The Philosophers' Cocoon

Grappling with the COVID-era job market

In the comment thread on my post on publishing advice for grad students and other early career people, a grad student writes:

As a graduate student, I do appreciate the time and effort made to help us figure out how to best go about trying to publish papers. My biggest concern is that such posts utterly fail to take into account the current moment. Maybe such advice will be applicable in the future (we can hope!), but for right now, I'd love to see advice that explicitly takes into account the fact that the academic job market has simply collapsed.

This is a great point, and I'd love to offer more posts and discussion how to grapple effectively with the post-COVID reality. I just haven't been quite sure how to do so. I'm definitely open to suggestions! One graduate student planning on defending their dissertation made one suggestion, namely:

I just mean it could also be good to talk about the nuts and bolts of building a plan B.

For example: if I have to devote half my working hours now to developing a set of skills for plan B, as I in fact am, which of the more purely academic skills should get cut first, that are also the least likely to just totally tank my prospects (however antecedently dim) of getting a job in academia?

For me, I've basically leaned into the research and forsaken any hope of developing a compelling teaching portfolio.

My research habits have also changed. I've gone more in the direction of, write and try to publish papers I'm excited to write, don't worry about the bigger picture or how this stuff hangs together. Because all indications are that I've got maybe 18 months left in this profession, and none of that big picture stuff will pan out.

You can hopefully see how serious, and scary, these sorts of decisions can be.

I wonder what readers think: first, on the nuts and bolts of preparing for a plan B, but also, second, on whether this person's decisions are good ones.

I myself don't have any advice on the nuts and bolts of building a plan B. But I have a few thoughts on the other issue. Personally, I think the decision to focus on publishing stuff you're excited about is a great one. It's more or less the strategy that I adopted when my time on the job market looked like it was running out--and it not only made philosophy again; I started publishing a lot more than I ever did before. My rationale was basically this: "If I'm going to flunk out of this profession, I might as well go down doing work that I enjoy and believe in." It was pretty transformative, and I've never looked back.

On the other hand, I'm a bit less sure about this individual's decision to lean into research and forsake any hope of developing a teaching portfolio. I think whether this is a good decision probably depends on three things:

1. Whether the academic job market is likely to be equally catastrophic in future years.
2. Whether this person is willing to stay on the market beyond this year.
3. Whether they are interested in community college jobs.

On (1) & (2): given that effective vaccines seem to be on the horizon, and people are likely to be vaccinated en masse, it seems to me highly likely that the academic job market will recover. Of course, this job market was already brutal before COVID, but that's a different story. The point is, the market seems to me like it is likely to recover pretty significantly--so if this individual's decisions are predicated upon the assumption that the market is going to be consistently like it is this year, I think that may be a bad bet (one anecdote: it looks like my department will probably hire a tenure-track person once COVID is resolved--and I expect many other universities are waiting to do hires as well). So, it seems to me, if this person is willing to stick on the academic market for at least a couple of years after their defense, the drastic decisions they are making now (focusing on research rather than developing their teaching portfolio) might be really short-sighted.

On that note, it's worth thinking about (3): community college jobs. As this discussion revealed, community college jobs can be really great; you just need a wealth of teaching experience (and ideally, experience teaching at a community college) to be competitive. I personally know a few full-time tenure-track faculty at community colleges, and they love their jobs (seemingly more, in fact, than some of the faculty I know at 4-year universities). Moreover, from what I have heard, community colleges are expected to flourish post-COVID. During times of economic uncertainty, people seem to flee 4-year universities for community colleges, and so the latter are likely to need more faculty, not fewer (indeed, I've already seen some of my own students say they are taking time away from university during COVID to take community college classes for economic reasons). So, it seems to me, if this reader is seriously interested in an academic job and they might be happy with a CC job, their decision to lean into research at the detriment of developing their teaching portfolio seems like it could be doubly short-sighted (though, of course, they might not want a teaching-heavy CC job).

But these are just my thoughts. What are yours? Also, if any readers have any suggestions for other topics the Cocoon might cover to address the first reader's concerns (how to better help early-career people in the post-COVID reality), I'm all ears!

Addressing ability to attract outside funding?

In our November "how can we help you?" thread, Mary writes:

Writing applications now, [currently a] post doc, second year on the market [applying for TT jobs]. I think I finally have a handle on how to address what hiring committees are looking for with one big exception: evidence of ability to attract funding. I see this frequently in Europeans jobs (yea I’m including the UK in that). Not only am I confused what exactly they are looking for and why, but I simply don’t have anything that can be squished until it kind of looks like evidence for external funding when you squint. It’s just not something that ever came up for me (or anyone in my cohort), I didn’t even know it was a thing until I started seeing it on job ads to be honest. My ideal is a European job so I would really appreciate any advice how to address this.

This is a great query. When I was on the market, I was very interested in European jobs. However, I had no idea how to address this kind of issue, as external funding isn't something that grad students early-career philosophers in the United States are generally expected or encouraged to obtain. Is this something that can be overcome, or is a lack of a track record of obtaining external funding basically a disqualifier for obtaining a job in European countries where this sort of thing is expected? If not, what is the best thing for a candidate like Mary to do in her application materials?  

Looking at job-candidate websites?

In our November "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I have two questions about the role of personal websites in the job application process.

1. What are some reasons search committee members might visit an applicant's webpage?
I have a hidden, password-protected page on my website that contains all my application materials and a few additional ones. I put the address and password in my cover letters. Now that most of my applications are in, I see that people from regions I applied in are visiting my webpage, but they are not using this page. Instead, they are just browsing the website in general. Most frequently, they spend a minute or less on my homepage and research page. Sometimes it's less than 30 seconds and just my homepage. But I'm not sure what information they are looking for in these pages, since all of it is predictably contained in my dossier. The only thing I can think of is that the website gives a vibe of who the candidate is, or maybe they just want to see a photo?

2. In what stage of the process do search committees look at the candidates' websites?
For example, is it when they go through the batch to make the initial cut? It is when they decide on the long list? I'm sure there's a lot of variation, but I wonder if there are some commonalities. I'm curious because of a pattern I see on my website. Sometimes there is a burst of visitors from a certain place for a few days and then they stop vising my website. Could this be interpreted as some vague indication that there was a discussion of my dossier? If I don't hear from that department in the following weeks and they have stopped visiting my website, should I take it as some sort of signal that my dossier is no longer considered? On the one hand, intuitively, it does seem to me like a sign that they lost interest. On the other hand, this happened to me with several departments and I haven't seen reports that any of them invited people for interviews or any updates about their searches.

Another reader submitting the following reply:

I think you are overthinking this way too much. This is the sort of worrying that leads to serious anxiety around the job market. Your job is to submit an application. Then leave it to the committee to do their work. Some people will look at your webpage and some won't. The one case I remember most vividly is a very unaccomplished colleague trolling around looking for dirt on an application ... and finding it! So just keep the content professional.

In one sense (as I explain below), I think the OP probably is overthinking things. But as the follow-up comment notes, one reason search committee members may visit a candidate's website is to simply see how professional and 'put together' a candidate is. So, I think it is important to reflect a bit on why search committee member might visit candidate websites.

Updating search committees?

In our November "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

Suppose that an R1 institution schedules a first-round Zoom interview with a job applicant. And suppose that between the moment the interview was scheduled and the interview itself, this applicant receives a request to contribute to a special issue of a specialty journal and an invitation to contribute to an edited volume on some topic relevant to their AOS.

Should this applicant inform the search committee of these developments? Or do these developments not rise to the level of newsworthy?

And in a case like this, what developments are newsworthy such that an applicant should inform search committee members?

Good questions! I'm inclined to think that it's just fine to inform a committee of new accomplishments, such as a new forthcoming (i.e. accepted) publication. However, I'm not sue that mere invitations to contribute to a special issue or edited volume rise to that level. What do all you think, particularly those of you who have served on search committees? Which kinds of developments are newsworthy enough to inform search committees about?

Philosophers in Industry updates!

This is just a quick note that I made significant updates to the Philosophers in Industry directory, adding over 20 entries yesterday thanks to a helpful reader. Given how historically awful this year's academic job market is, my hope that the directory will help philosophers in need of work network outside of academia, as well as better appreciate the kinds of possibilities open to philosophers in industry. Looking at the updates, a few things really pop out at me.

