The Career Network: On the Tenure Track

On the Tenure Track

FIRST PERSON
Betrayed by Your Adviser
A dissertation shows your potential as a scholar; it shouldn't simply be a long footnote to your mentor's glorious career.

THE TWO-YEAR TRACK
The Community-College Interview
The odds are against candidates who are unfamiliar with our values and don't speak our lingo.

FIRST PERSON
Sabbatical Blues
You don't ask for a yearlong leave to do some ordinary piece of work, but to produce the "big one." It seemed feasible at the start.

FIRST PERSON
Ready for Round 2
What is the best way to respond to a conference interviewer who says, "I don't see the scholarly value of your work. Care to comment?"

BALANCING ACT
Working Toward Motherhood
If male academics don't have to choose between their personal and professional goals, an assistant professor wonders, why should she?

An Academic in America
Leaving the Academic Village
It's time for professors to abandon the genteel pose of being aloof from the sordid marketplace.

CAREER TALK
Switching Sides
For Ph.D.'s who can't find, or don't want, a teaching job, but would like a career on a campus, what are the options?

HEADS UP
What Conspiracy?
Faculty members are all too willing to adopt an "us versus them" attitude toward administrators but it's never that simple.

FIRST PERSON
Were the Road Signs Wrong?
A junior scholar reconsiders the advice he got from senior professors on how to win tenure.

FIRST PERSON
The Professor as Instant Messenger
Determined not to be left behind, a faculty member decides to become IM buddies with her students.

MS. MENTOR
Isn't It Romantic?
Eager scholars could spend years reading up on how hard it is to have a romance in academe, without ever emerging to see if it's true.

FIRST PERSON
Not a Counselor
What, exactly, is a professor to do when confronted by a student with psychological problems?

FIRST PERSON
What Next?
Awaiting word on his tenure case, an assistant professor finds himself starting, and abandoning, new projects.

FIRST PERSON
Yielding to Convention
Instead of merely torturing himself at one big academic conference, an assistant professor opts to attend two.

HEADS UP
Facing the Facebook
Unless we reassess our high-tech priorities, issues of student insensitivity, indiscretion, bias, and fabrication will consume us.

MS. MENTOR
What if I Don't Know the Ropes?
Just because most of the rules for academicians are unwritten doesn't mean you're not supposed to learn them.

AN ACADEMIC IN AMERICA
Don't Call Me Thomas
How can I give a C to someone who is close enough to me to use my first name?

FIRST PERSON
A New Job and a Hurricane
As she heads back to work, an assistant professor feels lucky to have only lost the experience of being a new faculty member in the normal way.

FIRST PERSON
The Academic Path to Hollywood
You, too, can guide famous filmmakers through the thickets of historical or scientific accuracy.

FIRST PERSON
Cutting the Cord
When it's time for some Big Life Decisions, it's eerie to discover that your advisers can no longer make them for you.

FIRST PERSON
Vertigo on the Market
Combine a new baby, a full teaching schedule, and a job search, and your head would be spinning, too.

An Academic in America
Reference Works and Academic Celebrity
The unsung heroes of the humanities are the anonymous editors of books that most of us use nearly every day.

FIRST PERSON
With a Little Help From My Enemies
The writing was slow-going, and she felt herself losing interest. She needed motivation. She needed a nemesis.

CATALYST
So Happy Together
If you're a scientist who is not used to collaborating with nonscientists, you'd better get used to it.

FIRST PERSON
On Guard
When you're up for tenure at a teaching-oriented college, every time you teach feels like it has to be a masterwork of pedagogical achievement.

BALANCING ACT
Keeping Up Appearances
A Ph.D. thought her transition from graduate student to faculty member would be a good time to lose weight. Somehow, things got out of hand.

FIRST PERSON
Do Not Fear the Blog
Until recently, it had never occurred to a graduate student that her blog and her professional fate might be connected.

FIRST PERSON
My Credentials Gap
He has a Ph.D., publications, a book contract, great teaching evaluations, and experience. What he doesn't have is the right pedigree.

CAREER TALK
Go Ahead, Haggle
Fail to negotiate your first job offer and you risk sacrificing thousands of dollars in potential income.

AN ACADEMIC IN AMERICA
Principled Mediocrity
How many of us, as teachers, have encountered a student or colleague whose talents were greater than our own?

FIRST PERSON
Entering the Fog
A green professor is tapped to serve on a curriculum-policy committee and learns how faculty governance really works.

FIRST PERSON
Plotting Our Strategy
An academic couple begins a search for two tenure-track jobs in the same field and the same city.

THE TWO-YEAR TRACK
Crisis Management
You're teaching a night class when a student confesses to suicidal thoughts. The counseling office is closed. What should you do?

HEADS UP
We Want Change; No We Don't
An outside candidate for a department chairmanship finds himself asked to pick a side before he's even joined the battle.

FIRST PERSON
The Smell of Indoctrination in the Morning
Why can't an undergraduate think more like a Ph.D.?

FIRST PERSON
Going on Sabbatical
The gap can be wide between what you hope to achieve during a year off and what you actually do.

FIRST PERSON
The Dark Side of the Moon
A Ph.D. in history who landed a great job on the wrong continent wants to come home.

AN ACADEMIC IN AMERICA
Productive Procrastination
Avoidance can be highly fruitful, provided you have plenty of things to do while postponing the most dreaded task.

HEADS UP
Interim and Untenured
An assistant professor who used to wonder what his department chairman did all day finds out the hard way.

FIRST PERSON
By the Numbers, Please
Writing a self-evaluation for his tenure case, an assistant professor wishes someone would just tell him what to say.

THE TWO-YEAR TRACK
Know Thy Students
The truth about community-college students often flies in the face of long-established stereotypes.

FIRST PERSON
Have Baby, Will Travel
An assistant professor with a good tenure-track job decides it's not quite good enough.

FIRST PERSON
The Sixth Time's the Charm
A Ph.D. in the social sciences shares a few lessons she's learned after five years on the market.

FIRST PERSON
Turn and Face the Strange
Is it ever a good idea for an applicant to tell an interviewer that he looks like an aging androgynous rock star?

MS. MENTOR
Bored by Department Meetings
Few faculty meetings are actually dull, Ms. Mentor says, because almost all have hidden agendas.

FIRST PERSON
Being Bad
A job candidate makes a case for misbehaving a bit during the interview.

FIRST PERSON
Free Fall
Two job offers would seem an embarrassment of riches, except when you have to make a decision on the first with no assurance that the second will even be offered.

FIRST PERSON
Pushing Them Through
To be a strong dissertation adviser, you have to learn to distinguish your own skills and limitations from those of your students.

AN ACADEMIC IN AMERICA
Saving Secondhand Bookstores
Used bookshops are as essential to scholarship as the availability of open stacks in campus libraries.

FIRST PERSON
A Lateral Move
A dual-career couple moves to a university that looks a lot like their old one -- with a few crucial differences.

FIRST PERSON
The Hollywood Mouse and the Ivory Tower Mouse
The glamorous lives of Los Angeles yuppies can inspire jealousy in a Ph.D. student, but only for an evening.

FIRST PERSON
E-Application Etiquette
An online application system is convenient but it can lead to a glut of candidates and other problems for search committees.

FIRST PERSON
What Small Colleges Really Want
If you're applying to a college that emphasizes teaching, ignore your mentor's advice about what to include in your cover letter.

FIRST PERSON
When Hitting Reply Means Forever
The problem with using an e-mail list to discuss a search is that the new hire can go back and read what everyone wrote. It's not always pretty.

FIRST PERSON
Talking About It
Why do academics never talk openly about sexual attraction between professors and students?

FIRST PERSON
How I Learned to Love Economics
A new Ph.D. emerges from the the stresses of the academic job market with a new appreciation for her field.

CATALYST
Playing It Safe With Research Risk
Fail to follow the rules and you could conduct an entire project and be forbidden to publish the results. Here's what you need to know.

FIRST PERSON
Dressing the Part
Unlike their male counterparts, female professors have little choice but to watch what they wear in the classroom.

