"provided that potential buyers are willing to trade off housing, neighborhood and locational attributes"
In other words, as long as you are willing to live in a crappy fixer-upper in a lousy neighborhood with no attractions, OR as long as you are willing to devote 60% of your salary to a vastly overpriced house in a good neighborhood hours away from campus, LA offers a lot of opportunity.
A friend of mine was a visitor at one of the Claremont colleges for a couple years. His commute was 90 miles. One way!
I've posted the final versions of the job ads for the three positions at GaTech on the solicitations page. (Apologies if the ads appear twice.) I've also added instructions on how to apply for multiple positions, FWIW.
MODERATOR - Can we return to the format of last year at this point, with a tally board on top... With deadlines here, or nearly so, can't we expect some things to fill in fairly quickly?
The tally board was cool, but a royal pain. We're looking into alternative ways to format it that might make it easier. If anyone wants to get us rolling by, say, sending an HTML format table with the e-jobs listing, we'd appreciate it :-)
I'd add that I think the tally board became obsolete last year once the wiki was up-and-running. I went to the wiki for "breaking news" before I looked at the "big board." Does anybody know if a new wiki has been started for this year? If so, perhaps you could just add a link to the wiki at the top of the blog.
Does anyone have a sense of the average salary for assistant and associate professors at doctorate granting research universities? Negotiable and competitive in the APSA job listings is not very helpful.
Your best resource is at: http://chronicle.com/stats/aaup/
That's the Chronicle of Higher Ed's web site for the AAUP faculty salary survey data. Has average salary by rank for almost all institutions.
Two very important notes:
1. Salaries are AVERAGE for each rank. I.e, for a mid-range Asst Prof; a first-year Assistant will be somewhat lower (but almost always above Instructor, which is also listed).
2. Salaries are averaged across disciplines. Poli Sci salaries are almost always lower than university averages, as we tend to make less than scientists and economists, let alone biz/med/law profs. How far off average varies (at a SLAC, not much; private U with big professional schools, lots).
As a very rough range for starting Assistants, you can see high 40s for non-top 20 PhD depts at some public universities in lower cost states. Mid to high 50s seems pretty common. At a top-10 in a major city, I have no clue. 65-70k? Is anyone getting 80k out of the starting gate?
There is a wide range in faculty salaries. Mid-60k range is about average for assistant profs. I've heard of offers in the low 50's at some places. At the high end, "star" candidates at the best schools can earn close to 80k. However, a BIG consideration is that 65k in, say, Iowa, Texas, Georgia, or Ohio, puts you at the top of the food chain and where can afford a very nice house. 65k in Boston or the SF Bay Area gets you a dingy condo in a bad neighborhood. I left a coast for that very reason.
7:49's observation is, to me, really the key piece of the compensation question -- how far does it go (i.e., the USC housing discussion up-thread).
$70K sounds like a lot, but it's not a lot in NYC or Chicago or SF or LA. Compared to us, before they've taken off their caps and gowns, law school graduates have walked into an average over $100K.
I doubt there's a rule of thumb about cost-of-living considerations in the job search. Obviously you want to work at the best place you can. But one still has to consider whether or not one can AFFORD to work at the best place one can.
That's even more the case for marrieds and marrieds-with-children (which also introduces the school-quality variable).
Buying a house right now in some markets (e.g. DC-VA) is not a good idea, given the bursting bubble. One would likely rent until rent and mortgage prices converge again:
Real median prices will fall - perhaps by as much as 20% in the most overvalued markets - in the next 18-24 months, which means that COL in those overvalued markets will actually fall as real salary (hopefully) increases. If people on the market now wait until summer 2009 to buy, the gap between median home prices in say DC and Iowa will have narrowed.
"Obviously you want to work at the best place you can. "
I'd caveat that: you want to get a job at the best place where you can have the career and life that you want. That does not necessarily involve being at a highly ranked institution but saddled with
- all of the less-qualified graduate students since your more distinguished senior colleagues have the better ones
- coping with the stress from a salary inadequate for the cost of living, leading to constant family problems and eventual divorce (not great for productivity; I speak from experience)
- low probability of tenure, so at the end of seven to nine years, you are back on the market competing against people more up to date on the literature, and less expensive, than you are
Not a pretty picture. Settling for a job a bit further down in the rankings (albeit not too far down -- if you have expectations of a research career, you need to be at a RU/VH institution) could be the wiser move in the long term. Low-cost airfares and, profoundly, the internet and electronic document exchange have considerably reduced the impact of geography on academic work (not, however, on real estate prices)
On housing/location. I understand that a lot of people have "small-town phobia". I prefer to live in a larger city, so the prospect of living in Bloomington or Iowa City doesn't appeal to me. BUT, there are plenty of nice cities with good schools that are not on the coasts, where prices are insane. Columbus OH, Nashville, Atlanta, Dallas, Austin, St. Louis, etc, are all nice towns. Coast snobbery can set you back several thousand-K a year.