First, 'ontologist' jobs seem to be a big growth area. I don't know much about the line of work, but it appears to involve logic and formal semantics--the general aim being to improve how software applications (including AI and web search engines) reason and categorize things. There is a pretty large number of ontologists listed on the directory, both at big corporations (Amazon, Dell) and smaller start-ups. Second, although I recall seeing a few job ads from them on PhilJobs over the years, I did not realize until now how big of an employer of philosophers Cycorp appears to be.

In brief, people with philosophy degrees can get very good jobs in industry, especially (but not only) if they are willing to learn how to code and network well. Over the years, many readers at the Cocoon and elsewhere have despaired over a philosophy PhD only preparing them for poorly paying, 'entry-level' jobs. I hope the Directory helps despairing readers see that philosophical training can be leveraged into good careers outside of the academy, and that it serves as a helpful resource for networking, finding good jobs, and learning what it takes to transition into them!

Listing articles under review?

In our November "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

Does anyone have strong feelings about listing "under review" manuscripts in a separate section of the CV? (That is, below the actual publications, of course.)

On the one hand, it seems smart to let everyone know that one has a pile of research that could be accepted for publication any day now. On the other hand, I'm not sure whether anyone will be impressed by the fact that one submits a lot for publication consideration, much of which might not ever be published anyway.

Another reader submitted the following response:

I would say it is not smart, and it does not seem smart. Too often people who do list things under review are deceptive - after all, you can list anything and any journals, and there is no effective way to confirm any of this information. Consequently, it does not belong on a c.v. - translation: course of life. All you end up doing is making more work for search committees because they have to work through what the person is really claiming, and this takes time if you are looking at 85 c.v.s

I entirely agree with this response. As a past search committee member, it rub me the wrong way when I see articles listed as under review on a CV. When I'm hiring, I'm looking for hard accomplishments--specifically, the kinds of accomplishments that are likely to get the candidate tenured or promoted at my institution. Listing articles under review, even many of them, just isn't good evidence of that: a publishing record is. Now, I know sometimes search committees--particularly search committees at research institutions (or so I've heard)--look to hire on the basis of a candidate's 'promise'. But here too, it doesn't seem to me like having a bunch of articles under review is good evidence of that. If I were interested in some nebulous notion of promise, I would instead want to focus on the candidate's research statement, writing sample, and recommendation letters. So again, I just don't see the purpose of listing articles under review.

But these are just my thoughts. As we all know from past discussions on this blog, search committee members can differ wildly on how they think about things and evaluate candidates. So I wonder what other search committee members think. Any other search committee members willing to weigh in on this?

The post-interview waiting game

In our November "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

Going on two weeks post first round interview; committee said they'd be in touch by early November.

I have heard nothing even after reaching out once to try and get an update.

Is this unusual or are the circumstances and idiosyncrasies of particular searches and committees just too different to say anything meaningful?

Good question. I think there are all kinds of possible explanations here. The most obvious is that given that we're just around 30% through the month, it's still technically early November--so the OP could hear any day. A second, related possibility is simply that the committee has had trouble finding time to meet to make a decision on who to move forward with. A third possibility is that the committee has met but is having trouble deciding between one or more candidates. A fourth possibility is that they have decided and sent their recommendations on who to invite to campus to the college dean, but the dean is being slow with things. You get the picture by now. It could be just about anything.

This is just one of many reasons why I think, as some other readers have noted, the best thing to do in general is to try your best to put things out of your mind and not get your hopes up. Either you'll get a campus invite or you won't. There's nothing you can do about it post-interview. I know, it's maddening--but in my experience the best thing to do is to simply move on in your own mind and if you get a campus invite, you get a very happy surprise.

But these are just my thoughts. What are yours?

How long do search committees take?

(Comments open now!)

In our November "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I have a question related to applying for jobs this year. It's my first time on the market. I've read a lot of articles and blog posts about the unspoken rules of academic searches and their timelines, one of them being: you often don't get informed about having been rejected until much, much later. I find myself wondering: How much time, on average, does it take the search committee to come up with a list of first-round interviewees after the job posting deadline? I'm asking about TT jobs especially. In other words, when can I reasonably assume that I'm no longer in the running? I've read here and there that it's about 2-6 weeks, but that guess wasn't specific to our field. (And could this timeline be altered during the pandemic?)

One search committee member submitted the following response:

This is in response to job-seeker. 2-6 weeks strikes me as quite fast. I'm on a search committee this year, and we're not intending to contact shortlisted applicants until 7-8 weeks after the deadline. It takes a long time to read applications! Perhaps it makes a difference that we'll go straight to (zoom) talks, rather than doing first-round (zoom) interviews.

I think these two comments are a bit telling. On the one hand, on the search committees that I've served on, we've tried to move fast, meeting just a week or two after the application deadline. However, as the above search committee member notes, they move quite a bit more slowly: 7-8 weeks is close to two months after the application deadline. When I was a job-candidate, I got a first-round interview for a job over two months after the deadline. So, sadly, I think the answer to the OP is: you never really know. Search committees can make decisions quickly, or they can take their time. The best thing to do in order to know whether interview decisions have been made, I think, is for candidates who have received them to report them on our job-market reporting thread (which has been oddly quiet so far this season).

How do search committees work? - part 1: reading candidate files

Now that we're in the midst of the academic job season (a horrific one, I know), I thought it might be helpful to current and future job-candidates to try running a series soliciting from search-committee members an inside view on how their deliberations work. For example, how do search committee members read applications? What do they look for in interviews? How do search committees deliberate in meetings in deciding who to interview? How do they deliberate in deciding who to invite to campus? Whom to hire? I'd like to begin today by asking search committee members to share how they read applications. Here are some questions to consider:

1. Do you read applications before the deadline?
2. If so, do you think it matters whether candidates apply early?
3. In what order do you read documents? Why?
4. What do you look for in different parts of the application (e.g. the CV, research statement, teaching dossier, diversity statements, etc.)?
5. How large of a role do recommendation letters play?
6. Etc.

Any search committee members out there willing to weigh in?

How long should job-market materials be?

In our November "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I am writing in response to the thread that got going earlier on diversity statements and their length. One respondent mentioned that all of their materials were just one page, and I'd like to hear from others if this is true of them as well, and also from perhaps hiring committee members that this is what they prefer. I'm especially interested in the proper length of a research statement.

In my own case, my diversity and teaching statements are one page. However, my research statement is longer. I've had friends who have been hired share their research statements with me, and they were very long, like, five pages singled-spaced long. Now I know someone can say, "Well, that whole thing isn't going to get read." But I guess my response is, so? It's all there if they want to read it. My statement is fairly long, but I also have a little roadmap that tells them what area of my research I discuss in each section. So if they want to jump around, they can do that. Is that bad? Would that annoy you if you were a hiring committee member?

One more thought here (I know this is already long-winded): Wouldn't it be the case that shorter research statements speak in broad brush strokes? And isn't that not great? I'm imagining a short statement that just spends three or four sentences describing each project, or just says things like, "My next project explores the rationality of anger; I argue X." The end. I guess my issue with this tricky document is figuring out how to say enough for the reader to see your ideas are not half-baked, but not so much that it starts to read like a scholarly article.

Help?

Great questions! I'll be very curious to hear what other readers who have served on search committees think. However, here are a few quick thoughts of my own.

Job-market consultants/services?

Back in 2015 in the Cocoon's Job-Market Boot Camp series, I shared my experience using a job-market consultant. This week, a reader emailed me asking who I used and whether we could have a thread discussing consultants. Given how catastrophic this year's academic job-market is so far, I think it could be helpful to not only discuss academic job-market consultants, but also any potentially helpful services to help job-seekers transition into non-academic jobs.

So, then, I'll put out four questions to our readers:

1. What academic job-market consultants are out there?
2. If you have used an academic job-market consultant, would you recommend using them?
3. What non-academic job-market services are there to help job-seekers?
4. If you have used a non-academic job-search service, would you recommend using them?