FIRST PERSON
Tenure Epiphanies
Two years after earning tenure, an associate professor finally comes to realize what it means for his career.

FIRST PERSON
Master (or Mistress) of Your Domain
Creating a Web site for your latest book will not only showcase the work, it will help your case for tenure and promotion.

FIRST PERSON
Celebrated, not Just Tolerated
A black economist chooses a supportive department in a nowhere town over chilly colleagues in a more vibrant city.

FIRST PERSON
The Perfect Offer
An academic couple learns the crucial different between recruitment and retention.

FIRST PERSON
Teaching With MS
Part of the challenge for a professor with multiple sclerosis is figuring out what to tell her students.

BALANCING ACT
The Dual-Career Divorce
You negotiated a job for your partner as part of your hiring package. Then he dumped you. Can't you negotiate his firing?

FIRST PERSON
Looking Like a Professor
Does how you dress in the classroom say anything about your teaching style?

FIRST PERSON
Arrested Development?
The elimination of an academic unit is not unlike the cancellation of a television sitcom, with one glaring exception.

FIRST PERSON
Stacks' Appeal
Even if you never have sex in a great library, you can have moments there that are almost erotic in their intellectual intensity.

FIRST PERSON
Death and Wheatgrass
An assistant professor finds that teaching and grieving are a surprisingly well-matched pair.

ACADEMIC ASSETS
The Bankrupt Professor
A tenure-track faculty member who once succumbed to the lure of plastic tries to dig herself out.

FIRST PERSON
Ph.D. in Hand
One half of an academic couple hopes that those three words will make all the difference in his job search come fall.

BALANCING ACT
Getting Back on Track
A Ph.D. in sociology who left academe to raise a family finds few departments welcoming her return.

FIRST PERSON
The Grass Isn't Greener
A senior professor who spent the spring teaching in Europe finds that faculty work there can be far more problematic than in the States.

MS. MENTOR
Lab or Love Nest?
In the heat of the summer, Ms. Mentor finds that some of her correspondents have very humid imaginations.

FIRST PERSON
Let the Experiment Be Made
It's easy to panic about online education at liberal-arts colleges, but one faculty member makes the case.

FIRST PERSON
Game Over
A couple of game-studies scholars, who aren't a couple in the romantic sense, come up short in their dual job search.

CATALYST
Postdocs Across the Pond
If you can work out the logistics, Europe offers plenty of opportunities to American postdocs in the sciences.

BALANCING ACT
So, What's in It for Me?
When faculty members ask that question, what they really mean is "What's in it for my family?"

FIRST PERSON
Me and My Big Ideas
An assistant professor finds that you can make a difference at a small college, but not without a lot of work.

THE TWO-YEAR TRACK
The Impersonal Touch
Too many community colleges put themselves at a serious disadvantage in recruiting with perfunctory job interviews.

FIRST PERSON
Academic Flame Wars
Not only are blogs and online forums potential time wasters, they also breed civil war and anarchy within departments.

FIRST PERSON
Scholarly Debts
The problem with taking a research sabbatical at partial pay is that your expenses aren't reduced by the same proportion.

FIRST PERSON
All Humanists Will Be Assimilated
An English professor confesses that some educational technologies actually make teaching more enjoyable and intellectually exciting.

FIRST PERSON
No Harm Intended
Teaching a class on torts offers a new law professor endless opportunity for dark humor -- until she realizes that a few students aren't laughing.

CATALYST
The Mysteries of Grant Budgeting
Let the sponsored-projects folks spend years mastering federal rules about research costs. Here's what you need to know as an investigator.

FIRST PERSON
A Short, Strange Trip
A Ph.D. in English from a mid-tier university finds his dream job just down the road.

FIRST PERSON
The Price of Indifference
Even in academe's tight labor market, the hiring committee is supposed to woo you a little bit, isn't it?

THE ADJUNCT TRACK
Integrated and Informed
It's not too much to ask, says a part-time instructor, that she be treated as if she belonged on the campus.

FIRST PERSON
I Walk the Line
A professor at a small college finds that the boundary between friendliness and friendship can get very blurry in dealing with students.

FIRST PERSON
Wake Us When It's Over
A married couple of assistant professors -- he a psychologist and she a chemist -- await word on their promotions.

THE TWO-YEAR TRACK
Don't Waste My Time
Why do so many community-college instructors who go back to graduate school find it tedious and unrewarding?

MS. MENTOR
How Dysfunctional Is Your Department?
You cannot force people to be warm, wise, or witty, but most can be taught to be civil.

FIRST PERSON
No Extra Credit For You
If it's exam week, it must be time for students to make those last-minute pleas for leniency.

FIRST PERSON
Life After the Death of Theory
An assistant professor in the humanities tries to teach himself not to care about the Next Big Thing.

FIRST PERSON
No Longer a Desperado
Come fall, a Ph.D. in religious studies finds he will actually be teaching on the tenure track, instead of making sushi or parking cars.

CATALYST
Reproductive Success for Working Scientists
As a female ready to contribute your highly trained brain and your genetic material to society, what can you do to succeed at both?

FIRST PERSON
Becoming a Learner Again
In order to be a better teacher, sometimes you have to become a student again.

FIRST PERSON
Grading Blues
When you sit before a stack of ungraded blue-book exams, anything seems preferable to the task at hand.

FIRST PERSON
A Career-Making Performance
For music professors, one of the keys to getting that first tenure-track job is a strong showing during the interview recital.

BALANCING ACT
It's All an Illusion
An untenured academic mother decides that she can't do it all, so she's just trying to look like she can.

CATALYST
Words Worth Their Weight in Cash
The narrative section can make or break a grant proposal. Don't make yours easy to eliminate.

FIRST PERSON
Diary of a Joint Search, Part 3
How does an area-studies program maneuver to gain the upper hand in a joint search with a more powerful department?

FIRST PERSON
Class Notes
More than ever, faculty members are being recruited to raise money for their departments.

headsup
The Necessity of Mobility
A chairman explains why departments often shy away from hiring too many Ph.D.'s from local universities.

BALANCING ACT
When You Don't Fit In
A biologist wonders why, after five years, her small-town college still doesn't feel like home.

FIRST PERSON
The Worst Building on the Campus
Tired of aging facilities, a humanities professor arranges to teach in his college's new science center. But are the scientists on to him?

FIRST PERSON
Part Gatekeeper, Part Huckster
A graduate-studies director finds that the admissions season demands a Dr. Jekyll-and-Mr. Hyde approach to applicants.

FIRST PERSON
Team Job Interviews
Two scholars in game studies share what it's like to perform the interview gantlet with a partner.

FIRST PERSON
Settling In
An assistant professor realizes in his fifth year on the tenure track that he's actually come to view his college as home.

THE ADJUNCT TRACK
Dear Adjunct Faculty Member
So maybe the official memorandum didn't exactly read like this one. But it might as well have.

FIRST PERSON
Teaching: the View From Poland
The realities of working in an overstressed educational system hit home for an American scholar on a Fulbright.

FIRST PERSON
An Academic Wanderer Accepts Tenure
The intoxication of dreaming about the next new place has left a Ph.D. with a hangover, and a desire, finally, to stay put.

FIRST PERSON
A God in Colchester
It is probably inevitable that some variety of "celebrity" will become a quantifiable part of the average academic job.

FIRST PERSON
Deadlines and Due Dates
In academe, the work of teaching and research never really ends, and that is the reward.

FIRST PERSON
In Search of a Room With a View
While he's not proposing an academic version of feng shui, a professor does believe a course can be different depending on the classroom.

CATALYST
The Buck Starts Here
An experienced grant writer offers tips on how to improve the odds that your grant request will get financed.

FIRST PERSON
Becoming More Productive
Are you spending more time on tasks that will not help your tenure case than on work that will? Here are some tips for turning that ratio around.

HEADS UP
The Fourth Factor for Hiring
Research, teaching, and service are the big three, but there's one more criterion that interviewers need to evaluate -- attitude.