And remember, median housing prices by city are still deceptive. Median prices in Toluca Lake are around $1 million. Median prices in Watts are $400,000.
That's a nice snapshot of the cost-of-living tradeoff, and it's even sharper when you consider that the medians are being driven down by parts of town where homes are sold but where one would not want to live.
It is regrettable, but one would generally not want to live in, say, Anacostia or many parts of Prince George's County, MD, for example, but those data are included in the median prices.
If you cut into the median home price more finely, limiting the search to the ZIP codes where most people would prefer to live if they had a choice, then the prices go up even further.
And of course the more complicated your life, the more you would want to analyze the financial picture closely before leaping at an offer. My health insurance, for example, is around $300; when I added my spouse and child, it went up to nearly $500. Likewise eyecare and dental. All of it is still low priced by corporate standards, but it illustrates even further the cost-of-living calculus.
And when I moved from the cornfields to Metro D.C. (like the poster above), my car insurance tripled -- something I hadn't anticipated and which bit quite seriously into the budget.
If you're still early on grad school, you really want to spend your weekends hanging out with the law, business, and medical students, not PhD students. Don't date future professors!
I'm only half joking. I know two PhD classmates who did exactly that, explicitly on the grounds that at least their dating pool would consist of men (they were both women) who were likely to reasonably mobile and reasonably well paid.
I second 7:15's advice that about the advantages of starting your career somewhere other than the most prestigious department in the profession. I know several unhappy people forced to relive the stress and humiliation of their initial job search seven years later after being denied tenure--or simply deciding to forego the tenure process--at an Ivy. (It turns out that it isn't always true that everyone denied tenure at an Ivy can write their own ticket elsewhere.) If you publish a lot, you can move up if you so desire, and probably wind up with a higher salary from having done so. If you don't, you'll be cast aside at one of the Ivys like yesterday's news. Either way, you're better off starting at a place where you have a realistic shot at tenure.
Thanks to whomever started it up--personally I think that there should be some sort of celebration: with a hint of fall in the air and as the leaves begin to turn, the new wiki officially marks the beginning of the hiring season.
Don't overestimate the "mobility" of doctors and lawyers. They're overachievers, too. They want to start out with the best internships and residencies or the best law firms. There's a nice couple debate: do we move to Boston for a residency at Mass General or do we move to Ohio for your post-doc at the Mershon Center? Hmmmm. Who's going to make more money?
Guess who loses?
And after a couple years -- the Ph.D. is still in school while the J.D. is now in year 3 or 4 of practice -- the Golden Handcuffs are going to tie up a lot of that mobility (especially for lawyers, who have to take the bar exam).
Maybe it's just like my old Drill Instructor told me -- if the Corps wanted me to have a spouse they would have issued me one.
If your department wants you to have a spouse, you'll get one with your tenure package....
The wiki site has Colaresi interviewing at Colorado on 9/13-14. While he would be a great hire, this seems kind of, well, skeevy/sketchy, given that the deadline for the position was 9/15.
Colorado is advertising two positions. One is a continuation of last year's search and the other is a new advertisement (at least that is what the advertisement says). The inference is that Colaresi is interviewing for the slot that is a continuation of last year's search.
That is way off base. The ejobs listing shows two jobs, one joint with International Affairs (a continuation of last year's failed search) and says this:
"We will begin considering applications as they arrive for the position that is joint with the International Affairs Program and on September 15 for the position that is fully rostered in Political Science"
Colaresi interviewed for the joint job, with running review of applications.
The previous post hinted at a question that I had. . .
Do schools start interviewing before their closing dates for Assistant Professor positions? Of course search committees may meet, but is it acceptable/legal to start calling in candidates before the position is officially closed?
Colaresi has interviewed there before so they probably already had interest. I am sure they will give everyone consideration who sent in their application by the deadline.
perhaps a silly question, but pertinent as i set out to print 40+ cover letters: what are thoughts on fancy cover letter paper from the applicant's home institution? is this required, desirable, or a waste of time?
All's fair in love, war, and the academic job market. My sense is that most (all?) schools look at all applications that are in by the deadline, but that doesn't stop them from moving on particular candidates of interest before their deadlines. And I suspect most HR departments would be ok with that as long as all applications are, in fact, given a fair look if they arrive before the deadline.
Colaresi's great, and I'm not a candidate for the Colorado job(s), but this doesn't sound kosher to me.