I'll answer first. I used Karen Kelsky from The Professor Is In as an academic job-market consultant way back in 2014. I have to confess that I was pretty skeptical about the service. It was also damn expensive, and I couldn't really afford it (especially given that I was still in substantial student debt at the time). However, I had been on the market for six years, planned for my seventh year to be my last, and personally knew two other philosophers who got tenure-track jobs after using her--so my spouse and I decided I should give two of her services (dossier review and interviewing intervention) a try as a last ditch shot. Surprisingly, although I was skeptical and found Kelsky a bit gruff personally, my sense is that her help vastly improved my materials and helped me correct a few bad interviewing habits--and I ended up finally getting a tenure-track job. It's hard to know whether using her services 'made the difference', as it were. After all, correlation isn't causation, and I might have ended up with a tenure-track job anyway. I'm also just one person, though, and it was a long time ago, so I cannot vouch for the quality of the services today. But this was my experience.

What about the rest of you? Do any of you have experience with academic or non-academic job-consultants (or similar services)? If so, what was your experience like?

Query on diversity statements

In our October "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

How long should a diversity statement be for R1 jobs and postdocs? Many of these job ads ask for one, but none of them specify length.

Good question. I understand that some universities have detailed rubrics for diversity statements, in which case I'm guessing the answer is: the statement should be as concise as possible while aiming to satisfy as many things in the rubric as possible (given the applicant's background). Do all universities that require diversity statements have similar rubrics? If so, it might be good to hear about how similar or different they are to the one outlined above. It might also be good to hear from search committee members on how long effective diversity statements tend to be, and as a general rule what is too short or too long. Finally, it could be good to hear from search committee members on some "do's" but also some "don'ts" (i.e. things that candidates sometimes write in diversity statements that don't come off very well). Anyone with experience and insight willing and able to weigh in?

The 'any questions for us?' question

In our October "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I'm curious if folks who have been on hiring committees can shed some light on the oft-used concluding question at interviews: "Do you have any questions for us?"

My understanding is that this is, in one sense, a genuine ask: does the candidate have any questions we haven't addressed? But, clearly, it is also a signaling opportunity: what sorts of things does the candidate care about, and what can we glean about them as a colleague, teacher, and philosopher from these questions?

There are obviously terrible answers: "How much is the pay?" "Can I wear jorts to work?" "Are the students there really as bad as I've heard?"

But it's much less clear to me what constitutes a *good* question to ask here. I've heard of folks asking about developing courses, research funding, and extra-curriculars, but these seem overdone now (since we've all been taught from the same playbook, so to speak).

Maybe those who have served on committees could offer some more specific advice/commentary on this. Are there any answers to this question that have really struck you as *good*? What sorts of things make you cringe? What are you tired of hearing? What sorts of things make a candidate stand out here?

Great questions! Any search committee members willing to weigh in? I'll just share three brief thoughts: (1) In my experience, good questions show that you have done your homework on the institution and actually thought in some depth about ways that you might contribute; (2) As a general rule, I think questions about the philosophy club tend to be cringeworthy (as it can seem to betray a kind of laziness in terms of learning anything more substantial about the institution before the interview). Beyond this, I'm not sure though. I think it would be great to hear from other search committee members!

Teaching statements & COVID?

In our October "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I'm curious whether and how everyone on the market is changing their teaching statements to fit the new realities of teaching. Teaching right now has required significant changes in techniques for most, if not all of us. For example, I'm teaching hybrid, socially distanced classes and my usual activities can't be used. I've tried adapted versions, but honestly, they did not go as well for practical reasons. Should I downplay the in-class activities in my teaching statement? Should we all have paragraphs devoted to hybrid and online teaching generally? What are people doing?

Great questions! I think it would be great to hear from both job-candidates and search committee members. Anyone have any insight?

Interviewing tips for religious university jobs

In our October "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

Could you address some potential strategies for interviewing at religiously affiliated--specifically Catholic--liberal arts colleges? My general sense is that the school is less interested in the applicant's particular beliefs or religious affiliations and more in hearing how the candidate is able to incorporate the university's religious values into teaching, research, and service. This may be right but I can's escape the nagging feeling that there will be some left field question about religion or theology that will throw me off?

Is this a well founded worry?

Another reader submitted the following response:

My experience with Catholic schools was not great. I was long-listed for a number of jobs at such schools, because of my profile. Inevitably they ask a question or questions that are the litmus test. They ask what you know about Catholic philosophy ... I was educated at a place where I knew who Jacques Maritain was ... and other greats in 20th C Catholic philosophy. I think I was too honest. I am not saying these places only hire Catholics, but they generally are looking for one of their own.

This coheres with my own experience applying for jobs at Catholic schools. I recall, even at the application stage, a number of Catholic universities that I applied to requiring materials (e.g. statements speaking to the Catholic mission of the university) that suggested they were probably looking for someone in the faith. However, I also remember applying to a number of other religiously-affiliated universities (particularly non-Catholic schools) that seemed entirely open to candidates irrespective of these kinds of things. What are other people's experiences here? It would be great to hear from job candidates about their experiences, as well as people at religious institutions who can comment on their hiring priorities and practices.

How to list talks on a CV

In our October "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

How should talks appear on a CV? I'm late-junior stage (about to be tenured) so I've given more than a few. Do I just list the most recent? Going back how far? Do I list the most prestigious and somehow indicate that it's a selected list? Do I not list any? For context, the 'talks' section of my CV is currently taking up a little over a page, about the same as my publications. How do other people navigate this?

Another reader submitted the following reply:

A common practice is to have a list of invited talks, and then a list of refereed conference talks. Each list is labelled - clearly! I assume, if you have some publications (a page worth), that that is what will really determine whether you get tenure or not. Talks are much more important for early career people with few pubs. I am far along, and generally just list recent talks.

I'm curious what other people think. What do you all do, and why?

 

Explaining CV oddities in applications?

In our September "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes in:

I am a second-year M.A. student of Philosophy at a low ranked university, looking forward to applying for another master's next year in a better university. I passed nine graduate philosophy courses with good grades. My bachelor studies were not in Philosophy and I had just one Philosophy course at bachelor, so I think I need my master's degree (and courses) for a successful application to a philosophy major. I have no personal problem completing my current studies as a master student to get my degree, but there is an educational law in my country that prevents people from entering master studies twice unless the mandatory military service (which lasts two years) is completed. I can withdraw from my current M.A. and apply for another M.A. without any problem with this law. In that case, my current university will give me an official transcript, but no degree. I prefer this withdraw option because it saves two years for me. Are there any problems with the withdrawal from my current master's in applying for another master? I mean does this have a bad effect on the strength of my application, and should I mention this in my application? Thanks for your advice.

This is an interesting query in a couple of respects. First, it raises questions not only about what this particular poster should do given their situation. Second, it raises more general questions about what people should do--both in graduate school applications and in job applications--regarding similar 'oddities' on their CV.

What do you all think? First, what do you think this reader should do? Do you think withdrawing from one MA and applying to another will give them problems? If so, what's the best path forward for them? Should they try to explain their situation in some way in their application? And how, more generally, do you think applicants should handle similar CV oddities? (If you have a CV oddity yourself, feel free to share it and/or how you handled it in the comments section!).

How are different types of publications weighted?

Yesterday on social media I came across an interesting question: namely, how different types of publications are weighted, both on the job market and in tenure and promotion. Among other things, it was brought to my attention that different types of publications can be valued more in some countries than others. For example, I learned that in Germany, publications in edited volumes are looked upon very highly, but that in the UK, this may not be true (with exceptions, perhaps, for publications in volumes published by OUP or CUP). Similarly, I heard that public philosophy (i.e. publications in popular press such as Aeon, The New York Times, etc.) can be looked upon highly in the US, but not in other countries. I think it might be great to crowdsource more information about these differences in the comments section below.

I also think it might be good to hear people's thoughts on other particular issues, such as how it looks to a search committee  or tenure and promotion (T&P) committee when most of a candidate's publications are in edited volumes (as opposed to journals). For example, suppose someone has a publication or two in decent but not great journals, but a bunch of publications in edited volumes by top-ranked presses with influential editors. How do people think this looks on the job-market and in T&P? On the one hand, I imagine that it may look good to publish in volumes put together by big name editors for good presses. On the other hand, I've always wondered whether publishing primarily in edited volumes may raise the following concern: namely, that publishing in edited volumes is a more ambiguous measure of research quality than publishing in journals. After all, one of the key things about journal publishing--at least in the present system--is that peer-review is anonymized. In edited volumes, on the other hand, the editors know who you are and (depending on the review process) so too may any reviewers they send your chapter to. Because content for edited volumes isn't selected by a fully (double- or triple-) anonymized process, the worry is that readers (i.e. search committees or T&P committees) won't feel in a good position to know if the work was selected primarily on its merits or as a result of the person having 'good connections.'