THE TW0-YEAR TRACK
Cattle Call
About to serve on a search committee at a community college? Here are two common complaints to avoid.

FIRST PERSON
Too Many Dissonant Notes
A music professor who prides himself on his cultural sensitivity suddenly finds it wanting in the classroom of an urban university.

FIRST PERSON
Up for Tenure Together
A married couple of assistant professors -- he a psychologist and she a chemist -- await word on their promotions.

BALANCING ACT
Are Your Parental-Leave Policies Legal?
Many institutions' aren't, says a law professor, but a best-practices model is now available that is worth adopting.

ALL IN THE GAME
Who's In Charge Here?
For Stanley Fish, the evaluation of teaching by students amounts to a whole lot of machinery with a very small and dubious yield.

FIRST PERSON
Conference Man Returns to the MLA
A tenure-track professor thinks that maybe it's time to stop attending his discipline's annual convention.

CAREER TALK
Next Question?
Two graduate career counselors answer questions from Ph.D.'s about the academic job market.

FIRST PERSON
All Dressed Up ...
An ecologist goes on the job market again, and finds that he is not the same candidate this time around.

BALANCING ACT
The Bachelorette in Academe
A Ph.D. in history finds that a rural, small-town campus is no place to be single.

FIRST PERSON
Who Really Benefits?
An academic parent sees his employee tuition benefit as a boon for his pocketbook but wonders if it will limit his children's educational options.

FIRST PERSON
Should a Mentor Be a Friend?
A tenured mentor fears that he is too emotionally invested in his relationship with a young colleague.

FIRST PERSON
A Couple of Rare Birds
How can you summarize two scholarly careers in a single two-page cover letter?

THE TWO-YEAR TRACK
Are 2 Master's Better Than 1?
A veteran of the two-year-college market mulls the advantages for applicants prepared to teach in more than one field.

FIRST PERSON
Diary of Joint Search, Part 2
An area-studies program maneuvers to overcome its weak position in a joint search with a traditional department.

MS. MENTOR
Don't Be Docile
Ms. Mentor advises some overworked female faculty members to stop being stoic workhorses.

ALL IN THE GAME>
One University Under God?
What will succeed high theory and race, gender, and class as the center of intellectual energy in academe? Religion, says Stanley Fish.

FIRST PERSON
Just What Is a Dossier?
A job-seeking couple would gladly provide a department with any information it wants, if only the pair could figure out what that is.

FIRST PERSON
My Secret Stash of Books on Tape
An English professor confesses that it was the spoken word, and not the written one, that first drew him to literature.

FIRST PERSON
Being There
At first, a scholar on a Fulbright kicks himself for not requesting a better location. But soon his temporary home reveals its charms.

FIRST PERSON
In but Not Of Academe
A new assistant professor finds that his conservative politics mean he will never quite fit in on a campus.

THE ADJUNCT TRACK
Not Exploited
A Ph.D. who toiled in low-paid academic jobs for four years says he would rather be called a fool than a pawn.

BALANCING ACT
Part-Time Single Parent
When you love your family and your job, sometimes you've got to put pressure on one to enhance the other.

MS. MENTOR
They're Just Not That Into You
Sometimes, Ms. Mentor says, winning over your foes is impossible and your best course of action is to move on.

FIRST PERSON
Failing to Motivate
Why does a poor grade inspire one student to do better and cause another to do worse?

FIRST PERSON
4th Quarter and the Home Team's Behind
A married couple of assistant professors -- he a psychologist and she a chemist -- prepare to go up for tenure this year.

FIRST PERSON
Tireless Research Assistants
Every RA needs to understand that the job is mostly about protecting your faculty employer's time and mental energy.

CAREER TALK
Next Question?
Two graduate career counselors answer questions from Ph.D.'s about the academic job market.

BALANCING ACT
Cancer, Children, and Career
For a pregnant professor, diagnosed with cancer, suddenly earning tenure was no longer her life's biggest challenge.

FIRST PERSON
Doctoral Student, Scholar, Baby Sitter?
In the annals of graduate-student exploitation, there's one form of mistreatment that has gotten little attention.

FIRST PERSON
Polish Autumn
An associate professor of history continues to chronicle his Fulbright year in Poland.

MS. MENTOR
Where Are the Bodies Buried?
Should senior professors air the department's dirty laundry with new recruits or keep a demure silence?

FIRST PERSON
Expatriate Teaching
In his first year teaching overseas, a historian experiences culture shock, budget woes, and more than a little anti-Americanism.

FIRST PERSON
A Cheating Heart
Three years into the relationship, an assistant professor in the sciences begins to get cold feet.

FIRST PERSON
Doing My Best?
A veteran faculty member who has landed three community-college jobs wonders why a fourth has eluded her.

FIRST PERSON
My Own Private Library
An assistant professor suspects that he is a scholar because he is a bibliophile -- rather than the other way around.

FIRST PERSON
My Four Minutes
The key to a successful television interview, a professor learns, is finding a way to give the answers you've prepared, no matter what questions are asked.

BALANCING ACT
Part-Timers on the Tenure Track
More women are persuading their institutions to let them work a reduced schedule on the tenure track.

THE ADJUNCT TRACK
Why Do I Do This?
Teaching here, writes a lecturer, is like being in a bad marriage that looks good to outsiders.

FIRST PERSON
Game for Anything
Academic couple seeks open-minded institution for nontraditional relationship.

FIRST PERSON
Starting Over
An assistant professor with a drinking problem tries to regain control over his life and work.

FIRST PERSON
Missing Summer Already
Back on campus, an assistant professor mulls the wisdom of the faculty tradition of summers off.

FIRST PERSON
Trailing Spousedom
Watching Gwyneth Paltrow, as Sylvia Plath, fume at being stuck in her husband's shadow, a pair of spousal hires get a jolt of recognition.

FIRST PERSON
Prepare for Departure
A historian begins a chronicle of his Fulbright year in Poland.

FIRST PERSON
Just Deserts
A new assistant professor wonders about the price of ascending the academic ranks.

FIRST PERSON
Diary of a Joint Search
An assistant professor begins a three-part series on how a traditional department and an area-studies program go about hiring a faculty member together.

MS. MENTOR
Her Partner Stole My Job
Aside from murder, does a job candidate who lost out to a spousal hire have any options?

FIRST PERSON
The Attrition Bug
With his junior colleagues departing for greener pastures, an assistant professor fears for the future of his department, and his social life.

FIRST PERSON
Dead Professor Walking
Besieged by admirers after being denied tenure, an assistant professor feels like she's attending her own funeral.

FIRST PERSON
On Being a Fat Professor
Summer means there's time to get in shape, but fall returns with the usual temptations.

FIRST PERSON
Searching for Sinister Motives
A new assistant professor learns how not to start off on the right foot.

BALANCING ACT
Stuck in Transition
In the weeks after a miscarriage, a young scholar finds writing about her professional development to be too daunting.

CAREER TALK
How to Get Unstuck
Readers share their stories about how they got themselves out of a career rut.

FIRST PERSON
A Good Speech
Asked to deliver a baccalaureate address, an assistant professor reflects on some of the speeches he has had to endure.

FIRST PERSON
What Savings?
Academe, says a soon-to-retire professor, is not structured to help faculty members accumulate savings early in their careers.

FIRST PERSON
A Comedy of Errors
Is it too much to ask applicants to spell my name correctly, a vice president wonders?

FIRST PERSON
Silencing Huck Finn
A professor sets out to teach students a lesson on censorship and book banning, and learns one himself.

BALANCING ACT
Making Time
Faculty members who are not teaching during the summer have all the time in the world to do research. That's the problem.

FIRST PERSON
Collegiality Lessons
The one skill that her mentors in graduate school failed to teach her was how to schmooze.

ALL IN THE GAME
The Case for Academic Autonomy
A prerequisite for academe's survival is distinctiveness. Without it, says Stanley Fish, we haven't got a prayer.