Even if they already knew him from a prior search or some other connection, interviewing him before reviewing other applications could bias that process.
Some schools do not *permit* use of letterhead by grad students for cover letters. Writing on letterhead implies that you are writing on behalf of (or in your professional capacity as an employee of) the university. Check with your department staff on the legality of that before you do it.
My dept's placement office gave us departmental letterhead and mailing labels to use if we wanted. When I was on a search committee last year, quite a few apps came on letterhead. I think it's probably fine. Of course, that's _generic_ letterhead; using say, Bob Keohane's letterhead is probably not fine...
If you're from a top-20 PhD program I'd absolutely use letterhead if you have the option. If nothing else, for people like me with very visual memories, having distingushing "looks" to a file helps with keeping track.
On a related note, does anything think its worth sending documents on expensive resume paper? I was stressed on my first job search and did, but wouldn't bother now. I do use 24lb high brightness copy paper (for writing samples as well as letters/CV) as it's easier to read and photocopies made from it are sharper, but that's only an extra buck or two a ream.
Don't use 84-brightness generic recycled (like in our office printers, ugh), but don't spend $$$ on Crane cotton bond either.
"Even if they already knew him from a prior search or some other connection, interviewing him before reviewing other applications could bias that process."
Read the job ad: it says they'll begin reviewing files immediately since it's a continuation search So what's not kosher about ... uhhh ... reviewing files immediately (and inviting someone out if they like him/her)?
Parsing the dates on which particular applicants get invited to interview is a fruitless endeavor. So what if Colorado wants to hire Colaresi, and knew that before they posted their ad? He's a very advanced assistant with a exceptional record. It isn't exactly shocking that he is being courted. If he says "no," the job will still go to someone else who has applied by their regular deadline. Colorado is not alone in looking for especially attractive candidates in advance of their official process. As with any job, if you want it, you should send in your application and hope for the best.
The type of paper you use in your application is completely irrelevant. Save your money. All that matters is what is on the paper. I have served on numerous search committees. Nobody cares what kind of paper it is. Search committes care about where you were trained, what you have published, what your letters say, whether your dissertation is interesting, and whether you can teach (well) the courses the department needs to teach.
It doesn't matter how much lipstick you put on a pig, everyone will still notice it's a pig. The reverse is also true. If you have a great dissertation and articles published in IO and APSR, then you can send in your CV on a napkin. You will get an interview.
Further to the USC/quality of life discussion above, here's a recent report on the traffic quality of life in major SMSAs. Now obviously nobody's going to tailor her/his job search to the places where traffic is terrible, but it's certainly a consideration for some jobs. The USC discussion, for example, suggested that the "good" places to live are a drive away. Well, here's some data on what the "drive" means. Stealing from Kevin Drum on the Washington Monthly blog, it's not good (he describes a 7-mile drive on one of the local interstates as taking an hour!).
We've had several searches in the past couple years, and some real pigs came out.
Great CVs, great articles in great journals, but just absolutely rotten people -- shabby, dirty, low-rent. One picked the nose while presenting. Another picked the backside. One belched.
And their CVs weren't even printed on napkins.
But they were just so absolutely appalling that no one even wanted to talk them one-to-one. Dinners were endurance tests.
Colorado eJobs listing says "At least one of the positions can be a tenured position at the level of associate professor." So that is "senior" as in "tenured," not "senior" as in "full professor" or "moosehead."
If the advertisement says "tenured associate" then it means "tenured associate" and not full. My guess is that no one is trying to be sneaky when they write a job advertisement.
I know for certain that other committees are meeting. I advise applicants to ensure your applications arrive before deadlines that are set early. Others might advise you it is okay for applications to arrive a few days late. Sometimes it does not matter, but at some places it really does. If a department sets an early October deadline, it might indicate that they intend to move early.
Anyone know anything about the University of Vermont IPE job? What specifically they're looking for? I'm trying to decide whether I should apply or not.
UVM has the rep of being extremely, extremely dysfunctional. I don't know if that is still the case, but the chair is the same as many years ago. A department blessed with incredibly nice people who allow the truly insane people to run the place. For one bit of interesting data, check out how many good associate profs have degrees/arrival dates in the 1980s. Too bad, as the location is terrific and the good people are great.
someone mentioned earlier on the blog that Grinnell was leaning more towards an IPE hire. I interviewed with them at APSA (I'm a security person) and I didn't get this impression at all. Has anyone else heard anything about Grinnell's IR search?
At the military schools like NDU, Naval Postgrad, War Colleges, Asst Prof starting salaries are high. Probably mid 80s in DC, to low 70s at the Army school at Fort Leavenworth.
Caveats: the salary scales are flatter than civilian institutions. Full profs earn maybe $110k to $120k (higher at NDU).