For these reasons, I can't help but wonder--at least in terms of job-market success and eventual tenure decisions--whether candidates should focus primarily on journal publishing. Maybe I'm off on this--it's just something I've long wondered about, and figured it might be good to hear from more people about. Anyway, what do you all think, particularly those of you with good experience in these matters? How are different kinds of publications weighted on the job-market and T&P? How do things differ from country to country? And how do things differ with respect to department types (e.g. do R1 institutions weigh certain things more heavily than non-R1's)?

Visualizations of PhD program placement data

Charles Lassiter (Gonzaga) writes in:

I've been working on a project for some time now. I've downloaded placement and graduation data from Philjobs, cleaned it up, did some analyses, and visualized the findings. The result is a site where visitors can find job placement rates for PhD programs. There's also a searchable drill-down table where users can see where graduates of a program have historically placed. You can find it here: https://charleslassiter.weebly.com/placement-data.html

Lassiter adds, "This is an ongoing project and I plan to update every 6 months in September (for job seekers) and March (for students headed into PhD programs)." He also notes that, "The biggest issue is that the data is crowd-sourced from Philjobs' placement page as well as PhilPeople profiles."

Publishing outside one's AOS/AOC and the market

In our September "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I am a grad student who has been fortunate enough to publish a few papers. But my publication record is peculiar: while I have one paper in an AOS in a top generalist journal, my other two papers are in areas I don't even list as an AOC. (One is in a specialist journal; the other is in a decent generalist journal.)

These latter two papers were the culminations of side projects. I am hesitant to list the relevant areas even as AOC's because I sincerely consider myself incompetent to, without very serious preparation, teach advanced undergraduate-level survey courses on them. Basically, in both areas, I found a niche question and completely ignored any literature that did not directly address it. I have no other background in these areas. Moreover, I do not expect to continue research in these areas. My current research lies within my AOS's.

I am curious how hiring committees would perceive such a publication record. In my own case, I do have at least a couple years before I go on the job market. So, if I am lucky, I might be able to get another publication or two squarely within my AOS's. But whether or not that happens, how would hiring committees view an applicant with several publications in areas that they do not list as either an AOC or AOS?

This query raises a few good questions:

1. What is enough background to list something as an AOC?
2. How do search committees think about candidates who publish outside of their AOS & AOC?

I'll be honest about #1: it's never been quite clear to me what is sufficient to claim something as an AOC. As this reader notes, the standard rule of thumb is whether you would be able to teach an advanced undergraduate course. However, as someone who has hired four times at a liberal arts university, this rule of thumb actually seems wrong to me. We normally have people only teach upper-division undergraduate courses in their AOS, and treat AOCs more like areas that a person would be well-prepared to teach lower-division courses. And so, in that regard, we're looking for things like 'enough graduate coursework' or teaching experience in the area to make us think that the candidate has a fairly good basic understanding of the area.

In terms of question 2, my guess here is that search committees think very differently here at R1 institutions as opposed to liberal arts universities. At R1's, my sense is that search-committees are primarily look for someone who is outstanding in their AOS--someone who is likely to 'make a name for themselves' and become a leading figure in their main research area. So, to this extent, my bet is that unless your publications outside of your AOS/AOC are in leading journals and you have a good track record publishing in top journals in your AOS, they may work against you, making you look like you lack focus. However, for liberal arts universities, my sense is that the opposite may be true: that publications outside of your AOS/AOC may make you look like a more attractive candidate--namely, as someone with broad research interests with the ability (at least in principle) to teach a wider variety of courses. 

But these are just my guesses. Anyone in the know care to weigh in on either or both questions?

Types of journals and the job market

In our September "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I'm an upper-year PhD student whose looking to go on the job market in a year or two. My question: in deciding where to publish papers, how should I balance general prestige with area focus? My default view has always been to just publish in the best general journals possible. I guess my more specific question then is whether there is any special value in, for instance, publishing in a less prestigious ethics-focused journal as opposed to a general journal that might be more 'prestigious.' My thought has always been that people looking at a CV want the most prestigious journal possible, but I hear from some that there might be a value in going for an ethics-focused journal, at least at times.

I'm curious to hear from people in the know here. I would have thought that as far as R1 jobs are concerned, as long as you're publishing in top journals, you're good to go. I mean, is it really going to bother someone that you haven't published in an ethics journal if you've published in, say, Phil Review, Nous, and PPR? That just seems weird to me. And when it comes to non-R1/SLAC jobs, my sense is that venue doesn't tend to matter much in general. As long as you're publishing consistently in decent journals and your work is interesting, you're a good candidate. 

Am I missing something? Anyone in the know care to weigh in?

Job Market Reporting Thread (2020-21 season)

Each year, readers ask for threads for discussing and reporting news on the job-market. I recently posted this season's discussion thread here. Please visit that thread if you are interested in discussing/commiserating about this year's market. The current thread (below) is for reporting news on the market (i.e. reporting interviews, flyouts, offers, hires, and so on). Although it should go without saying, commenters are asked to please remember the Cocoon's supportive mission while reporting. A link to this thread will remain on the blog's right sidebar for the remainder of the job season.

Flagging your career stage/situation in job apps?

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, a reader asks:

I wonder how TT assistant professor folks can flag that they are in their first or second year when applying for TT positions? The worry is that folks on search committees may unwittingly favor assistant professors who are further along the tenure track because these folks will often have more publications and generally a more robust CV.

Two readers replied:

Your CV will do it, so long as you list employment and dates. - Submitted by TT

JuniorTT, it should come across clearly on your CV. That is, your employment history should make explicit when you got your PhD, when you started your job, etc., from which search committees shouldn't have to work too hard to figure out how far along on the tenure track you are. I also don't think there's anything wrong with a cover letter saying: "I'm in my second year of a TT position at X, but I'm interested in your job because Y..." - Submitted by Daniel

Let me add a couple of quick remarks here that I think job applicants in general might find helpful, and then add a question to follow up on Daniel's reply.

Listing pro-life publications on a CV?

In our "how can we help you?" thread, a reader asks: 

Suppose you have 3 publications. 2 in one area, 1 in another area. But suppose that the 1 publication identifies you as being pro-life. Is it better to keep this publication on your CV, outing you as being pro-life, or is it better to leave it off, thereby looking less accomplished and depriving yourself of an area of specialization?

My concern here is that this position (pro-life) is not only unpopular, but appears to be frowned upon in lots of philosophy circles. For example, Elizabeth Harman recently said on the blog of the APA (!) that she considers most opposition to abortion *sexist*. So, if she knows someone is pro-life, this makes it pretty likely that that person's application will be thrown out. (Would you hire a sexist?) It seems that Harman's views aren't idiosyncratic. So, which strategy is more advantageous?

Interesting questions, and I'm not sure what the answers are. I tend to think that when you're on the j0b market, you should be honest, rolling with your actual accomplishments and who you really are. Sure, some people may not want to hire someone who's pro-life. But surely there are some people at some places (e.g. Christian universities) who do. Would you really want to work somewhere where people would discriminate against you, or where you feel like you need to hide your views? Suppose you do get hired. Sooner or later, people there are likely to find out about your pro-life views and work. What then? Wouldn't it be better for you to get a job at a university where people do value what you do? I understand the job market is awful and it's natural to want any job rather than no job at all. But I've also known people get jobs at universities they are miserable at and trying (mostly in vain) to leave. Better, I think, to get the right job to begin with.

But these are just my thoughts. What are yours?

Getting an academic job with an MA?

In our August "how can we help you?" thread, a reader asks: "Is it possible for one to have an academic job (eg. lecturer) with only an MA? How does one go about finding such jobs?" As a reader commented on to follow up, there are basically three ways to get an academic job with only an MA:

1. Part-time adjunct positions often only require an MA, but are low-paying without full-time benefits.
2. Some full-time lecturer positions at universities may only require an MA, but appear to be quite rare in philosophy.
3. Many permanent community college jobs appear to only require an MA.