FIRST PERSON
An Adviser Without Advice
Hadn't I learned from my own experiences the folly of giving career advice to young people?

FIRST PERSON
Taking Care of Your Life
No one survives a 40-year career in this business, or any business, without confronting personal tragedy.

FIRST PERSON
When the Honeymoon Is Over
At some point, the courting ends and the hot young Ph.D. has to peel potatoes like the rest of us.

FIRST PERSON
Fending Off a Plagiarist
An assistant professor found herself having to prove that her dissertation was really hers.

MS. MENTOR
A Fraud and a Great Teacher
Should a cheater who also happens to be a great teacher be outed or protected?

FIRST PERSON
Is Graduate School a Cult?
For anyone who has been in graduate school, the mind-control practices of cults will seem weirdly familiar.

FIRST PERSON
It's OK to Say No
Rejection -- whether you're the one being turned down or the one declining an offer -- is not always a bad thing.

FIRST PERSON
On Your Marks
We are not alone, those of us who indulge in procrastination and get irritable when grading. We are legion.

FIRST PERSON
Life Lessons from Football
To appreciate the rush of work and life, a Ph.D. reminds himself to ponder less and yield more.

FIRST PERSON
Grateful for Tenure, but ...
Is it normal to feel trapped once you finally earn tenure?

FIRST PERSON
Switching Disciplines
A Ph.D. in psychology struck out on the market in his own field, but landed on the tenure track in a related one.

FIRST PERSON
Music to My Ears
A highly regarded music program wouldn't be interested in hiring a community-college teacher, would it?

FIRST PERSON
Office Doors
What do the images and captions that professors tape on their doors say about the occupants inside?

FIRST PERSON
A Good Search
The academic market is rough, jobs are in short supply, and hiring committees can be cruel. But those aren't the only stories.

FIRST PERSON
Notes From the Hiring Season
A department completes another round of faculty hiring, despite badly worded job ads and internal philosophical disputes.

MS. MENTOR
Academic Failure
Ms. Mentor counsels an academic spouse who fears that her husband is going to be denied tenure.

BALANCING ACT
Falsely Accused
A Ph.D. sacrifices her career to follow her academic spouse and finds herself accused of sexual harassment.

FIRST PERSON
Enjoy the Walk
Now that his search for a tenure-track job is over, a Ph.D. in English savors the journey.

FIRST PERSON
Shyness and Academe
For the introverted scholar, who happily spends days alone, the social interactions of academic life can be brutal.

FIRST PERSON
Two Lives Become One
Just when she had reconciled herself to living 1,000 miles from her partner indefinitely, a Ph.D.'s luck changes.

ACADEMIC ASSETS
Taking Your Questions
A financial planner with expertise in advising academics answers questions from our readers about Social Security and other money matters.

FIRST PERSON
The Benefits of Eavesdropping
An assistant professor improves his teaching by "invading" his colleagues' privacy.

BALANCING ACT
Not the Catch
Can a trailing spouse ever make it to the tenure track? A Ph.D. who landed a job through her husband's appointment has her doubts.

FIRST PERSON
Death of the Reader
When a young scholar's mentor dies suddenly, she realizes the profound loss of the one person who understood her work completely.

MS. MENTOR
Terrified by Graduate Students
A new assistant professor who feels inadequate teaching graduate seminars seeks Ms. Mentor's counsel.

FIRST PERSON
On the Market
An assistant professor of music continues her search for an opening at a college where the students want to learn what she has to teach.

FIRST PERSON
Living Well
A house, a family, a garden, possessions -- all of those things undermine professional mobility in academe.

FIRST PERSON
Remembering the Old Lions
For all their gruff aloofness, the old lions of the faculty were extraordinarily effective teachers.

FIRST PERSON
A Search Committee Starts Over
After being snubbed at the last minute by its top candidate, a department in the rural South tries again.

FIRST PERSON
Getting Tenure
After years of anxiety on the path to tenure, a newly promoted professor tries to appreciate the moment.

FIRST PERSON
Adventures in Trade Publishing
Having written his first trade book, an assistant professor wonders why he has to hawk it, too.

THE ADJUNCT TRACK
The Half-Time Track
After 16 years of splitting his time between two campuses, an adjunct decides he wouldn't have it any other way.

FIRST PERSON
I'm Professor Nobody
After 13 years as a "visiting lecturer," an adjunct makes it to the full-time ranks as a "lecturer," and finds she is still invisible.

FIRST PERSON
Teaching and the Butterfly Effect
Can the small events that transpire over the course of a 60-minute class period change someone, somehow, for the better, for a lifetime?

FIRST PERSON
Complain, Complain
A scholar who has never taken a sabbatical wonders why so many academics gripe so much about their work.

MS. MENTOR
Are You the Retiring Sort?
Retirement, says Ms. Mentor, crouches like an elephant in the middle of the floor at countless faculty meetings.

FIRST PERSON
On the Market
An assistant professor of music who is searching for a new job wonders if she has the right kind of doctoral degree.

BALANCING ACT
So, What's the Inside Scoop?
An insider's information about a job opening can be as off-base as an outsider's ignorance.

FIRST PERSON
Eccentric Professors
With their bizarre behavior and magnificent obsessions, oddball academics are a glue that holds together the culture of an institution.

ACADEMIC ASSETS
How to Prosper
Your ability to make sound investment decisions at each stage of your campus career can influence how everything else turns out.

FIRST PERSON
Hung Over Again
An assistant professor fears he is throwing away his career one drink at a time.

BALANCING ACT
From Spousal Hire to Single Mom
What happens when an academic couple breaks up and the spousal hire with a half-time appointment needs a full-time job?

FIRST PERSON
Road Signs to Tenure
A junior scholar asks his elders about what to keep in mind as he prepares his bid for tenure.

ALL IN THE GAME
Intellectual Diversity
As a genuine academic value, intellectual diversity is a nonstarter. As an imposed imperative, it is a disaster.

FIRST PERSON
In Defense of LPU's
A dean of science makes the case for publishing research results piecemeal to boost your CV.

MS. MENTOR
Private Lives
Volunteering too much information is not in your best interest, Ms. Mentor says, and it might "frighten the horses."

SPOTLIGHT
Fewer Jobs in Foreign Languages
The number of faculty openings in foreign languages this academic year is projected to decline by more than 10 percent.

BALANCING ACT
Job Sharing on the Tenure Track
Two academics opt to share a faculty position and a half to make time for their children.

FIRST PERSON
Ignoring My Inner Lawyer
A former adjunct finds that the tenure track gives him the freedom to be a better teacher.

CAREER TALK
Answering the Mail
Should a tenured professor explain to hiring committees why he is on the job market? Our columnist answers that question and others.

FIRST PERSON
Search Committee Virgin
An assistant professor serves on his first search committee and picks up a few pointers for his own dossier.

FIRST PERSON
The Academic Pyramid Club
The getting and giving of letters of recommendation is a chain of favors constantly repaid.

FIRST PERSON
Never Mind
An assistant professor who thought about quitting academe has a change of heart.

FIRST PERSON
Interviewing at a Two-Year College
A veteran faculty member offers advice on how best to prepare for a job interview at a community college.

FIRST PERSON
To Spurn a Star
Big-name scholars are used to being courted, but sometimes they're just not right for the job.

MS. MENTOR
The Tenure Gloat
You've won tenure despite your critics' best efforts. Is it OK to rub it in?

FIRST PERSON
Just Another Leftist Loon
A new assistant professor pens an Op-Ed piece criticizing President Bush and gets an earful.

FIRST PERSON
No Respect
When students are disrespectful, it is usually because they feel disrespected by the teacher.

FIRST PERSON
Faith, Persistence, and Luck
An assistant professor of English needed all three to survive the academic job market.

FIRST PERSON
Lessons in Time Management
For new assistant professors, the most difficult challenge is learning how to schedule their time.

FIRST PERSON
Number Crunching
A new assistant professor takes a peek at his colleagues' salaries and sees his future.

