again, not look like you are 'hiding anything'), I think it is again a really good idea to include some kind of overview summary to make things easier on your reader.

Citation rates and journal rankings

Yesterday, this Google Scholar report on h5-index statistics of philosophy journals started going around my social media feed, and a few questions occurred to me: what, if anything, should we take statistics like these to indicate? Should they lead people who rank journals, or use journal rankings in hiring, tenure, and promotion, to revise how they think about these things? Although I tend not to care much about rankings in general, I still found myself curious about these questions.

In brief, my understanding is that in STEM fields, disciplinary journal rankings tend to follow journal impact-factors--that is, that people in those fields tend to identify the 'best journals' with ones that have the biggest impact in the literature. In philosophy, however, impact-factors rarely seem to be mentioned. Many journals do not even appear to report them. I found the above Google Scholar report interesting, in that although many highly-ranked philosophy journals appear in the list (with Nous and PPR in particular featuring at the top of the Google Scholar list), the list as a whole diverges fairly significantly from common journal rankings in the discipline.

One reason I found myself curious about this is that it is not clear what kind of validity subjective polls on journal-rankings have. If those kinds of common rankings merely represent people's beliefs about various journals' reputation, there is always the further question of whether a given journal's reputation is accurate. On the other hand, impact factors (such as h-indexes) merely reflect how often a journal's work is cited--which is a very imperfect (at best) measure of the quality of work. Further, journal citation-ranks may in part reflect the sheer number of articles a given journal publishes (as some journals publish far more articles than others).

Anyway, I don't have much of a well-developed view about any of this--aside again, from being skeptical about rankings in general. Still, I'm curious what others think.

Summer sounds

Job-Market Boot Camp, Part 27: common mistakes with teaching statements

Last week, we had a new thread in this series examining common mistakes in research-statements. In today's post, I'd like to discuss common mistakes in teaching statements. Then, in my next post, we will examine teaching portfolios more broadly. I will begin by sharing my sense of what some common mistakes are, based on my experiences on search-committees and as a job-market mentor. I will then open up the thread for further discussion, and hopefully some other search-committee members will weigh in.

Without further ado, here's my sense of some common teaching-statement mistakes:

Verbose teaching statements: Search-committee members are very strapped for time. They typically have hundreds of applications to review. Consequently, overly long materials can frustrate them, whereas nice and concise materials can come across as 'sparkling' and thoughtful. I have read some very good 2-3 page teaching statements--so it is certainly possible to have an effective teaching statement that long. However, my sense is that many teaching statements are far longer than they need to be, in ways that don't reflect well on a candidate. They not only make things more difficult on the reader. Given that most of us think it is important to teach our students to write concisely, a verbose teaching-statement may make it look like one has a bad sense of what writing effectively involves--a bad first-look for a teacher! Anyway, I was advised by a job-market consultant to keep my teaching statement to one-page, and it served me well. So, I think this is one common mistake. Try to err on the shorter side of things. 

Generalities without concrete examples: As I've mentioned before, I learned from my consultant that the single biggest error that candidates make in teaching statements is writing in generalities (e.g. 'I diagram arguments and have students do group work in class'). Given that the vast majority of other candidates write more or less the same thing, statements like these do these do little to help a candidate stand out or enable a search-committee to form any kind of clear picture of what the person is actually like in the classroom. Give concrete examples: of actual in-class assignments you have given, how the assignment led to a productive discussion, and so on.

Overly-emotive language: Saying you are a 'passionate' teacher 'strongly committed' to such-and-such may seem rhetorically effective, given that as a candidate you want to impress upon readers that you have these qualities. In practice, however, these kinds of rhetorical moves can come across as banal cliches. Just about everyone regards themselves as a passionate teacher committed to X, Y, and Z--or, if not, just about everyone can say they are in a teaching statement. The problem, again, is that so many people say these kinds of things, without giving a clear picture of how they actually are these things. I was taught by my consultant to "show, not tell". Just explain in concrete detail the things you do as a teacher and the pedagogical rationales for why you do those things. My sense is this will show (and illustrate) one's passion for teaching and commitment to students and student-learning in ways that saying one is passionate or committed don't do. 