I suspect that of these three options, the first is the most common (but least attractive of the three), and that if one wants full-time employment with an MA, the third option is probably one's best shot. But I don't know for sure. Anyone with experience on this care to weigh in? 

Getting a 2nd PhD to stay in philosophy?

In our August "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I have a PhD in philosophy but haven't been able to get a TT job despite a few years on the market. I still want to be a professional philosopher.

My publication record is good enough for tenure at nearly any R1. But I came from a Leiter low-ranked school, and multiple search committee members have told me that this makes me unhireable.

Is it possible to get a second philosophy PhD, from a school like NYU or Princeton, to check the 'pedigree' and 'fancy advisor' boxes?

One reader responded as follows:

[N]o, that is not possible—no high-ranking program would accept someone who already had a PhD . Do you really have a tenure at an R1 profile? Like multiple articles a year + a book with a top-notch press, something like that? I do not think that what you propose is wise, even if it were possible. I would invest in conferencing (I know, Covid, but for the time being, online conferences)—if you become well-known in your sub discipline, you can get letters etc, to overcome the lack of “clout” of your home institution. it’s always a gamble, though. I know very smart accomplished people from high-ranked programs who have been shut out—no interviews, year after year. It sucks—you always think someone else has the golden ticket, truth is, there is no golden ticket.

While I think this reader is almost certainly right that a second philosophy PhD is out of the question, there's another fairly obvious possibility that I'm curious about readers' thoughts to: seeking a second PhD in another discipline. For example, suppose you work in moral or political philosophy. Although some philosophers (e.g. Scanlon) think empirical work is irrelevant to normative philosophical matters, there are those of who who deeply disagree--people who think that things like empirical psychology and political science are vital to draw on in moral and political theorizing. So, if moral or political is your philosophical focus and you really want to stay in academia, why not consider pursuing a second PhD in one of these areas? Doing so could not open up other job-markets to you (e.g. academic and industry jobs in psych and poli-sci), but also give you time to keep publishing in philosophy. Similarly, if the person works in logic, epistemology, or philosophy of science, there are all kinds of science-y PhDs they might pursue. 

If, as this reader claims, they really do have an R1-tenure-worthy publication record, then I have to imagine that someone in philosophy would eventually hire them if they stay on the market, particularly if they keep publishing at a good clip. Given how terrible the market is, it's all to easy to have an extended 'string of bad luck' (I spent 7 years on the market myself!). So, again, why not pursue a 2nd PhD in another field? Doing so, again, could enable this person to stay on the philosophy job-market while preparing them for additional job-markets. It would, of course, mean another 5-7+ years in a philosophy grad program. However, if they really don't want to leave academia, this seems to me a better option than, say, long-term adjunct work.

But these are just my thoughts. What are yours?

Putting Zoom talks to online groups on CVs?

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, Al writes:

People are forming all kinds of zoom groups. Suppose it’s wildly unlikely that you would have been brought out to a campus setting for some event but a group of people invited you to speak or present something to their department zoom group or these people are reading something of yours and they invite you join in that week. This doesn’t feel CV worthy to me but I also can’t see why not exactly... it’s a lot like a department or research group inviting you to their campus for a colloquium in a way... just no plane ticket. I’m tempted to add a “Covid/online activity” section to my cv. Any thoughts?

I haven't been a part of any of these groups, but I've heard a bit about them. People increasingly seem to be getting invited to provide guest-talks to other people's classes (including graduate seminars), as well as to reading groups of various sorts--some housed primarily within a department and others including scholars from other universities (particularly universities in the surrounding region). In response to this query, another reader ('Appearances') wrote:

You can put what you want on your cv. But the lower grade the stuff is that you list, the lower you are pitching yourself. I advised someone to take their computer skills off their cv...and then they got a permanent position. They were pitching themselves in a way that made them look like ...

This seems right to me. Appearances matter, and it seems to me that the more you include stuff like this, the more 'desperate' you may look. In addition to being quite a bit of a lottery, the academic job-market has always seemed to me a lot like dating: you want to look confident and accomplished rather than insecure and 'making up accomplishments' to pad your CV. While it may be tempting to think of being invited to present to one of these online groups as a genuine accomplishment, the real question here is how it is going to look. As 'Appearances' noted, they don't think it looks very good, and I suspect they are not alone. Might there be counterexamples? Suppose that some Famous Philosopher invites you to give a guest lecture to their grad seminar. Could that look good? I guess it could--but in that case, instead of creating a Covid/online activity' section, I'm inclined to think it may make more sense to just change the 'Invited Talks' section of your CV to something like 'Invited Talks and Guest Lectures', or some such. 

But these are just my thoughts. What are yours? 

Strange 'part-time' jobs this year?

A reader writes in:

I am on the market this year, and noticed quite a few “part time” jobs, e.g. “3 year, 80% time post” and “Assistant professor (50% +).” I am unfamiliar with such practices, so would like to know a) what is it like to be in such positions (I know experiences should differ from person to person), b) do people work de facto full time in these jobs, and c) will the part time nature make working visa applications more difficult.

Interesting query. I think I've seen a few jobs like this in the past, but suspect they may be more common this year for an obvious reason: universities looking to save money due to the pandemic. Does anyone have the inside scoop on these kinds of positions? I cannot help but have the suspicion that people in these positions may be expected to work de facto full-time job, in which case jobs like these could be a really underhanded way for universities to underpay the person hired. But maybe I'm wrong about this. In any case, what are these jobs like? Do they have any implications for visa applications?

Advice for people who start graduate school in the midst of a pandemic

(This is a talk I am giving to the incoming graduate students at my department).

Welcome, incoming graduate students; I am so pleased you are joining us. I'm excited to see what lies ahead for you. I'm your placement director, and was asked to give a brief talk to you via Zoom, as we are still in the midst of a pandemic. 

If I had spoken to you last year, I would've talked in detail about my journey into philosophy. Everyone's experience is different, but it's often helpful to hear from a diversity of experiences, particularly if they are from people who don't fit the archetype of a philosopher, for example, someone who is (like me) from a working-class immigrant background, who is not a white man, whose philosophical interests are unconventional, etc. 

My trajectory to become a philosophy professor was unusual. When I started my second postdoc in 2013 I wondered if I would ever be able to land a tenure-track job. I turned to various mentors, informal ones and even a job market consultant, to try to learn the secret to job market success in academia. I then discovered there are many donts. Don't co-author in philosophy, certainly not with your partner if you are a woman. Don't publish in non-philosophy journals. Don't blog or do public philosophy, that is for senior people with the security of tenure. There were also many dos. Always have at least three papers under review (I did that! Now I think, wow that's exhausting!). Write the sort of paper you see appear in Mind or Philosophical Review. Hang out with important people. 

I've since learned you can't just distill success in grad school and on the job market into some formula. I know lots of people who fit all the dos and dont, and who have at the time they finish the PhD job CVs that would suffice for tenure at a research-intensive school. Yet they do not receive any offers for tenure track jobs. And I also know people who flouted the rules and did well.

So, my advice back in 2019 would have been this, and I think this advice still applies. It's important to cultivate good habits that help you be productive and to get your work out there (see here for an excellent list of tips by Liz Jackson). But also, you must do so in such a way that you can grow authentically into the person that you want to be. 

Bringing up the authentic self in the context of job market advice may seem strange, because the advice of job market consultants, advisers and many placement directors seems to be that you should not be yourself. Rather, they argue you should become a narrowly specialized candidate who is well networked and who writes papers that appear in top journals. They think you should fit your professional persona to the demands of the job market.

However, people with long-term high job satisfaction as academics tend to be people who are able to live and work authentically, to do the work they love and value, and teach and do service in line with their values. Obviously, there is a lot of work that you might not love as a professor. Examples may include grading, committees, admin (in the UK), or teaching that intro course for the nth time. Still, it strikes me that professors who are enduringly happy are people who have somehow merged their professional persona with their values, and who are doing things they delight in.

What does this mean concretely? In research, it means that you should do work that excites you. Writing a dissertation is difficult and a lot of job market failure lies in people who do not complete their PhD. You are in it for the long haul, you will be with us for at least five years, and you need enough love for the topic to be able to complete it. You must not lose your love for reading or other things you valued. Don't be tempted into the trap of "I will focus everything on being an academic and will make time for the rest of my life once I have tenure". That is counterproductive and unsustainable.