FIRST PERSON
RateMyBuns.com
Ask a stupid question -- How sexy is your professor -- and you'll get a lot of stupid answers.

FIRST PERSON
To Retire or Not?
Professors hired back in the era of mandatory retirement are caught between the instinct to leave at 70 and the drive to keep going.

BALANCING ACT
A Family Affair
When an assistant professor of English goes out on the academic job market, it's not just his future at stake.

FIRST PERSON
Grading on My Nerves
Faced with the chore of grading papers, a professor develops a powerful aptitude for evasion, delay, and self-protection.

CATALYST
Raising the Research Bar?
Science professors at teaching-oriented universities say the pressure to get grants has intensified.

MS. MENTOR
Academic Frauds
Should a doctoral student be allowed to hire an editor to help write her dissertation?

FIRST PERSON
On the Market
An assistant professor, who looks likely to win tenure this year, is nonetheless going on the job market. Why?

BALANCING ACT
When Tenure Isn't Enough
Overworked and unhappy, a tenured professor decides she wants out.

FIRST PERSON
College and the Fall
Settling in to the rhythms of academic life, an assistant professor wonders what happened to his self-righteous anger?

CAREER TALK
Pregnant on the Job Market
If you are pregnant and interviewing for a job, what should you tell potential employers? And when?

FIRST PERSON
Equal Pay for Equal Work
A part-time faculty member makes the case for paying adjuncts proportionately to full-time professors.

SPOTLIGHT
Beauty and the Brains
Good-looking professors consistently outscore less attractive ones on student evaluations of teaching, a new study finds.

FIRST PERSON
The Tenure-Track Diaries
How many times can you recycle lesson plans before you, and your students, get bored?

MS. MENTOR
Keeping a Lid on Your Blog
Should a young student be dissuaded from revealing too much on his blog?

FIRST PERSON
Give Us a Chance
Job candidates are desperate for tenure-track openings. So why does a department in the rural South keep getting the brushoff?

FIRST PERSON
On the Market
Sophie Ruscello likes almost everything about her first tenure-track job -- except for the students.

BALANCING ACT
Part Time by Choice
A tenured professor goes out on a professional limb to get a life.

CAREER TALK
The CV Doctor Returns
Our experts evaluate the vitas of four faculty-job candidates and an administrator seeking to move up.

FIRST PERSON
Life in Mutation
A historian adapts both personally and professionally to his wife's cancer.

BEYOND THE IVORY TOWER
Cappuccino Dreams
You've just quit the tenure-track job for which you've trained your entire life. Now what?

FIRST PERSON
On the Market
An assistant professor, fearful that his college may shut down, starts searching for a new job.

FIRST PERSON
Shameless Self-Promotion
Having a successful academic career largely depends upon your talents at tooting your own horn.

MS. MENTOR
In a Fall Funk
Ms. Mentor observes that many academics feel victimized in the autumn by the clueless and the uncaring.

MS. MENTOR
In a Fall Funk
Ms. Mentor observes that many academics feel victimized in the fall by the clueless and the uncaring.

ALL IN THE GAME
Let Them Teach at Stanford
When a public university hires "rock star professors," does it translate into any benefits for undergraduate education? Stanley Fish thinks so.

FIRST PERSON
Rescuing My Manuscript
For an associate professor, the publication of her first book was exhilarating. The editing process was not.

FIRST PERSON
On the Market
Captivated by a glitzy fellowship opportunity, an assistant professor nearly bungles a shot at a new tenure-track job.

FIRST PERSON
Some Reflection on Rejection
For all the advice offered on landing a faculty job, not much is said about dealing with the other side of the coin -- not getting one.

MS. MENTOR
It's All About Fit
Dr. Good Fit teaches superbly, seeks advice, shares research, joins committees, makes lasagna, smiles a lot, and is fictional.

SPOTLIGHT
Nontraditional Ph.D.'s
Can applicants with doctorates from distance-learning programs land tenure-track jobs in academe?

BALANCING ACT
Out of Sync
Harmony derives from a sense of personal control over our work and our lives.

CAREER TALK
A Summer Reading List
For those preparing to go on the job market in the fall, Mary Morris Heiberger and Julia Miller Vick offer a little required reading.

SPOTLIGHT
Canceled Searches
Even the normally robust job market in economics has slowed down lately.

FIRST PERSON
On Camera
A veteran television producer asks you to appear in a documentary as an academic expert. Here's what to expect.

SPOTLIGHT
Do the Math
Professors are retiring in mathematics but many departments don't have the money to replace them with tenure-track hires.

FIRST PERSON
On the Market
A historian's search for a new tenure-track job comes up empty. So why isn't he upset?

FIRST PERSON
Life After Tenure
Even when your promotion goes well, the up-or-out experience colors the quality of academic life.

MS. MENTOR
Tone it Down
Ms. Mentor explains why most high-pitched voices get weeded out of academe.

ALL IN THE GAME
The Same Old Song
It is only by remaining distinct -- by remaining narrow -- that an enterprise can ensure its survival and its utility.

SPOTLIGHT
Jobs in History
It was a bad year to be a senior professor on the market in history.

BALANCING ACT
When to Procreate
Is it better to have children in graduate school than on the tenure track? A young scholar finds out.

FIRST PERSON
The Other Candidate
Is it wrong to wonder how heavily race worked in the other guy's favor and against mine?

FIRST PERSON
Debunking the Myths
Grant writing is an essential skill for academics. So why is it so difficult and so mysterious?

SPOTLIGHT
Jobs in Physics
A wave of faculty retirements is under way in physics but not all departments can afford to replace the retirees.

FIRST PERSON
Learning a Little Discipline
A new assistant professor credits the pressures of graduate school with preparing her for the tenure track.

FIRST PERSON
When Tenure Fails
The experience of not getting tenure can affect a lot more than just your employment status.

CAREER TALK
The Best Home Pages
Our columnists take a look at the Web pages of academics and offer critiques of what works and what doesn't.

FIRST PERSON
Double Jeopardy
Being black and female may have helped a young Ph.D. land tenure-track jobs, but they have also kept her on the job market.

FIRST PERSON
Don't Go
The best piece of advice you can give an undergraduate who wants to go to graduate school in the humanities is, don't.

FIRST PERSON
No Contest
An assistant professor decides he would rather withdraw from competition than sell his soul to win a teaching award.

FIRST PERSON
Wrong Answers
The chairman of an English department at a teaching-focused university advises job candidates on what not to say in the interview.

FIRST PERSON
The Decision
A diary of a faculty search in history comes to a close as the committee makes an offer.

MS. MENTOR
When to Remain Silent
Ms. Mentor knows when you should speak up and when you should shut up.

ALL IN THE GAME
Aim Low
Democratic values and academic values are not the same, says Stanley Fish, and confusing the two can easily damage the quality of education.

FIRST PERSON
Addicted to Realtor.com
Some academics obsessively troll the job ads. But it's the real-estate listings that have one academic couple hooked.

FIRST PERSON
Office Hours
You can tell a lot about faculty members by how they set up their office hours.

ACADEMIC ASSETS
Planning Ahead
Just starting out as a new faculty member? It's time to start thinking about your retirement, advises a retiring professor.

FIRST PERSON
So Why Are You Really Leaving?
An assistant professor leaves a plum job and her colleagues wonder: Is it the tug of family? Divorce? Is it us?

FIRST PERSON
Turned Down
How do you learn to live with faculty colleagues who voted against your promotion?

CATALYST
Beating the Odds
How two doctoral students in the sciences made it straight to the tenure track.

MS. MENTOR
Sullen Spouses
She's got her dream job. He hates the location. What to do? Ms. Mentor knows.

FIRST PERSON
Is Untenured Untenable?
A newly appointed but untenured department chairwoman wonders if she will regret taking the job.

FIRST PERSON
The Annual Move
After a series of one-year faculty positions, an M.F.A. decides her visiting days are over.

BALANCING ACT
Salary Games
Linking merit raises to outside offers is one of several practices in academe that discriminate against female professors with families.