Little to no discussion of assessment: Many teaching statements talk about what candidates do in the classroom (e.g. Socratic dialogue, group assignments, and so on), how they structure courses, and the readings they assessment, but say very little about forms of assessment or their rationale. Like it or not, many people at teaching-focused institutions--ranging from people on hiring committees, to administrators, to tenure-and-promotion committees--care a lot about assessment, taking it to be pedagogically important. You don't need to discuss every form of assessment you use: quizzes, exams, term-papers, and so on. That would probably come across as pedantic in teaching statement. What I do think is a good idea is briefly explaining at least one assessment central to your courses, and the rationale for it. In my statement, I explain briefly but in detail the several components of daily reading responses, along with the pedagogical rationale for each component. I also mention--in a single sentence--another form of assessment I use to develop student meta-cognition. My sense is that these kinds of brief but clear illustrations of assessment pedagogy can be important, as there are some people on the hiring side of things who care about these things.

Underdeveloped pedagogy: My final sense is that too many teaching statements come across as though relatively little thought has been given to pedagogy. In today's intensely competitive job-market, my sense is that candidates for jobs at teaching-focused jobs cannot expect to be very competitive with teaching statements that say (more or less): "I stand in front of the class, diagram arguments, and engage students in Socratic dialogue." If you mostly use Socratic techniques, that's fine--but my sense is that candidates need to find some way to distinguish themselves, illustrating (again, through concrete examples) that they are particularly thoughtful about how they do it, in ways that have given serious thought to pedagogy and assessment.

Anyway, these are just a few things that I suspect are common mistakes in teaching statements. What do other people who have served on search-committees think? Is my list mostly accurate in your experience? If not, what do you think I have gotten wrong? And are there any other common mistakes you think candidates should be aware to avoid?

Getting contracts for edited volumes?

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, junior anon writes:

The blog has talked extensively about how to write and achieve a contract for a monograph. I wanted to know what the process is like for getting a contract for a volume. How does one start the process? Presumably one cannot have all the papers ready beforehand. Does one simply pitch the idea to a press (e.g. Cambridge), and depending on your expertise in the field they may bite? Does one have an introduction ready?

I'm probably not the best person to ask here, as I've only had papers in edited volumes, never proposed one. However, my experience as a contributor has given me a little bit of insight into the process. My sense is that individuals proposing an edited volume need at least three things:

1. A compelling introduction/overview of the proposed volume.
2. A list of contributors, including some established, well-known researchers.
3. A complete compilation of paper titles and abstracts from each contributor.

Then, of course, one has to put together a full proposal, based on the proposal forms that presses typically have on their websites (which require proposals to specify an intended audience, competing works, and many other things). Does this sound about right to people? It would be great to hear from people who have actually secured contracts for and published edited volumes. What does one need to do in order to put together and submit a good proposal?

How forthright should cover letters be?

In our thread on prior credit toward tenure, 'Going Up Tenure Year' writes:

Question re: going up in your tenure year. I am going to be doing that -- is there something particular that you put into your cover letters? I am on track to get tenure here and my letter writers from here will mention that ... should I also mention it? 

My initial reaction is that this is probably not the sort of thing to note in a cover letter, as it should be easy for anyone reading a file to infer. Still, I'm not sure, and in any case it raises an interesting more general question: namely, how forthright should one be in cover-letters? To see what I mean, consider the following scenarios:

1. Applying for jobs elsewhere when going up for tenure as a 'backup plan' in case one doesn't get tenure.
2. Applying for jobs elsewhere when coming up for tenure because one is a 'sure thing' for tenure.
3. Applying for tenure-track jobs elsewhere well several years before coming up for tenure because one thinks one would be a better fit for a different kind of institution.
4. Applying for junior-level tenure-track jobs with a 'two-body problem' (i.e. spouse or partner).
5. Applying laterally for tenured positions because of a two-body problem.
6. Applying from tenured position to untenured positions because of a two-body problem.

How forthright should one be about one's reasons for applying for a position? I have to confess that I'm not sure at all! On the one hand, my sense is that in some cases a search-committee might find some kind of explanation in a cover letter helpful. Without any explanation, a search-committee in cases (3) or (6) might wonder, "Why in the world is this person applying for our job when they are already progressing well toward tenure at their current institution?" In these cases, some kind of explanation in the candidate's cover letter could help a search-committee better understand the candidate's intent in applying. On the other hand, providing such an explanation could be taken as "giving too much information" or prejudice the committee against the candidate. 

What do all of you think, particularly those of you who have served on search committees? Should "Going Up Tenure Year" mention that they are going up for tenure? Again, I'm inclined to think not, but I could be wrong. Alternatively, what do you all think about the other kinds of cases?