More importantly, these are 12 month contracts _without_ tenure. Standard is 2 to 5 year contracts depending on the school. Renewal rates are very high (well over 95% at the one I know).
You're not teaching for 12 months (though loads are higher than R1 institutions), but you are a regular employee all year: i.e., two weeks vacation for new employees, the other 50 weeks you're in your office. And, federal laws basically prohibit outside consulting, honoraria, keeping grant money for salary supplements or buying PCs for yourself, and even make it tough to keep book royalties.
Things vary by institution; NPS notably has tenure (NDU and the service War Colleges do not).
I met with Grinnell in Chicago as well, and I also got a very different impression. In fact, I was given the idea that they would ideally like a Comparativist with a European focus.
The other problem with Naval Postgraduate School (and I believe the other war colleges, but not Leavenworth) is that you are required to teach off-campus in military facilities such as aircraft carriers. Exciting the first time; gets old very quickly according to those I know who are required to do it. Also the military higher education system tends to be highly unstable -- look at the current debates around the value/dysfunction of Gen. Petraeus's Princeton Ph.D.
These jobs can be interesting, even fascinating (I taught at NPS for a couple of quarters as a visitor) but you absolutely need to go into them with eyes open and due diligence -- they are quite different than standard academic positions in the civilian sector.
The requirement to go out to the fleet to do teaching is specific to Naval Postgrad (some of them really enjoy it, some not). I'm at one of the war colleges, and most of us haven't travelled except for academic conferences and self-initiated research trips. Fewer junkets than I'd hoped for, actually.
Stability varies. In terms of job stability there's generally lots; non-renewals are very rare at all the schools. Curriculum can be in turmoil though, and that gets old fast. Particularly true for the Army as they grope for Iraq solutions and management positions turnover frequently. At my institution, you can't use ancient lessons over and over but we're not starting from scratch all the time either.
Bottom line: if you interview for a military teaching job, ask LOTS of questions. There's much that works differently, even from one DoD institution to another.
Since there seem to be some folks here who could answer this question....here goes:
Should a woman even consider applying for a job at the Citadel? What is the climate like there or at any other military institutions for female faculty?
I know a female faculty member who teaches at the Naval Academy. She has been there for more than 5 years and likes it a lot. I have no idea about the Citadel.
I have a female colleague at a war college who is perfectly content. Of course, the Citadel is more akin to USNA or USMA than the follow-on colleges. Important consideration -- these are NOT research jobs. You're there to teach, teach, teach.
Keep in mind also that the Citadel and VMI are private colleges, vs federal institutions. Citadel and VMI are much more self-conciously all-emcompassing cultural/social experiences than even the service academies, are more politically conservative, and were male-only much longer than the service schools (late 1990s vs 1970s). Federal employment rules also provide greater protection vs discrimination/harrassment. Pay is also what you expect for small schools, not the Defense Dept. numbers given earlier.
Moderator: Can we start a new thread specifically for discussing job rumors {ie, "campus invites issued", etc. Lately, with both the USC housing discussion and the VMI/Citadel gender discussion {both interesting in their own right} there has been a lot of distraction for those who merely wish to get updates about the status of their applications.
Does anyone know anything about the Cleveland State IR theory job beyond what's in their ad? What the place is like, what they might be looking for, etc.?
There's a lot of interest in the supply side of the job market. What about the demand side? I wonder how many people are on the job market searching for jobs at the junior level and at the senior level?
I know the discussion of teaching in military environments has been shut off by the blog police, but if anyone is still interested (and by the way, there are a considerable number of IR jobs open in such places, if not the one you applied for), there's a very nice article relevant to the topic in the 30-Sept New York Times Magazine. Try this link:
Apologies: I wasn't referring to the monitor as the "blog police", rather to the comments of <3:32 AM, September 27, 2007>.
No objections whatsoever to the monitoring of this blog -- in fact it is quite commendable. Objections rather to the folks who appear to believe we have an electron shortage and seek to quash all discussions not relevant to how their application at Harvard is going.
Any news re: Notre Dame's search for a junior IR position (not the Kroc Institute but the Poli Sci dept)? My impression is that they were looking for a more theory friendly IR candidate (theory as in political theory, not formal theory). Anything would be appreciateed. Thanks.
289 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 289 of 289Stanford does have a remarkably good housing program... if you're offered it. Not everyone is.
Some UC schools offer decent housing packages to junior hires (subsidized mortgage plus some cash for your down payment).
NYU and Columbia provide apartments.
So no wonder USC is not in the same league, academics-wise, as these schools.