We are now in the midst of a pandemic. Among its many ramifications is a likely deep economic crisis, the extent of which we don't yet know as we're still grappling with the virus. The effects will likely be bigger and longer-lasting than the 2008 financial crisis. The philosophy job market never recovered to pre-2008 levels after the previous crash, as can be seen in this figure from IHE. We are not even countenancing the beginning of an economic recovery yet from this pandemic (after all, it isn't over), and what shape that recovery will take is hard to predict. In the light of this crisis mode that higher education undeniably is in, my advice needs to be adapted.

Publishing fiction and the job-market?

In our July "how can we help you?" thread, an Author writes:

This might be a silly question but here goes. What would you think of a philosopher publishing fiction in addition to publishing philosophy? If their work has philosophical themes - if a character was a philosophy professor, or if characters explicitly discussed philosophers' work - would you think that was evidence of un-seriousness or lack of dedication to really doing philosophy? Would you assume the work was autobiographical? Would peers or mentors or hiring committees care? I studied creative writing in college and have been working on fiction projects in my spare time on and off since then and there's one I want to publish. But if there's even a little chance it would hurt my prospects in philosophy, forget it...

I don't think this is a silly question at all. On the contrary, I think it is a great set of questions, ones that draw attention to aspects of the profession and job-market that graduate students and job-candidates should be aware of and think about. Allow me to explain.

Job-market discussion thread (2020-21 season)

I know it's just the beginning of August and (sadly, but predictably) very few jobs advertisements have been posted over at PhilJobs and HigherEd Jobs. However, given that this job season is going to be unique--to say the least--and I expect there may be quite a few job-marketeers out there who already want to commiserate about how the market is already looking and how to prepare for it (including for Alt-Ac opportunities), I hereby open this job market discussion thread for the 2020-21 season.

Readers should feel free to discuss job-market matters in this post's comment section as they see fit, provided the discussion conforms to the blog's safe and supportive mission. As a rough rule of thumb, readers are expected to refrain from posting aggressive comments that can be reasonably interpreted as undermining a safe and supportive environment. As moderator, I will intervene if need be to let people know why I have elected not to approve their comments, so as to keep the discussion positive.

One other important thing. As in past years, the Cocoon will ultimately have two job-market threads this year:

1. A job-market discussion thread (the present thread): to commisserate about the market, discussing particular job ads, the market in general, questions about application materials, interviewing, alt-ac opportunities, and so on.
2. A job-market reporting thread: to post news about interviews, on-campus visits, offers, rejection notices, etc.

Because someone always asks, "Why two threads?", there are a couple of reasons for it. First, some people may want to discuss the market but not stress over daily news regarding which jobs they still do or don't have a chance for. Conversely, others may not want to discuss the market but just want news about the jobs they've applied for. Second, these threads can get very long already, so I think the best way for people to get the information they want in a well-ordered format is simply to have two threads.

A few final notes:

• Please reserve job-market news (i.e. interviews, on-campus visits, hires, etc.) for the job-market reporting thread, which I will open sometime in September.
• A 'permalink' to this thread will be on the upper right of blog's right sidebar. -->
• Because of Typepad's functionality limitations (which only permits 100 comments before starting a new comment page), readers may elect to bookmark each new page of comments (or update their previous bookmark) as each new page emerges. I recognize that is can be frustrating to scroll through page after page to get to new comments, and I think this is probably the best solution.

All that being said, this discussion thread is now open. 

Listing one's dissertation committee on the CV?

In our June "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

Should junior TT faculty, who are trying to do things such as get another TT job or secure a book contract with a good academic press, list their dissertation committee members on their CV?

Karen Kelsky advises against it because by her lights it makes one seem much more like a junior scholar or maybe even a graduate student.

But, on the other hand, both search committees and academic press suffer from prestige bias. So, one might think that if one's dissertation committee is very famous, one should include them on one's CV.

Interesting question! I would have thought the obvious answer here is, "Yes", for basically the prestige-related reasons (if you have particularly well-known committee members listed on the first page, that could catch someone's eye). But Kelsky's reasoning sort of makes sense as well, and I've heard similar things from others in the profession (i.e. you want to 'look like an equal' rather than someone who sees themselves still as a 'junior' scholar).

Any readers in the know have any thoughts on this?

Ageism on the academic job-market?

In our June "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I am an older graduate student (circa 40) who, in the coming years, expects to go on the academic job market. In your experience, is it true that older candidates are often looked at less favorably than younger candidates? Is there some sense that, with a younger candidate, it is more likely that "her best work is ahead of her"? To the extent that this age bias is prevalent, are there ways for older candidates to mitigate its impact? More specifically, are there particular worries about older candidates that they might be able to address in their application materials?

These are important questions. We had a discussion about ageism and grad program admissions a while back. However, to my recollection we've never had a discussion about ageism and the job-market. On the one hand, I'm tempted to say--on the basis of our grad program discussion and my own experience on search committees--that I don't think ageism (particularly against someone in their 40s) is likely to be a big issue. On the other hand, ageism in job-markets in general is (sadly) well-established. Further, it would not surprise me much if age discrimination is highly implicit, with those who engage in it not able to reliably introspect their own motives. 

Anyway, I'm curious what readers think, both about the existence of ageism in academic job-markets and about what applicants might do to mitigate its potential impact. Anyone have any experience or insights here?

Must job-candidates list every publication?

In our job-market discussion board, a reader writes:

I wasn't sure where to post this, but I hope someone sees it. I have a somewhat sensitive question related to the philosophy job market. I have a masters in religion and am published in that field. I was wondering if committees typically require *all* publications to be disclosed, or whether it's my prerogative to include them or not in the job application. Which leads me to the more sensitive question: unlike other candidates who have an interdisciplinary background in science, math, etc., there may be departments where, though the candidate is strong in the area of philosophy, the department may be intentionally hostile or unwelcoming to candidates with religious backgrounds, particularly candidates who studied at conservative institutions within religious academia; the religious background offsets an otherwise strong or merely promising candidate. Though I have no examples in mind, I'm wondering how common or unheard of it is for departments to be, either openly or less transparently, inclined to reject a job candidate who discloses such a background on their CV. I would be sincerely grateful for honest answers. Thanks in advance!

One reader initial followed up, saying:

I think taking publications off your CV is totally your discretion. That said, I've noticed a few people in the past few years getting R1 jobs with papers on philosophy of religion (particularly philosophy of Christianity). So I'm not sure it would hurt you.

However, another reader then weighed in:

There is one big risk if you take things off your c.v., like publications. If a committee member happens to find things - through a google search - then you look really deceitful. No one wants you then - even if someone on the committee was backing you, they will drop you like a hot potato, on the risk that you are hiding more or are just a big fat liar. So I would be more forthright with where you are coming from. There are people who are anti-religious. That is the reality. But even if you were hired at a place with such people you would probably find it a very hostile place to work. I saw similar thing happen, but [with] respect to a political piece.

I'm inclined to think the second reader is right on both counts. First, search committees interested in a candidate are likely to do their homework, looking up the candidate online. If they find a candidate has publications they didn't report in the application, that could very much make the candidate look deceitful--which is really the last way you want to appear as a job-candidate. Second, do you really want to work at a place where your colleagues will discriminate against you on the basis of your religious identity or views? 

But these are just my thoughts, and they don't answer the original poster's main question: namely, how common is it for departments to either openly or less transparently reject a job candidate who discloses a religious background on their CV?

Mentoring program update (call for +mentors)

I just wanted to give readers a quick update on the Cocoon's job-market mentoring program. Helen and I have received a lot of signups thus far, both in terms of mentors and mentee applicants--which is really great, as it looks like we will be able to match many of the mentees who have signed up to this point. However, we could use some additional volunteers with the following backgrounds:

• LGBTQ+
• POC
• Philosophy of mind
• Metaphysics
• Latin American philosophy
• UK academic market
• Non-western/international background
• Social-political philosophy

Helen and I plant to begin setting up the first matches later today, and plan to move forward as quickly as we can. But in the meantime, we encourage mentees and mentors (particularly mentors with the above backgrounds) to continue signing up here!