Extended CFP: Southwestern Phil. Society

CALL FOR PAPERS:

81st ANNUAL MEETING OF

THE SOUTHWESTERN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY

November 1-3, 2019 • Fort Worth, TX

Host Institution: Texas Christian University

Extended CFP Deadline: Friday, July 26, 2017

Conference URL: http://www.southwesternphilosophical.org

Overview: Papers on any philosophical topic are welcome. All presented papers will be published in the Society’s journal, Southwest Philosophy Review.

European program-ranks and the market

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, Amanda writes:

I have a friend with a BA from a Canadian institution, and MA in philosophy from a US institution, who, for compelling personal reasons, wants to do a PhD in Europe (non UK). They have US and EU (non-uk) citizenship. I am putting this here because I wasn't sure what advice to give. Ideally, my friend would like to create the best possibility of being competitive for US jobs once the degree is complete (they are not ruling out Europe jobs, but those are limited).

1.Is there a clear philosophy prestige hierarchy in Europe? If so does it carry over into the United States?

2. The vague impression I get is that search committees often treat all non-uk European PhDs the same, kind of like a low ranked US program, although there is often the disadvantage of lacking teaching experience.

3.Somewhat in conflict with what I just said, other times I get the impression that, especially at research schools, a European PhD is much preferred to a mid to low ranked US PhD. This seems to be because the former has a negative reputation (among elite research schools) while the latter really has no reputation. There is also some sort of plus from the mysteriousness of it all.

4.The more elite liberal arts schools often like the diversity this would bring, especially if you speak multiple langues (again, this is just my impression that is not based on anything known to be reliable.)

If anyone is knowledgeable about this, that would be great. Other things of interest are odds of getting accepted from the US (but with EU citizenship) and odds of getting funded, how long it takes to finish, etc.

I don't know the answers to these questions, but I think they are great ones to ask. Indeed, I'm very curious what the answers are myself, as I've recently noticed some people (including a few people I know) get great jobs in the US coming out of European programs. Anyone have any insight on Amanda's questions?

Summer sounds

Here.

How to write a referee report (John Greco)

This guest post is by John Greco, currently Leonard and Elizabeth Eslick Chair in Philosophy at Saint Louis University, and soon in McDevitt Chair in Philosophy at Georgetown University 

I am sure that there will be varying opinions about how to write a referee report. In keeping with the spirit of this series, I here offer my own opinion, based on my own experience as someone who has written and read quite a few such reports. I have written them as a referee, of course. I have read some as an author, but many more as the editor of a major philosophy journal. It is this last perspective, I believe, that is most useful for present purposes. For referee reports, remember, are written primarily for journal editors.[1] That is, the defining purpose of a referee report—its raison d'etre—is to help a journal editor to make a decision about a submission. And that is what gives us insight into the criteria for a good referee report.

Already I have said something (at least one thing) that is substantive and controversial. That is, I don’t think that everyone would agree that this is indeed the primary purpose of a referee report. Many writers of such reports seem to think (or at least this is what I gather from reading their reports) that referee reports are primarily directed at authors, and for the purpose of improving the paper that is being evaluated. In my opinion, this is a mistake, and it leads to many of the problems that are typical of referee reports. In any case, below I will describe what I think are the essential elements of a good referee report, guided by my understanding that referee reports are supposed to help editors make a decision on a submission. Following that, I will go over what I take to be some common mistakes and unhelpful practices.

The elements of a good report.

In my opinion, the best referee reports have a few essential elements.

Job-Market Boot Camp, Part 26: common mistakes with research statements

Our recent discussions of cover letters and teaching statements got me thinking it might be a good idea to add a few threads to the Cocoon's Job-Market Boot Camp from several years ago. Although that series examined cover letters, teaching statements, teaching portfolios, research statements, CV's, writing samples, and letters of recommendation, I thought it might be a good idea to focus some new posts on common problems (or 'mistakes') with each. That, at any rate, is what my next several posts adding to the series will aim to discuss. As with the rest of the series, I don't imagine that everything that I say is correct. I will just report my own sense of things, and then open things up to other people who have served on search-committees to say whether they agree, disagree, or have other ideas. My hope is that simply having these kinds of discussions will give current and future job-candidates a better idea of what search-committee members think constitute 'mistakes' in various materials. 

Let us begin, then, with research statements. What are some common 'mistakes' candidates make with them, at least from a search-committee member's point-of-view? Here, in my experience, are some potential mistakes:

Seeking a UK PhD from a distance?