I love that line from USC:
"provided that potential buyers are willing to trade off housing, neighborhood and locational attributes"
In other words, as long as you are willing to live in a crappy fixer-upper in a lousy neighborhood with no attractions, OR as long as you are willing to devote 60% of your salary to a vastly overpriced house in a good neighborhood hours away from campus, LA offers a lot of opportunity.
A friend of mine was a visitor at one of the Claremont colleges for a couple years. His commute was 90 miles. One way!
I've posted the final versions of the job ads for the three positions at GaTech on the solicitations page. (Apologies if the ads appear twice.) I've also added instructions on how to apply for multiple positions, FWIW.
MODERATOR - Can we return to the format of last year at this point, with a tally board on top... With deadlines here, or nearly so, can't we expect some things to fill in fairly quickly?
The tally board was cool, but a royal pain. We're looking into alternative ways to format it that might make it easier. If anyone wants to get us rolling by, say, sending an HTML format table with the e-jobs listing, we'd appreciate it :-)
I'd add that I think the tally board became obsolete last year once the wiki was up-and-running. I went to the wiki for "breaking news" before I looked at the "big board." Does anybody know if a new wiki has been started for this year? If so, perhaps you could just add a link to the wiki at the top of the blog.
Does anyone have a sense of the average salary for assistant and associate professors at doctorate granting research universities? Negotiable and competitive in the APSA job listings is not very helpful.
re: salaries
Your best resource is at: http://chronicle.com/stats/aaup/
That's the Chronicle of Higher Ed's web site for the AAUP faculty salary survey data. Has average salary by rank for almost all institutions.
Two very important notes:
1. Salaries are AVERAGE for each rank. I.e, for a mid-range Asst Prof; a first-year Assistant will be somewhat lower (but almost always above Instructor, which is also listed).
2. Salaries are averaged across disciplines. Poli Sci salaries are almost always lower than university averages, as we tend to make less than scientists and economists, let alone biz/med/law profs. How far off average varies (at a SLAC, not much; private U with big professional schools, lots).
As a very rough range for starting Assistants, you can see high 40s for non-top 20 PhD depts at some public universities in lower cost states. Mid to high 50s seems pretty common. At a top-10 in a major city, I have no clue. 65-70k? Is anyone getting 80k out of the starting gate?
There is a wide range in faculty salaries. Mid-60k range is about average for assistant profs. I've heard of offers in the low 50's at some places. At the high end, "star" candidates at the best schools can earn close to 80k. However, a BIG consideration is that 65k in, say, Iowa, Texas, Georgia, or Ohio, puts you at the top of the food chain and where can afford a very nice house. 65k in Boston or the SF Bay Area gets you a dingy condo in a bad neighborhood. I left a coast for that very reason.
Variation is huge. I am not sure the summary will be terribly informative.
Try the Chronicle for average salary info by institution.
http://chronicle.com/stats/aaup/
7:49's observation is, to me, really the key piece of the compensation question -- how far does it go (i.e., the USC housing discussion up-thread).
$70K sounds like a lot, but it's not a lot in NYC or Chicago or SF or LA. Compared to us, before they've taken off their caps and gowns, law school graduates have walked into an average over $100K.
I doubt there's a rule of thumb about cost-of-living considerations in the job search. Obviously you want to work at the best place you can. But one still has to consider whether or not one can AFFORD to work at the best place one can.
That's even more the case for marrieds and marrieds-with-children (which also introduces the school-quality variable).
Median Home Prices:
LA 584K. Riverside 400K
NY LI 469K. NY NJ 539K
DC-VA-MD 431K
Monthly mortage for 400K@6.5@30 = $2528 (no ins or pmi)
@ 40% of Household Budget => HH budget = $6320 => takehome of $76,000 & +/- $110,000 gross.
@ 50% of household Budget => HH budget of $5056 => takehome of $60,672 & +/- $90,000 gross.
On the other hand, median home prices in;
Bloomington IN 150K
Columbia SC 120K
Iowa City 152K
"anyone getting 80k out of the starting gate?"
Yes, I know one ABD who got that as a starting salary (in a top 10 department). Needless to say, such a high starting salary is very rare.
Buying a house right now in some markets (e.g. DC-VA) is not a good idea, given the bursting bubble. One would likely rent until rent and mortgage prices converge again:
http://www.nationalcity.com/corporate
/EconomicInsight/HousingValuation/
default.asp?WT.mc_id=100206
Real median prices will fall - perhaps by as much as 20% in the most overvalued markets - in the next 18-24 months, which means that COL in those overvalued markets will actually fall as real salary (hopefully) increases. If people on the market now wait until summer 2009 to buy, the gap between median home prices in say DC and Iowa will have narrowed.