CAREER TALK
Good References
You have a job, but you want another. When should you ask your department head for a recommendation?

FIRST PERSON
The Seven Digital Sins
An ethicist devises a list of the seven digital sins infecting academe.

BEYOND THE IVORY TOWER
Giving Up a Good Thing
An assistant professor explains why she is leaving a plum tenure-track job for an unknown future outside academe.

FIRST PERSON
Skipping Maternity Leave
A new assistant professor questions her decision to not take a maternity leave and return to work.

SPOTLIGHT
What's Your Philosophy?
Job applicants are increasingly asked to submit a statement of their teaching philosophy. But do departments really use them?

SPOTLIGHT
Dos and Don'ts
Need help writing a statement of your teaching philosophy? Here are some tips on what to write, and what not to write.

FIRST PERSON
Making the Deal
"That's your final position?" the candidate asks. "I'm afraid so," I reply. "Take it or leave it," I think but don't say.

MS. MENTOR
Tormented by Evaluations
Ms. Mentor's mailbag is full of complaints about student evaluations of teaching -- none of them from students.

FIRST PERSON
Choosing the Finalists
In a diary of a faculty search in history, the committee settles on four finalists.

ACADEMIC ASSETS
Politics and Portfolios
Socially responsible mutual funds appeal to academics hoping to mesh their investments and their politics. Here's what to consider before investing in one.

BALANCING ACT
Joyous Interruptions
A Dad-to-be describes how he used technology to fulfill his teaching duties and plan for a family leave.

CAREER TALK
Answering Your Questions
How sincere are job ads about diversity? Mary Morris Heiberger and Julia Miller Vick answer that and other questions from readers.

FIRST PERSON
Settling In, or Settling?
An assistant professor of English mulls whether he should be applying for other jobs or just happy to have one.

BEYOND THE IVORY TOWER
Leaving a Faculty Job
The right way to leave a tenure-track job -- and it does happen -- depends on whether you're leaving academe for good.

SPOTLIGHT
The Two-Year Attraction
Frustrated with conditions at four-year colleges, many faculty members embrace the two-year mission.

CATALYST
The Community College Scientist
The benefits and sacrifices of a career in the sciences at community colleges.

MS. MENTOR
Survivor Guilt
Ms. Mentor explains why guilt plagues so many academics who've made it on the tenure track.

FIRST PERSON
Under the Knife
A new assistant professor chronicles the uncertainties of life at a public university in a time of budget woes.

FIRST PERSON
The Tenure Files
In his series on the tenure process, Dennis Baron looks at what it takes to get a case successfully past the college committee.

FIRST PERSON
Too Much Money
An assistant professor with a few years' experience finds that his salary is a few thousand more than departments are willing to spend on a new junior scholar.

FIRST PERSON
Looking for Lincoln
An assistant professor with second thoughts about the tenure track continues her search for alternative careers.

FIRST PERSON
A Long Shortlist
A committee creates a shortlist of 12 candidates in the latest installment of a diary about a faculty search in history.

FIRST PERSON
Bennington or Tenure?
A nearly tenured professor mulls the risks of giving it up for a job at a better college.

CATALYST
The Scientist as Manager
Like any business, a laboratory can flourish or flounder by the quality of its management.

FIRST PERSON
Newly Hired and Pregnant
Jeanne S. Zaino wouldn't recommend getting pregnant in your first year on the tenure track, but so far, she's found it's not a career killer.

ALL IN THE GAME
Saving the World
If you want to save the world as a university administrator, says Stanley Fish, do it on your own time.

SPOTLIGHT
Lessons in Grantsmanship
After hiring 11 new assistant professors, SMU's engineering school takes the unusual step of training them in how to get grants.

BALANCING ACT
Which Half Is Yours?
Excessive attention to who deserves the credit in collaborative ventures defeats the whole point.

FIRST PERSON
My First Shipwreck
Like many an academic, James M. Lang was entranced by the siren song of the commercial publishing market.

FIRST PERSON
External Reviewers
The third article in a series on how the tenure process works in one English department.

SPOTLIGHT
Jobs for Historians
History departments had expected to be doing a lot of hiring to replace retirees, but the economy has put a damper on that.

FIRST PERSON
Conference Man
An academic superhero plans to use his X-ray vision to look into the unacknowledged hearts of job candidates at the MLA convention.

CATALYST
Competing for Students
Recruiting top graduate students to your laboratory can help ignite your career. Here's what to look for.

MS.MENTOR
'I Don't Fit In'
Sure you do, says Ms. Mentor. Academics just like to think they're especially unique.

FIRST PERSON
A History Search
A senior historian who is leading a hiring committee begins a chronicle of the search.

FIRST PERSON
Where I Belong
A self-described "white Canadian heathen" finds her niche teaching at a historically black university.

BALANCING ACT
The Trailing Spouse
Elizabeth Gilbey didn't particularly enjoy being spurned by her husband's department, but the experience did solidify her career goals.

FIRST PERSON
A Digression on Digression
For all the stress placed on order and proper planning in the classroom, sometimes digression is what works.

SPOTLIGHT
Demanding Full Credit
When most colleges calculate faculty workload, they only give science professors partial credit for teaching laboratory courses. Is that fair?

BEYOND THE IVORY TOWER
Your Secret Desire
Why do so many academics secretly want to be freelance magazine writers?

FIRST PERSON
In the Minority
Forced to resign after only a year on the job, a new assistant professor sees an insidious force at work: racial discrimination.

FIRST PERSON
The Weasel Clause
When your tenure-track career is derailed by the weasel clause, the options are grim.

CATALYST
A Couple of Scientists
The scientific life seems suited to being single. Here's how a few academic couples have managed to combine love and research.

MS. MENTOR
The Art of Not Making Enemies
Ms. Mentor rarely gets to tell all of her correspondents that they have done wrong. Now's her chance.

ALL IN THE GAME
Discipline and Punish
The general reluctance in academe to dismiss or even discipline a professor stems from class prejudice, says Stanley Fish.

FIRST PERSON
Dreaming of 6 Figures
Academics like to say they're not in it for the money. Would it be so bad, asks Thomas H. Benton, if they were?

BALANCING ACT
Your Money or Your Time?
Academic employers need to learn that many professors, given the choice, would take time off over more money any day.

FIRST PERSON
A Look at the Record
Here's the second in a series of articles by Dennis Baron on how the tenure process works in one English department.

SPOTLIGHT
In Charge Without Tenure
Departments are increasingly tapping untenured faculty members to serve as chairmen.

FIRST PERSON
Tenure-Track Heaven
For three years, her college held her tenure-track job for her while she finished her Ph.D. Now she's not sure she wants it anymore.

FIRST PERSON
The Faculty Spouse
Academic life is stressful for the tenure-track professor. What is it like for the professor's nonacademic spouse?

SPOTLIGHT
Tomorrow's Professor
A small but growing e-mail list offers "desktop faculty development" to new academics and future ones.

FIRST PERSON
Redefining Myself
Your courseload may be heavier at a teaching-oriented college, but the chains that can constrict your scholarly work will be lighter.

CATALYST
Small-Scale Science
You may have pictured yourself at a major research university. Here's how to know if you should give small-college science a try.

MS. MENTOR
Kicking the Competition
Just because a colleague is undermining you, Ms. Mentor says, doesn't mean you should respond in kind.

SPOTLIGHT
Post-Tenure Review
Whether you think it has saved tenure or eroded it, post-tenure review is an unavoidable reality at most public institutions.

SPOTLIGHT
What to Expect
Professors who have been through post-tenure review offer advice on what to expect.

FIRST PERSON
Trial and Error
A Ph.D. who tried out administrative work decides to go back on the market for a tenure-track job.

CAREER TALK
The CV Doctor Returns
Our experts evaluate the CVs of three recent Ph.D.'s, a community-college instructor, and an administrator.

FIRST PERSON
Not Expecting This
A new assistant professor lands her dream job on the tenure track and then discovers she's pregnant.

ACADEMIC ASSETS
Taking on Outside Work
John Vineyard has a few pointers for academics on how to get started as a consultant.