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, Bernardo Vargas writes:

I am recent graduate of an MA Phil. program in the US and I am looking at PhD programs in the UK. However, I am looking at distance-learning programs because of family circumstances such as the Uni. of Birmingham or Uni. of Leeds. However, from my understanding (and please correct me if I am wrong), programs like these in the UK are not funded. My question is, does anyone have any advice in regards to how to find funding for a PhD program in the UK given that I am a US citizen. Also, does anyone know of any programs that are funded (my interest is in philosophy of religion, aesthetics, and their relation to one another)? Thank you for any help or advice!

Amanda wrote in reply:

I hope someone can provide you helpful advice. But I would also recommend writing to the chair of the departments or graduate directors and asking. Each program will have some differences, so no one will know better than those currently working for the university.

I think this is a good suggestion, but I wonder what other people think. Does anyone have any helpful advice?

Prior credit toward tenure?

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, Anon writes:

I have a question about moving from a VAP to a TT-job. Is it possible, in your experience, to count the years you have been VAP in the tenure clock when you move to a TT-job? For instance, if you had been VAP for 2 years, then you get a TT-job and you can go for tenure after 4 years. I'm interested in this especially in terms of articles published during the VAP period. Thanks!

A very good question. It's important to know the answer to, and my sense is that a good number of job-marketeers don't know much about it. 'Tenured' answered:

The rules around "prior service credit" as it is sometimes called, vary widely. I was able to get some credit for prior service at other institutions - for 5 years, they gave me three years credit, the maximum the institution would give. It does, though, add pressure to you. You are expected to earn tenure on the publications you do AT the new job (at least at some places). But I have seen people told they cannot count post doc positions, and other temporary positions as prior credit. So some institutions only count years at another tenured positions, or years in full time employment (ie. where your title is Visiting Assistant Professor). So count on nothing. In fact, I was not told how much prior credit I would get until AFTER I started the job!

My experience is that Tenured is right on a variety of counts. Some schools have very strong policies against awarding 'prior credit'. They may have policies not only against cutting the number of years before one can go up to tenure, but also policies against counting anything you have done before being hired toward tenure. Other schools may be willing to shorten time to tenure, but still not count previously published work and the like. In cases like this, it might sound great if a school tells you that you can come up for tenure after four years. But in that case, as Tenured notes, you'll be under even greater pressure to publish a ton during those four years, since your previous publications won't count.

Query about relocation expenses

In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, Relocator writes:

This job-market season, I accepted a tenure-track job at a large state teaching-focused university. I am coming right out of graduate school. I was very happy that part of the offer included relocation funding.

But, the relocation funding is provided through reimbursement. This is a problem for me because I have been a graduate student in a major US city for the last 6 years and as a result I don't have the money to spend on relocation such that they can reimburse me.

Is reimbursement typical or standard in academia when it comes to funding moving or relocation expenses? If it is typical or standard, this practice seems to assume that graduate students have access to thousands of dollars of cash or credit.

Amanda then replied:

I dealt with the same problem. It is indeed typical to not pay up front and assume the hire has the money or credit to pay for everything. And this will most likely be true for everything in the future, notably conference travel.

When I signed my contract I was told it would be easy to get moving money paid in advance. I then followed up on this, and was meet with massive layers of bureaucratic red tape and apathetic administrators. In the end, it just wasn't going to happen. So I got rid of all my furniture. Put the rest of what I could fit in my car, and drove across the country staying in Motel 6's.

And yes, everyone assumes you have thousands of dollars on credit cards. They absolutely assume this, and they assume that if you don't, then you can apply for a credit card and get one...

I'm curious whether anyone else has experience with this, and particularly whether anyone might have helpful advice for Relocator. My own sense is similar to Amanda's: that universities typically expect you to pay for things first (e.g. on credit) and then reimburse you later. In the past, when I was in debt, this posed problems for me too. However, I had enough open credit to deal with it, so that's what I did. But, as Amanda notes, not everyone has access to credit. What should relocator do? Do universities ever give advances on relocation expenses?

What looks good in teaching statements?

In our most recent "Ask a search-committee member" thread, Postdoc writes:

I'd like to know how search committees read teaching statements. I'm familiar with the standard advice on teaching statements from The Professor is In (give concrete examples, don't be saccharine, keep it down to one page), but I am curious what people on the other end are actually looking for. What can a search committee learn about a candidate from their teaching statement? What role - if any - does a teaching statement play when determining whether a candidate would be a good teacher? And, for good measure, what are some things that SC members find annoying?