"Obviously you want to work at the best place you can. "
I'd caveat that: you want to get a job at the best place where you can have the career and life that you want. That does not necessarily involve being at a highly ranked institution but saddled with
- all of the less-qualified graduate students since your more distinguished senior colleagues have the better ones
- coping with the stress from a salary inadequate for the cost of living, leading to constant family problems and eventual divorce (not great for productivity; I speak from experience)
- low probability of tenure, so at the end of seven to nine years, you are back on the market competing against people more up to date on the literature, and less expensive, than you are
Not a pretty picture. Settling for a job a bit further down in the rankings (albeit not too far down -- if you have expectations of a research career, you need to be at a RU/VH institution) could be the wiser move in the long term. Low-cost airfares and, profoundly, the internet and electronic document exchange have considerably reduced the impact of geography on academic work (not, however, on real estate prices)
On housing/location. I understand that a lot of people have "small-town phobia". I prefer to live in a larger city, so the prospect of living in Bloomington or Iowa City doesn't appeal to me. BUT, there are plenty of nice cities with good schools that are not on the coasts, where prices are insane. Columbus OH, Nashville, Atlanta, Dallas, Austin, St. Louis, etc, are all nice towns. Coast snobbery can set you back several thousand-K a year.
And remember, median housing prices by city are still deceptive. Median prices in Toluca Lake are around $1 million. Median prices in Watts are $400,000.
The Duke website reported a jobtalk for Sept 11. Any idea if that was for their IR job?
That's a nice snapshot of the cost-of-living tradeoff, and it's even sharper when you consider that the medians are being driven down by parts of town where homes are sold but where one would not want to live.
It is regrettable, but one would generally not want to live in, say, Anacostia or many parts of Prince George's County, MD, for example, but those data are included in the median prices.
If you cut into the median home price more finely, limiting the search to the ZIP codes where most people would prefer to live if they had a choice, then the prices go up even further.
And of course the more complicated your life, the more you would want to analyze the financial picture closely before leaping at an offer. My health insurance, for example, is around $300; when I added my spouse and child, it went up to nearly $500. Likewise eyecare and dental. All of it is still low priced by corporate standards, but it illustrates even further the cost-of-living calculus.
And when I moved from the cornfields to Metro D.C. (like the poster above), my car insurance tripled -- something I hadn't anticipated and which bit quite seriously into the budget.
Use this site to compare salaries and costs of living:
http://cgi.money.cnn.com/tools/costofliving/costofliving.html
My students never believe the results, but I wish they would.
Bottom line:
If you're still early on grad school, you really want to spend your weekends hanging out with the law, business, and medical students, not PhD students. Don't date future professors!
I'm only half joking. I know two PhD classmates who did exactly that, explicitly on the grounds that at least their dating pool would consist of men (they were both women) who were likely to reasonably mobile and reasonably well paid.
I second 7:15's advice that about the advantages of starting your career somewhere other than the most prestigious department in the profession. I know several unhappy people forced to relive the stress and humiliation of their initial job search seven years later after being denied tenure--or simply deciding to forego the tenure process--at an Ivy. (It turns out that it isn't always true that everyone denied tenure at an Ivy can write their own ticket elsewhere.) If you publish a lot, you can move up if you so desire, and probably wind up with a higher salary from having done so. If you don't, you'll be cast aside at one of the Ivys like yesterday's news. Either way, you're better off starting at a place where you have a realistic shot at tenure.
That site is bonkers. It thinks that Austin has cheaper houses than Buffalo, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Rochester, or even Plattsburgh, for God's sake.
Here is the start of the Political Science Job Wiki for this year.
Have at it:
http://wikihost.org/wikis/polsci0708
Duke's job talk on 9/11 was an Americanist.
Fresh wiki:
http://wikihost.org/wikis/polsci0708/
Thanks to whomever started it up--personally I think that there should be some sort of celebration: with a hint of fall in the air and as the leaves begin to turn, the new wiki officially marks the beginning of the hiring season.
Don't overestimate the "mobility" of doctors and lawyers. They're overachievers, too. They want to start out with the best internships and residencies or the best law firms. There's a nice couple debate: do we move to Boston for a residency at Mass General or do we move to Ohio for your post-doc at the Mershon Center? Hmmmm. Who's going to make more money?
Guess who loses?
And after a couple years -- the Ph.D. is still in school while the J.D. is now in year 3 or 4 of practice -- the Golden Handcuffs are going to tie up a lot of that mobility (especially for lawyers, who have to take the bar exam).
Maybe it's just like my old Drill Instructor told me -- if the Corps wanted me to have a spouse they would have issued me one.
If your department wants you to have a spouse, you'll get one with your tenure package....