Motivation for teaching and the market?

In our July "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

[A]m I the only one who isn't motivated by teaching? I try hard at it and treat it seriously, but there isn't really anything about teaching that I actively like or that motivates me to be in grad school or academia. (I don't dislike it either, it's kind of just a job.) I learned that I'm probably more of an exception in this regard, or else I'm one of the few willing to say that teaching doesn't motivate me. How should job applicants spin their relationship to teaching? Does it matter if we aren't passionate about it?

I too am curious to hear people's answers. By all accounts, being motivated by teaching matters very little for getting a job at a research institution. However, what about getting a job at a teaching institution? Here, it seems to clearly important to look as though one is passionate about teaching, and to be motivated enough to appear to be very good at it. However, as we all know from everyday life and Book II of The Republic, it's one thing to appear to be motivated by something, and another thing to actually be motivated by it!

So, then, how do readers actually feel about teaching--particularly those of you who have gotten jobs (and tenure?) at teaching-focused institutions? Are you actually motivated by or passionate about teaching? Or, is teaching 'just a job' for you that you've tried to be good enough at to get a job and tenure?

Stay in grad school or go on the market?

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

All things considered, is it better for your future academic job prospects to delay graduating and stay in graduate school or to graduate with a PhD in these Covid times? I have heard people in the profession talk about how extended "length of time to get your degree" can count against someone on the market. Alternatively, I have heard people talk about how having a "stale" PhD (i.e. your chances of getting a TT job decrease every year that you are on the market after you earned your PhD) can also count against you on the market (aka the "staying fresh" rule). I currently have completed my dissertation and am one of the older graduate students at my university (between 5-9 years in the program). I am not sure if it is better for my future academic employment to defend and graduate sooner rather than later. Everyone thinks that the job market in the Fall will be terrible. Some think that hiring committees in the future will be more understanding about getting your PhD in a post-Covid era, but I am not sure how sympathetic they will actually be. Any advice or insights are most welcome!

From my perspective, the answer here is clear: generally speaking (and within reason), it is far worse to come out of grad school too early and run the risk of 'going stale' than it is to stay in graduate school and look like you have a 'long time to completion'. Allow me to explain.

Can good publications offset grad program rank?

In our "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

On the topic of "tippy top" schools, how much can good publications offset coming from a lower ranked school on the job market? I'm set to defend in the fall and my department isn't particularly notable. I have however been fortunate enough to get two publications in top tier journals. Should I keep aiming to publish at high ranked journals or I am better off submitting to mid-level journals where I may be more likely to accumulate publications?

I'd be very curious to hear what readers think, particularly those who have been involved in hiring. For my part, I have to sadly confess--as I have before--that I am skeptical that publishing in the highest ranked journals is a very good job-market strategy for candidates coming out of lower-ranked programs. Allow me to explain why.

Do awards matter on the market?

A reader writes in:

How important are "awards" sections on a CV?  Do hiring departments put much weight on them? I only ask because I routinely see faculty CV-s include them, but for the couple that I have, I have to say I'm not impressed with them knowing what getting them required. They largely involved me engaging in a lot of schmoozy self-promotion and essentially out-self-promoting others who were nominated for the same award. Is this really a CV section an early career philosopher should be worried about lengthening?

I'm curious to hear what readers think. On the one hand, I'm inclined to think that a teaching or service award is likely to be a real boon to a candidate when applying for jobs at teaching institutions. Having served on several search committees, my experience has been that there are so many well-qualified candidates, and the differences between them often so small, that distinctions like awards can probably make a real difference. But what about at research schools? Here, I suppose that a book award or article in the Philosophers' Annual might make a difference. But I'm not sure. I'm also not all sure that most awards are gotten through schmoozing. I received a teaching award at my university in 2017, and it came as a complete surprise to me--and another member of my department received the same award a few years later, and she didn't schmooze for it either.

In any case, what do you all think? Do awards matter on the market? If so, is there anything that grad students or job-marketeers should do in terms of pursuing them? 

Publishing advice for grad students?

In our July "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

My department discourages students from professionalizing too early--but they are vague on when professionalization should start ramping up. They actively discourage us from publishing (and they encourage us to get the dissertation finished first). (I think they're trying to counter people who get distracted by publishing and then let the dissertation collect dust.) So, is this normal? What IS the best publishing advice for a graduate student, when should we start publishing?

'Current grad & incoming prof' then responded:

Particularly if research is your goal, you should start publishing as soon as possible. Once you have a couple chapters, the dissertation can be hastily wrapped up at any point you get a job; but publications are what help you to get the job in the first place. Jason Brennan gives the good advice of always having 3 things under review (which I haven't ever been able to maintain, but may be a good motivator). The dissertation should always be thought of in terms of material for potential future publications, never as an obstacle to publication. Or at least this is how I went about things and what helped me.

The original reader then responded:

This is one of those things that becomes SO OBVIOUS once somebody points it out, thank you! It's going in my "tips and tricks" file :) It fits with thinking of research projects along a pipeline: try to move different projects along so that there's always three at the review point in the research pipeline.

Although I think Brennan's advice here is fairly good, I also think there are other nuances to be aware of here. Let me explain.

Humanities for All - Project Director Position

Shay Logan (Kansas State) wrote in to draw my attention to this Project Director position with the National Humanities Alliance in Washington, DC. I think it would be great if a philosopher were to get the post! Here's a brief description of the position:

The National Humanities Alliance (NHA) is a nationwide coalition of organizations advocating for the humanities on campuses, in communities, and on Capitol Hill. Founded in 1981, NHA is supported by over 200 member organizations, including: colleges, universities, libraries, museums, cultural organizations, state humanities councils, and scholarly, professional, and higher education associations. It is the only organization that brings together the U.S. humanities community as a whole.

What we do:

• Cultivate support for federal funding for the humanities. 
• Promote the public value of the humanities.
• Promote the value of studying the humanities.
• Convene the humanities community to explore best practices for advocating for the humanities on campus, in communities, and on Capitol Hill.

As a part of its ongoing work to promote the public value of the humanities, NHA seeks a project director to work on the Humanities for All initiative. Humanities for All documents and promotes publicly engaged humanities work in U.S. higher education, including research, teaching, preservation, and programming conducted with and for diverse public partners. It is a resource for scholars carrying out their own publicly engaged work, educators teaching on the public humanities, and scholarly societies and funders looking to support public engagement efforts in the humanities

The project director will have the opportunity to develop expertise in the state of the field of publicly engaged humanities work and gain experience in project management and advocacy. This expertise and experience will provide a foundation for subsequent work in both academic and non-academic settings.

Interested readers can apply at the website linked to above!

Tips for moving academic jobs?

A reader writes in:

What advice is there for someone who already has an academic job but would like to get another one in a particular geographic region?  Is it better just to beef up one's qualifications on paper? Or is it more important to start networking with the departments in the desired region? Or are there other things that are more important? How does one increase their chances of getting that second job? Would attempting to publish in two separate AOS-es be a good idea? Or maybe a better question is, of those philosophers who had a permanent job (TT or whatever) but left it for a second permanent job, what were the mechanisms that got the majority of them that second job? (I'm nervous here the answer might be something like "they were invited and didn't even have to apply".)

Great questions! Does anyone in the know have any insights they are willing to share?

How Can I Be a Philosopher in a Non-Academic Career? (APA Blog Interview)

The Blog of the APA has a great interview up today with Gina Helfrich, who received her PhD at Emory and "is now program officer for global technology at Internews, an international nonprofit dedicated to empowering local media worldwide." A couple of choice passages:

Q: Tell me about the twists and turns.

....

There were a lot of unexpected moments. Sometimes, it seemed as if a perfect job fell from the sky with the job description written just for me. Other times, I had to work very hard to find a position.

My first full-time job, as assistant director of the Harvard College Women’s Center, fell from the sky. I saw it come across a mailing list I was on as a result of my graduate fellowship working in the Center for Women at Emory University, and it was a great fit with my scholarly focus in women’s and gender studies.

After a promotion to director and four years at the women’s center, I felt restless. So I read books like What Color Is Your Parachute? I did informational interviews. And eventually, I networked myself into a tech job at a startup—but I got laid off after a year, and I then was stuck with this bizarre resume.