Great questions! As readers may know, we've discussed teaching statements a few times. However, Postdoc is asking for a more detailed indication of what search committees look for. So let me offer a few thoughts and then open things up for other search-committee members to weigh in.

Summer sounds

Asking editors to reconsider?

A reader writes in:

After getting a rejection for very odd reasons, is it ever appropriate to write to an editor asking them to reconsider? 

I ask because I recently had a couple of rejections (different journals, different papers) that were very odd. In one case, the reviewer claimed I mischaracterized the position put forth by three philosophers (one of which is me) and pointed out that I failed to cite work that had not been published at the time of my submission. In the other case, I submitted a reply piece to the subfield journal where the target article appeared. The reviewer said that the debate relied on a misconception. 

I have always brushed the dust off my feet and moved on to a new journal when I get crappy comments like this (or no comments). However, I wonder if it would ever be appropriate to write back and say "hey, if this whole debate depends on a misconception, then you should not have published these two papers last year in your journal." Or "hey, I didn't mischaracterize my own argument from a few years back, and I can't time travel."

Good question! I've never asked an editor to reconsider, and I've heard anecdotally from editors that authors write in to object to reviews way too often. That being said, I have also heard a few people do it who've said they actually did get editors to change their mind by writing in to object. However, I assume this is rare, and don't know if it's worth trying. I guess my sense is that if it is really something egregious, then maybe a polite email pointing that out and respectfully asking whether they will reconsider could work.

What do you all think?

Mentoring program: mentee feedback

Updated July 25, 2019.

Readers may recall that Helen De Cruz and I have been running a Job-Market Mentoring Program for job-candidates the past several years. This was our third year running the program, and we were able to match 35 job-candidates with tenure-stream mentors. Although we will be getting the program started a little late this year (due to preexisting commitments Helen and I have), our plan is to open signups for this year's market cycle on August 1st.

Anyway, the past several weeks we have been collecting feedback from this year's mentors and mentees. This post will share the feedback that the mentees we've heard back from have authorized us to share. I will also continually update this post if and when we receive additional feedback. Next week, I'll share the feedback we've received from mentors. For more information on the program and previous years' feedback, see here.

Feedback from this year's mentees

1. Types of mentoring received (e.g. dossier materials?, interviewing, etc.):

“Cover letter help, interviewing, advice on publishing, general job market strategies.”

“I have been advised on all aspects of the job market, from dossier materials and interviews (both skype and on-campus).”

“[Redacted] reviewed my dossier materials, reviewed semester workplans that he incited me to prepare, read some of my work and answered my general questions about the job-market (Should I write a book? What do you think of press x? How do you perceive book chapters v. articles? How should I approach big conferences? Etc.).” – Étienne Brown

“dossier materials.”

“extensive feedback on dossier materials and mock interview.” - Joao Fabiano

“general advising via email.”

“Comments on dossier.”

“Dossier materials, general advice.”

“Dossier materials, interview advice, how to present and pitch my research and teaching.”

“CV, cover letter, teaching portfolio, research statement.”

"Advice on CV, cover letter, research statement and other job materials."

"Review application materials, prepare for interviews."

What search-committees look for in cover-letters

In our newest "Ask a search-committee member" thread, Anon writes:

Cover letters for me are to some extent the most mysterious part of the application, so much so that I think they shouldn't even be required.

I have read here already that you can tell just by reading someone's cover letter that they are or are not a good fit.

But what are you really looking for in one?

Are you looking for the cover letter to convince you of fit for the position mostly?

Are you looking for the cover to convince you I have tailored it sufficiently and done research about your school?

Maybe I am alone in this but I find this aspect of the application the most frustrating to compose, especially without just repeating thing that are found elsewhere in my dossier.

Do you have like a checklist for what might be considered "best practice" in a cover letter?

This is a great query. I will be curious to hear what other search-committee members think. But let me begin by sharing a few thoughts.

Propriety, good structures, and justice -- thoughts on leadership in academia

In spite of its meritocratic aspirations, academia is not a just place. There is a striking disconnect between the ideals of academia - meritocracy and an emphasis on talent no matter where it comes from - and the reality. This includes prestige bias (in graduate admissions and hiring, see also my earlier paper here), an unwelcome climate for minorities such as trans people), ableism, sexual harassment and assault cases, and so on. 