If it hasn't been noted here yet, there is now a new Political Science Job Market Wiki for the 2007-2008 season posted at:
http://wikihost.org/wikis/polsci0708/wiki/start
The wiki site has Colaresi interviewing at Colorado on 9/13-14. While he would be a great hire, this seems kind of, well, skeevy/sketchy, given that the deadline for the position was 9/15.
Any confirmation on this interview?
Colorado is advertising two positions. One is a continuation of last year's search and the other is a new advertisement (at least that is what the advertisement says). The inference is that Colaresi is interviewing for the slot that is a continuation of last year's search.
That is way off base. The ejobs listing shows two jobs, one joint with International Affairs (a continuation of last year's failed search) and says this:
"We will begin considering applications as they arrive for the position that is joint with the International Affairs Program and on September 15 for the position that is fully rostered in Political Science"
Colaresi interviewed for the joint job, with running review of applications.
The previous post hinted at a question that I had. . .
Do schools start interviewing before their closing dates for Assistant Professor positions? Of course search committees may meet, but is it acceptable/legal to start calling in candidates before the position is officially closed?
Colaresi has interviewed there before so they probably already had interest. I am sure they will give everyone consideration who sent in their application by the deadline.
Thanks for the quick response. The Rumor blog worked nicely in this case--quickly dispelling poorly founded suspicions.
perhaps a silly question, but pertinent as i set out to print 40+ cover letters: what are thoughts on fancy cover letter paper from the applicant's home institution? is this required, desirable, or a waste of time?
All's fair in love, war, and the academic job market. My sense is that most (all?) schools look at all applications that are in by the deadline, but that doesn't stop them from moving on particular candidates of interest before their deadlines. And I suspect most HR departments would be ok with that as long as all applications are, in fact, given a fair look if they arrive before the deadline.
Colaresi's great, and I'm not a candidate for the Colorado job(s), but this doesn't sound kosher to me.
Even if they already knew him from a prior search or some other connection, interviewing him before reviewing other applications could bias that process.
Anyone heard any rumors, recently, about what schools are looking for in terms of international security scholars???
Re: 9/17 6:33 AM -
Some schools do not *permit* use of letterhead by grad students for cover letters. Writing on letterhead implies that you are writing on behalf of (or in your professional capacity as an employee of) the university. Check with your department staff on the legality of that before you do it.
re: letterhead
My dept's placement office gave us departmental letterhead and mailing labels to use if we wanted. When I was on a search committee last year, quite a few apps came on letterhead. I think it's probably fine. Of course, that's _generic_ letterhead; using say, Bob Keohane's letterhead is probably not fine...
If you're from a top-20 PhD program I'd absolutely use letterhead if you have the option. If nothing else, for people like me with very visual memories, having distingushing "looks" to a file helps with keeping track.
On a related note, does anything think its worth sending documents on expensive resume paper? I was stressed on my first job search and did, but wouldn't bother now. I do use 24lb high brightness copy paper (for writing samples as well as letters/CV) as it's easier to read and photocopies made from it are sharper, but that's only an extra buck or two a ream.
Don't use 84-brightness generic recycled (like in our office printers, ugh), but don't spend $$$ on Crane cotton bond either.
"Even if they already knew him from a prior search or some other connection, interviewing him before reviewing other applications could bias that process."
Read the job ad: it says they'll begin reviewing files immediately since it's a continuation search So what's not kosher about ... uhhh ... reviewing files immediately (and inviting someone out if they like him/her)?
Parsing the dates on which particular applicants get invited to interview is a fruitless endeavor. So what if Colorado wants to hire Colaresi, and knew that before they posted their ad? He's a very advanced assistant with a exceptional record. It isn't exactly shocking that he is being courted. If he says "no," the job will still go to someone else who has applied by their regular deadline. Colorado is not alone in looking for especially attractive candidates in advance of their official process. As with any job, if you want it, you should send in your application and hope for the best.
The type of paper you use in your application is completely irrelevant. Save your money. All that matters is what is on the paper. I have served on numerous search committees. Nobody cares what kind of paper it is. Search committes care about where you were trained, what you have published, what your letters say, whether your dissertation is interesting, and whether you can teach (well) the courses the department needs to teach.
It doesn't matter how much lipstick you put on a pig, everyone will still notice it's a pig. The reverse is also true. If you have a great dissertation and articles published in IO and APSR, then you can send in your CV on a napkin. You will get an interview.
Further to the USC/quality of life discussion above, here's a recent report on the traffic quality of life in major SMSAs. Now obviously nobody's going to tailor her/his job search to the places where traffic is terrible, but it's certainly a consideration for some jobs. The USC discussion, for example, suggested that the "good" places to live are a drive away. Well, here's some data on what the "drive" means. Stealing from Kevin Drum on the Washington Monthly blog, it's not good (he describes a 7-mile drive on one of the local interstates as taking an hour!).
http://mobility.tamu.edu/ums/
I tried printing my CV on a napkin. It just gets jammed in the printer.
well done, 11:57 AM, September 19, 2007!