So I did what you do: I put myself out there, chased a lot of opportunities that didn’t pan out, and eventually landed a communications position with NumFOCUS, a nonprofit that supports open-source scientific research. Around the same time, I cofounded a staffing and consulting business to support better diversity and inclusion in technology. We started getting a lot of attention, and even got some venture capital, so at a certain point I was basically forced to leave my full-time/regular job. But the business didn’t work out, and after seven months of “funemployment,” I found my way back to NumFOCUS for few more years.

Then, something else fell from the sky. When I heard about my current position, I thought it was perfect—the candidate needed to understand open source software communities and be conversant in issues of diversity and inclusion. I submitted my resume and cover letter, and got the job.

Honestly, even that summary of my career feels a little too neat; it was very messy and unexpected. So that’s the non-academic path—terrifying, but beautiful!

.....

Q: What can philosophy faculty do to help their students pursue non-academic careers?

The most important thing is to be supportive. Graduate school can really undermine one’s self-confidence. But you need self-confidence to get a job—and faculty support helps.

Another thing faculty can do is get familiar with some basic resources to help graduate students find careers—things like the book Designing Your Life by Stanford University professors Bill Burnett and David Evans.

Faculty have to reckon with the fact that PhD students fund their lifestyles, but there are not enough academic jobs for every PhD student. So faculty really owe it to PhDs to support them in the search for all types of work. Our community should also do more to encourage and support hybrid careers for PhDs—you work in tech, for example, but also teach a course or write philosophical articles.

Job-Market Mentoring Program: Signups Open!

Helen De Cruz (St. Louis University) and I are happy to announce that signups are now open for this year's iteration of the Cocoon's Job-Market Mentoring Program. Job-candidates in need and potential mentors are both encouraged to sign up here. As a reminder, because of the COVID pandemic's expected effects on the academic job-market, this season our program will allow mentees to request non-academic industry mentors. Although volunteers who sign up as academic job-market mentors need to be tenure-stream faculty, we also encourage anyone in non-academic industry who is willing to mentor academic philosophers to sign up as potential mentors as well.

In any case, for those of you new to the program, here are the details:

Program Description:

This program, associated with The Philosophers’ Cocoon, aims to provide job-market mentoring to all those in need (regardless of background). The aim of this mentoring project is just what it sounds like: a scheme to enable job candidates in philosophy who face special challenges, including members of historically-marginalized groups as well as those with little access to mentoring (e.g., because their department or advisor does not offer this), to receive advice and support from more experienced members of the profession.

Having students write teaching letters?

In our June "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I know of someone who asked one of their former undergraduate students to write them a letter of recommendation that focused on teaching. They'd use this letter rather than a teaching letter from a faculty member.

When I learned about this, it made a lot of sense. Often faculty really have no clue about your teaching and aren't terribly motivated to learn about it beyond being told about it during a 10 minute meeting. Students, by contrast, are well positioned to speak about your teaching. Using a letter like this might also appeal to places that value the outlook of undergraduates (e.g. places where undergraduates are involved in the hiring process).

All of that said, it is somewhat odd, though perhaps it is more common than I think.

Do people do this? Do people think it's a good idea?

Interesting questions! Anyone have any thoughts on this?

Be my colleague! (VAP in feminist philosophy)

The Department of Philosophy & Religion within the College of Arts and Letters at The University of Tampa invites applications for a one year, full-time, non-tenure-track position as Visiting Assistant Professor of Philosophy beginning in August 2020. Apply here. 

The University of Tampa is a medium-sized, comprehensive, residentially-based private institution of 9,200 undergraduate and graduate students.  The University is ideally situated on a beautiful 110-acre campus next to the Hillsborough River, adjacent to Tampa's dynamic central business district, which is a growing, vibrant, diverse metropolitan area. UT reflects this vibrancy; with 20 consecutive years of enrollment growth UT boasts 229 student organizations, a multicultural student body from 50 states and 140 countries, and "Top Tier" ranking in U.S. News and World Report.

The area of specialization (AOS) is FEMINIST PHILOSOPHY.

The area of concentration (AOC) is OPEN.

The successful candidate must be able to teach an undergraduate Modern Philosophy course (i.e., 17th and 18th century European philosophy from Descartes through Kant with a focus on epistemology and metaphysics), an upper-division undergraduate course in Social Epistemology, and other lower and upper-division courses in the AOS.

Teaching load is 3 courses (12 credit hours) per semester.

Ph.D. in Philosophy must be in hand no later than August 30th, 2020. Teaching experience is preferred.

Prioritizing: dissertation or publishing?

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I have seen some discussion online (Reddit) recently discussing the trade-off between focusing on a strong PhD thesis and focusing on publishing papers. The posters agreed that focusing on publishing papers and putting the thesis second (either by having it be a collection of papers or just putting significantly less effort into it and only aiming for a pass) is better in almost all disciplines, though a number of philosophers claimed that it was strictly inferior to do that in philosophy (citing reasons of book potential, hidden gem applicants, etc). I would love to hear input from someone with experience in hiring comment on this trade-off. Thanks!

Obviously, the ideal thing is to publish and have a great dissertation. But, if you have to make one or the other your higher priority, which one should you choose? I'm curious to hear what everyone thinks.

40 ACLS Emerging Voices Fellowships

This is just a quick note that the American Council of Learned Societies has advertised 40 Emerging Voices Fellowships, :

At a time of economic downturn and uncertainty in academe, this program seeks to identify and assist a vanguard of scholars whose voices, perspectives, and broad visions will strengthen institutions of higher education and humanistic disciplines in the years to come.

The Emerging Voices Fellowship will allow recent PhDs in the humanities and related social sciences to take up one-year positions at select institutions in ACLS’s Research University Consortium beginning in August/September 2020. The program will provide a $60,000 stipend plus benefits, as well as $5,000 in research/ professional development funding, childcare or elder care costs, and access to ACLS professional development resources. Up to 40 fellowships will be available for a fall semester 2020 start date. We anticipate running a second competition this coming academic year for placements that will begin in fall 2021.

Looks like a great opportunity for philosophers in need of gainful academic employment in these tough times. Many thanks to Jake Wojtowicz for the pointer! H/t Krista Goff

Brennan on two types of grad students

In a recent Inside Higher Ed interview on his new book, Good Work If You Can Get It: How to Succeed in Academia, Jason Brennan states:

Anecdotally, there seem to be two types of grad students. Some treat their Ph.D. as an extension of college. They want graduate school to be a time to stew and develop. Others treat it more like an M.B.A. -- or, to use another metaphor, they act like athletes training for the Olympics. The latter think strategically. They try to ascertain what their CVs must look like when they go on the market to have the best chance of getting a job. They engage in backward induction, trying to determine what they need to do year by year to make their CVs look the right way when they enter the market. These students appear to be the most successful in terms of getting a job. For that reason, I suspect they are in the long run less stressed and happier, though admittedly I don’t know of survey evidence verifying that.

As I make clear in the book, I am not endorsing the way academia is. Indeed, I wrote an entire other book (Cracks in the Ivory Tower) on the bad business ethics practices of higher ed. But the current book is about succeeding in academia as it is, rather than how it should be...

I'm curious about Brennan's anecdotal claims here. First, do grad students who approach things strategically tend to fare better on the job-market and in their careers than grad students who treat graduate school as "a time to stew and develop"? Second, are the former "less stressed and happier" in the long run? Let me explain why I ask, and then ask readers to weigh in.

Tenure standards at state schools?

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:

I have a question about the tenure standards at state schools that focus on undergraduate teaching. It seems clear that research schools really emphasize publications and SLACs emphasize teaching (with ok publications). What about those state schools that only have undergraduate programs? The jobs at these schools require people to focus on teaching, and the workload is similar to (or heavier than) the SLACs. However, some of these schools are research universities. Is teaching still the main focus when one is considered for promotion at those schools?

Good questions. My sense is that it may vary quite a bit, as I've seen philosophy departments at some state schools whose faculty regularly publish in top-ranked journals (suggestive of high tenure standards), whereas I've seen departments at other state schools where the faculty seem to publish very little. But this sense is based on little more that visiting department webpages when I was a job-candidate. Any faculty at state schools with undergrad-only philosophy programs willing to chime in with some insight?