FIRST PERSON
On the Market
An assistant professor of history, tired of state budget cuts and a heavy teaching load, begins a search for a new tenure-track job.

BEYOND THE IVORY TOWER
A Living Wage
An Air Force Reserve officer finds that his summer job in the Pentagon pays more than his full-time job on the tenure track.

FIRST PERSON
A Fairly Happy Ending
An academic couple's four-year search for the perfect solution to their two-body problem finds them on the brink of stability.

CATALYST
The Seven-Year Itch
Mary Beckman offers advice from scientists on taking a sabbatical at home or abroad.

MS. MENTOR
Can Liars Get Tenure?
Is there an open, honest way to deny tenure to someone whose views are repellent? Ms. Mentor is stumped.

ALL IN THE GAME
Somebody Back There Didn't Like Me
Voting on a tenure case this year? Stanley Fish offers a few rules to help you make your decision for the right reasons.

BALANCING ACT
The Worst Question
For an academic couple, the worst question you can ask is about their future together.

CAREER TALK
Answering Your Questions
Our columnists advise readers about dual-career job searches, job hunting from overseas, and other career quandaries.

FIRST PERSON
Getting Promoted
The first in a series of articles by Dennis Baron on how the tenure-and-promotion process works in one English department.

SPOTLIGHT
Tenure or More Money?
DeSales University offers its faculty members a choice: Seek tenure or sign a five-year contract with a big bonus attached.

FIRST PERSON
An Academic Transient's Tale
As a spousal hire, Joel B. Peckham Jr., discovered that his job was a gift that could be taken away at any moment.

FIRST PERSON
The Waiting Game
You've interviewed at a community college and it went well. Now all you can do is wait -- and not do anything stupid.

FIRST PERSON
Was It Worth It?
David Rivers left a tenured job to start over on a new campus for family reasons. It seemed like the right move.

MS. MENTOR
Tenure-Track Anxiety
Ms. Mentor counsels nervous junior scholars who fear that their odds of getting tenure are slim.

ALL IN THE GAME
The Golden Rule, Part 2
Stanley Fish explains why academics seem incapable of treating job candidates as fellow human beings.

FIRST PERSON
Baiting the Cheaters
It's time to set ethics aside, says Vincent Moore, in order to beat plagiarists at their own game.

FIRST PERSON
Thank God for School
A married couple of teachers finds that a summer free of teaching offers a bit too much togetherness.

BALANCING ACT
Don't Go It Alone
The one thing female and minority scholars should most avoid in order to succeed in academe: isolation.

CAREER TALK
Attention, Hiring Committees
With a little foresight, a search committee can avoid unnecessary wear and tear on candidates. Here's how.

FIRST PERSON
The New Economics of Hiring
Positions disappear mid-search, and candidates are invited for campus interviews as long as they pay their own way.

FIRST PERSON
Back Where I Started
After three years on the job market, Jack Zibluk is right where he began, and he's relieved.

FIRST PERSON
Is Congeniality Overrated?
A congenial department is usually one whose members are of one sex, one race, one pedagogy -- in other words, homogeneous.

CATALYST
A Moving Experience
The life of a scientist doesn't settle down once the lab is established. There's always a move, somewhere down the line.

MS. MENTOR
I'm Perfect
So why won't anyone in academe hire me? Ms. Mentor knows why.

SPOTLIGHT
Rookies in the Classroom
In the fall, hundreds of graduate instructors and new assistant professors will teach on their own for the first time. Here's what to expect.

BALANCING ACT
Bringing Your Work Home
Naomi J. Miller experiments with ways to integrate her work with her family life.

CAREER TALK
Do I Need a Web Page?
If you're going on the market this fall, it might help to have your own Web page. Here's how to make it a good one.

FIRST PERSON
Leaving on a High Note
When Michael Dalton decided to leave his tenured job for a better-paying one, he knew his colleagues would understand. But would his students?

FIRST PERSON
Confessions of a Lone Extrovert
In an academic culture dominated by introverts, what's an extrovert to do?

SPOTLIGHT
Wake-Up Call
Cutbacks by university presses raise fears about how junior faculty members will meet the standard for tenure.

FIRST PERSON
Starting Over
What's it like to give up tenure and start over as a new assistant professor?

MS. MENTOR
I Thought I Mentored Her
It's easy, Ms. Mentor says, for a mentor's invitations to a young scholar to be misinterpreted.

ALL IN THE GAME
Say It Ain't So
Stanley Fish laments the lost art of speaking and writing precisely.

ACADEMIC ASSETS
It's Payback Time
You've left graduate school with a Ph.D. and a sizeable amount of debt. Here's how to get started paying it off.

BALANCING ACT
Mothers vs. Others
The chilly climate for women in academe reflects stereotypes not only about women in general, but about mothers in particular.

SPOTLIGHT
A Hot Commodity
The competition between business schools and economics departments to hire Ph.D.'s in economics has helped drive up salaries in both arenas.

FIRST PERSON
Completing the Cycle
The chairman of an English department signs off from another year in the academic hiring cycle.

CATALYST
Science on the Stand
Serving as an expert witness in court cases can be a lucrative side career for scientists.

ALL IN THE GAME
Stop the Presses
Why Stanley Fish continues talking to reporters, against his better judgment.

BALANCING ACT
Great Expectations
Achieving a perfect balance in work and life is an exercise in futility. But is it so futile you shouldn't even try?

FIRST PERSON
Dealing With Plagiarists
A professor experiments with a zero-tolerance policy for student plagiarists.

FIRST PERSON
Are We There Yet?
The saga continues: An academic couple -- she in chemistry, he in psychology -- search for jobs in the same vicinity.

FIRST PERSON
Giving Up Tenure
David Rivers gave up tenure to take a new job that better suited his family life. Is he insane?

FIRST PERSON
Reunion Blues
Thomas H. Benton goes to his first graduate-school reunion, and finds himself outclassed.

FIRST PERSON
Striking Out
Harry Lancaster's search for a tenure-track job ended without a single hit, but he still plans to play the game.

FIRST PERSON
Rejecting a Tenure-Track Future
Early on, Patty Payette began to see that her Ph.D. in the humanities could lead to more than just a teaching job.

ALL IN THE GAME
Were It Not for My ...
... wife, husband, partner, mother, dog, or flower garden. Stanley Fish ruminates on the reasons job candidates turn down offers.

MS. MENTOR
The New Faculty Wife
Ms. Mentor comes to the aid of a new faculty wife wondering about her social obligations.

FIRST PERSON
Hits and Misses
A department chairman tallies his regrets and his successes in handling this year's job search.

CATALYST
Scientists Turned Authors
When scientists take the plunge into the literary world, they rarely return to the laboratory.

ACADEMIC ASSETS
Investing Wisely
You've landed your first tenure-track job. Here's what you need to consider for your financial future.

CAREER TALK
Learning the Lingo
The jargon of the academic job market can be confusing. Here's a glossary of terms you need to know.

BALANCING ACT
Don't Explain, Don't Complain
That's the motto Lisa Krissoff Boehm lives by when it comes to balancing work and family.

FIRST PERSON
The Community-College Job Search
It's a different animal than the hiring process at four-year colleges, writes Dana M. Zimbleman.

FIRST PERSON
Not What I Had in Mind
A community college was the last place Christine Rauchfuss Gray wanted to teach.

FIRST PERSON
Life Without the Hat
In the Harry Potter novels, a magical sorting hat decides where students would be happiest living. Pamela Johnston thinks she could use one in academe.

FIRST PERSON
You're the One
The interviews are over, and it's time to make a choice. Here's how one department chooses a finalist and makes its offer.

SPOTLIGHT
Letting Lecturers Go
A plan to hire fewer lecturers and more tenure-track professors at the University of California at Davis runs into opposition.

FIRST PERSON
The More Things Change ...
After Travis J. Ryan joined the tenure track, he thought his life would be different from graduate school. It is, and it isn't.