What can we do to improve our departments, and particularly, our profession? In this post I'll focus on leadership in academia, but the post might well apply to other domains, such as the corporate private sector, any kind of sector that has problems in equal opportunity for employees, sexual harassment, and so on.  I'm going to explore two ideas from Chinese philosophy (both mainly from the Warring States period) that propose two different kinds of intervention, one is more focused on civility and change of culture, the other more on institutional and legal frameworks. 

The aim of both kinds of interventions should ideally be to promote both harmonious relationships and flourishing of members of the profession (not only of tenure-track professors but also, graduate students, adjuncts, etc), and to promote justice, particularly for people who are not in positions of power, such as graduate students, adjuncts, and members of various minorities.

Compromising anonymized review

I came across this illuminating post by a former journal editor yesterday, and was reminded of a disturbing discussion I happened across on social media a couple of weeks ago. In that discussion, a philosopher on social media began by sharing an interesting proposal: that journals should ask submitting authors for a list of people they have circulated their paper to, in order to help ensure that the journal selects reviewers who do not know the author's identity (viz. ensuring anonymized review). Although a number of people expressed support for the proposal (myself included), there was some pushback, including one bit that I found concerning. At one point, one commenter mentioned that they thought the proposal could prevent journals from finding the most qualified reviewers for a given paper. Their suggestion was that in very small subfields the people most qualified to review a paper might be ones who have seen the paper before and know who its author is. That person then added that they routinely accept reviewer assignments in cases like this, estimating that approximately 50% (!) of the time they review papers, they either know or strongly suspect the author's identity.

This isn't the first time I've come across claims like this on social media. Over the past few years, I have come across multiple comment threads on social media where reviewers and even some editors have said similar things. For example, in previous threads, I've some suggest that if a reviewer knows who a paper's author is, then the editor should decide whether the reviewer should accept the assignment. I have to confess that I find this very concerning. Anonymized review exists for a reason. The entire point of it is to prevent explicit or implicit biases toward or against authors from affecting editorial outcomes--so that work is judged on its merits. Reviewers or editors deciding to let a review occur when the identity of an author is known compromises this protection against bias.

Do the little things matter on the market?

In our newest "Ask a search-committee member", grymes writes:

Here's something I'm curious about, looking back on the job market with at-least-closer-to-20/20 hindsight. My suspicion is that folks on the market (myself included) often commit the following fallacy: 'I'm competing against hundreds of well-qualified applicants for every job, therefore every minute detail of my application is likely to make a difference'. This fallacy (if it is one) tends to be encouraged by sources like The Professor Is In and, occasionally, posts on this blog, like the recent one about putting job talks on your CV. Frankly, I very much doubt that it makes a net difference whether or not you put job talks on your CV, or have a high quality photo of yourself on your website, or whatever. It may turn some people off, it may turn other people on, it will hardly be registered by most search committee members (including those who interview you). Ditto for a hundred other small decisions you make when putting your materials together. The things that land you interviews are (a) the big things that you can no longer control when you're tweaking applications in the Fall, (b) the idiosyncratic tastes of departments and individual search committee members, which you can sometimes appeal to by tailoring cover letters, but which are often invisible, and (c) luck. That's my hunch, anyway. I'd be curious to hear search committee members weigh in.

'Now' responded:

I agree. The most important by far is (a) the big things you can no longer control ...
If you still only have two conference presentations and no publications on your c.v. when you apply for a job, that will really determine how you will fare in the competition for that job. If you still have never taught your own course when your application goes in, all the hypothetical course syllabi in the world will not make a difference for most jobs at teaching oriented colleges. etc.

I'd be curious to hear search-committee members weigh in too. I'm inclined to agree that the big things matter the most: one's publication record, research program, teaching experience, service experience, and overall 'fit' to the department. Nevertheless, I am also inclined to think the small things matter too--particularly how one comes across in one's materials. Allow me to briefly explain.

Grad question on philosophy of math

A reader writes in:

How much math and also what math should one learn, in order to do well (maybe even stand out) in the philosophy of math? I'm a philosophy PhD student who knows roughly the first three semesters of calculus for an undergraduate science or engineering major. I also know that there are philosophers who make notable contributions to the philosophy of math without much mathematical training. So, to be careful with my question, what are the best math classes for philosophers of math---who enjoy taking math classes---to take?

I don't know the answers to these questions. Do any of you?