Hi. My name's Dr Zcat_abroad, and I'll be your companion for a while. I've recently finished my PhD, graduated with a silly hat and all. And now I'm trying to find a real job, and discovering that there's more to getting an academic job than simply finishing a thesis and being a good teacher. You also have to publish!
Now, I have all sorts of excuses for why I don't currently have multiple publications on my CV, but no-one is interested in that. So, socks up time. Time to get writing. Follow me, if you will, as I attempt to improve my word-count and visibility.
Already in the pipe-line is one article, under review.
Step One is a paper to be delivered at the International Medieval Congress at Leeds - a goal I have been aiming for since I became a Medievalist, back when I started my MA.
Step Two and Three are two articles arising from my thesis, but requiring a bit of work. They need to be done by September.
Step Four is a book proposal, which should be submitted by the end of October.
I have more plans ahead, but that's enough to be going on with for now.
Good luck, but my own personal experience in academia is that publishing really does not count for much in landing a teaching job.
ReplyDeleteI have had varied information on the role of publishing and jobs, but considering that my otherwise healthy CV has not yet even gained me an interview, it's definitely time to fix that hole. (And, when I asked why I had not made the grade for the last post-doc I applied for, the answer was "competition, publications".
ReplyDeleteI did get a 6 month post-doc, to write articles. So write I will!
Well I had lots of publications and got no interviews with the excuse that I had no teaching experience. But, a lot of the jobs I applied to went to people with no publications. Indeed a number have gone to people with no PhDs, they were only ABD. So my feeling is that most academic selections are fixed. The hiring has nothing to do with any type of merit, but rather on personal connections.
ReplyDeleteHi, Zcat! I wanted to say a little more about the webpages-to-replace-PowerPoint idea. I've done this using Word, but I think most word-processing programs allow you to save as HTML, which is the key step. And you can't put the links in until you have a name for the next page.
ReplyDeleteIn my experience on several hiring committees (at a single institution), personal connections are irrelevant. We look for both teaching experience and promise of research ability, which is usually exemplified by publications. Personality is also a factor, though it's harder to quantify. You don't have to be a live-wire; calmness in the face of probing questions is a good quality for a teacher. But a candidate who can't work up some enthusiasm for speaking of her/his research is unlikely to be a dynamic teacher who can interest students in material they expect to find "boring."