FIRST PERSON
When a Former Colleague Dies
It used to be that months could go by before you learned of a former colleague's death. Not anymore.

BALANCING ACT
Following Your Passions
If you follow scholarly trends rather than pursuing your research passions, you may win recognition but you'll lose yourself.

FIRST PERSON
Unexpected Perks
Teaching at a small, liberal-arts college, says James M. Lang, brings with it some unexpected benefits.

FIRST PERSON
The Search Goes Cold
Harry Lancaster, an assistant professor of English, finds his search for a better job foundering.

FIRST PERSON
The Question No One Asks
Job candidates in academe answer a lot of questions during interviews, but there's one big one they're never asked.

FIRST PERSON
Being a Professor and a Parent
Thomas H. Benton discovers that his life as a parent makes him a better teacher, and vice versa.

FIRST PERSON
Tips for Better Teaching
What are some of the things that good college teachers seem to do?

FIRST PERSON
Too Much of a Good Thing
An academic couple -- she in chemistry and he in psychology -- struggle to find jobs in the same area.

FIRST PERSON
My Dream Campus Interview
Searching for a tenured position in accounting, Michael Dalton hits the interview circuit.

CATALYST
Keeping Your Lab Clean
Even careful, conscientious scientists can get blindsided by research misconduct in their laboratories.

ALL IN THE GAME
You Probably Think This Song Is About You
Unhappy departments, writes Stanley Fish, are each unhappy in their own way.

MS. MENTOR
Embarrassed in Academe
A terror of public humiliation dwells in the souls of all untenured academics.

FIRST PERSON
From 'Old Boys' to Mentors
As graduate programs take on the task of socializing Ph.D.'s to professional life, what remains for the adviser to do? Plenty, says Robert A. Gross.

FIRST PERSON
The Tenure Game
Figuring out what counts in the quest for tenure.

FIRST PERSON
The Campus Visit
So you've landed the big on-campus interview. Here's what to expect.

BALANCING ACT
The Backlash Against Academic Parents
Outdated assumptions about the ideal worker undermine people's efforts to integrate their work life with their personal life.

CAREER TALK
Your Activism and Your CV
How much should you reveal on a vita about your political and academic activism?

SPOTLIGHT
More jobs than job seekers
In mathematics education, Ph.D.'s are few and job openings go unfilled.

FIRST PERSON
Teaching the MTV Learner
How to keep students from "channel surfing" for something more interesting once class begins.

FIRST PERSON
The Ones We Didn't Hire
If you didn't get the job, Mary Cullinan writes, here may be one of the reasons why.

FIRST PERSON
Lessons Learned
While waiting to hear back on his job applications, Harry Lancaster recalls what he's learned about interviewing.

FIRST PERSON
The Death of Creativity
The research-university model has killed creativity in the humanities and social sciences, writes James M. Jasper.

FIRST PERSON
Professorial Prayers
A liberal Catholic academic adapts to a new world as an assistant professor at an evangelical college.

CATALYST
From Nobel to Ig Nobel
More than 30,000 scientific prizes are awarded around the world. What can winning one of them actually mean for your career?

MS. MENTOR
What Should You Wear?
Ms. Mentor comes to the aid of wardrobe-challenged academics.

FIRST PERSON
Hiding the Baby
Should you keep quiet about your infant during the job search?

FIRST PERSON
Teaching "American Psychos"
As he prepared a special-topics course, Douglas L. Howard wondered, Have I sold out?

BALANCING ACT
Professors and Parents
Joan Williams applauds the AAUP's new policy recommending special benefits for new parents, but wonders, Will anyone follow it?

CAREER TALK
Answering Your Questions
Do I have to return from a sabbatical? Readers get some answers to their career quandaries.

SPOTLIGHT
Getting that First Job
New assistant professors discussed, at the recent MLA convention, how they landed their first tenure-track job.

FIRST PERSON
How I Got My Job
Why do some Ph.D.'s prevail in their search for a tenure-track job while so many others fall by the wayside?

SPOTLIGHT
The Market for Historians
Job openings in history reach record levels, driven by faculty retirements.

FIRST PERSON
Relationship Counseling
Why is the relationship between professors and fund raisers so often a strained one?

FIRST PERSON
"Are You Coming Back?"
She had taken a leave from her tenured post out west to be with her husband, a fellow academic in the Midwest. Now she had a decision to make.

SPOTLIGHT
The State of Hiring
How the recession has affected hiring at a regional state university in Tennessee, a community college in California, a liberal-arts college in Iowa, a public research university in Arizona, and a private research university in New York.

CATALYST
Doing Science Under Protest
How to keep your research going in the face of public attack.

ALL IN THE GAME
Staying the Course
Stanley Fish looks at the challenges of sustaining an institutional campaign to move up in the academic world.

MS. MENTOR
Academic Revenge
Even the gentlest of academics, Ms. Mentor knows, harbor fantasies of revenge.

SPOTLIGHT
The Job Market in English
Job openings are up in the ever-competitive market for English faculty members, but so is the number of new Ph.D.'s.

FIRST PERSON
Junior Faculty Syndrome
Daniel Kowalsky vowed he wouldn't repeat the worst habits of his professors when he finally became one himself.

SPOTLIGHT
When a Colleague Dies
How departments deal with the death of a faculty member in the middle of a semester.

ACADEMIC ASSETS
Continuing Care
Advice for academics who plan to move into one of the many retirement communities springing up near college campuses.

FIRST PERSON
Stopping Grade Inflation
The untenured faculty members who do most of the grading can do little about grade inflation if they want to keep their jobs.

ACADEMIC ASSETS
Continuing Care
Advice for academics who plan to move into one of the many retirement communities springing up near college campuses.

FIRST PERSON
Stopping Grade Inflation
The untenured faculty members who do most of the grading can do little about grade inflation if they want to keep their jobs.

FIRST PERSON
Working in a Small Town
A Ph.D. in English leaves behind the big city -- with few regrets -- to take a tenure-track position in the sticks.

FIRST PERSON
Take My Advice -- Or Not
In his first year on the tenure track in the sciences, Travis J. Ryan learns on the job about the duties of student advising.

MS. MENTOR
Fear of Committee-ment
Ms. Mentor offers advice on how to escape from being devoured by committee work.

FIRST PERSON
4 Jobs in 3 Years
It took her a while, but Katherine Hannigan finally managed to trade in the scattered existence of an artist/adjunct for a tenure-track job.

FIRST PERSON
The Art of Meetings
Some academics seem to like faculty meetings. James M. Lang is not one of them.

FIRST PERSON
The Tenure-Track Diaries
In his second year on the tenure track in English, James M. Lang has a message for first-year faculty members: "Hang on, it'll get better."

FIRST PERSON
Looking for More than 'Good Enough'
Harry Lancaster, an assistant professor of English, begins a diary of his search for a tenure-track job.

FIRST PERSON
Teaching Through Tragedy
In the wake of the recent terrorist attacks, teaching requires a delicate balance of the personal and the professional, writes Douglas L. Howard.

FIRST PERSON
The Wrath of the Retiree
When Clark Baker applied for a position in history, he didn't expect to have to defend himself to the retiring professor who was leaving the job.

FIRST PERSON
The Replacement
Douglas L. Howard chronicles the difficulties of taking the place of a popular faculty member in the classroom.

FIRST PERSON
Tenure Denied
James M. Jasper explains why institutions are not your friends, in the third of a three-piece series on being denied tenure.

FIRST PERSON
Was I Moving Up in the World -- Or Just Moving?
Jack Zibluk finally got an opportunity to move on to a bigger and better university. But did he really want it?

FIRST PERSON
Denied Tenured
James M. Jasper chronicles the life lessons he learned from the experience of being denied tenure.

Also see:

Balancing Act
How to find a balance between work and family.

Career Talk
Practical guidance for academic job seekers from professional career counselors.

Ms. Mentor
Words of wisdom about academic culture.

First Person
Firsthand accounts of Ph.D.'s on landing jobs and working in academe, or outside the ivory tower.