And yet, I'd take a nasty commute in CA for anything in Texas barring Austin (where there are, too, bad traffic jams).
Each to her own.
How long ago did Colaresi get his PhD? Is he being considered for a senior position?
Are there really no rumors? No one has anything? We are talking about letterhead. . . .
Re:
How long ago did Colaresi get his PhD? Is he being considered for a senior position?
------
My guess is it's junior given this
http://www.indiana.edu/~iupolsci/weekly/jan92004.html
scan down for Placement
2002, and yes.
Re: lipsticks on pigs.
We've had several searches in the past couple years, and some real pigs came out.
Great CVs, great articles in great journals, but just absolutely rotten people -- shabby, dirty, low-rent. One picked the nose while presenting. Another picked the backside. One belched.
And their CVs weren't even printed on napkins.
But they were just so absolutely appalling that no one even wanted to talk them one-to-one. Dinners were endurance tests.
So it's not all what you've got on paper.
Colaresi is being considered for the senior position at Colorado.
Colorado eJobs listing says "At least one of the positions can be a tenured position at the level of associate professor." So that is "senior" as in "tenured," not "senior" as in "full professor" or "moosehead."
If the advertisement says "tenured associate" then it means "tenured associate" and not full. My guess is that no one is trying to be sneaky when they write a job advertisement.
From what I'm hearing, Colorado is about the only school moving on applications so far. Anybody else heard any rumors of committees meeting?
re: 9/22 10:43 -- I've heard from Catholic; they've at least gotten far enough into the files to request me to expedite my letters.
I know for certain that other committees are meeting. I advise applicants to ensure your applications arrive before deadlines that are set early. Others might advise you it is okay for applications to arrive a few days late. Sometimes it does not matter, but at some places it really does. If a department sets an early October deadline, it might indicate that they intend to move early.
Any ideas about what College of Charleston is looking for in terms of research? Do they emphasize this or is it more of a teaching-oriented dept?
7:00 am:
I'm guessing that everyone reading this blog is already obsessed with the job market, and we all know that our applications should arrive on time.
There's really no need to increase everyone's stress level with such comments.
Anyone know anything about the University of Vermont IPE job? What specifically they're looking for? I'm trying to decide whether I should apply or not.
UVM has the rep of being extremely, extremely dysfunctional. I don't know if that is still the case, but the chair is the same as many years ago. A department blessed with incredibly nice people who allow the truly insane people to run the place.
For one bit of interesting data, check out how many good associate profs have degrees/arrival dates in the 1980s.
Too bad, as the location is terrific and the good people are great.
Question: What are salaries like at places such as NDU, monterrey (NPS), Center for Naval Analysis, etc. ?
someone mentioned earlier on the blog that Grinnell was leaning more towards an IPE hire. I interviewed with them at APSA (I'm a security person) and I didn't get this impression at all. Has anyone else heard anything about Grinnell's IR search?
on salaries:
At the military schools like NDU, Naval Postgrad, War Colleges, Asst Prof starting salaries are high. Probably mid 80s in DC, to low 70s at the Army school at Fort Leavenworth.
Caveats: the salary scales are flatter than civilian institutions. Full profs earn maybe $110k to $120k (higher at NDU).
More importantly, these are 12 month contracts _without_ tenure. Standard is 2 to 5 year contracts depending on the school. Renewal rates are very high (well over 95% at the one I know).
You're not teaching for 12 months (though loads are higher than R1 institutions), but you are a regular employee all year: i.e., two weeks vacation for new employees, the other 50 weeks you're in your office. And, federal laws basically prohibit outside consulting, honoraria, keeping grant money for salary supplements or buying PCs for yourself, and even make it tough to keep book royalties.
Things vary by institution; NPS notably has tenure (NDU and the service War Colleges do not).
I met with Grinnell in Chicago as well, and I also got a very different impression. In fact, I was given the idea that they would ideally like a Comparativist with a European focus.
The other problem with Naval Postgraduate School (and I believe the other war colleges, but not Leavenworth) is that you are required to teach off-campus in military facilities such as aircraft carriers. Exciting the first time; gets old very quickly according to those I know who are required to do it. Also the military higher education system tends to be highly unstable -- look at the current debates around the value/dysfunction of Gen. Petraeus's Princeton Ph.D.
These jobs can be interesting, even fascinating (I taught at NPS for a couple of quarters as a visitor) but you absolutely need to go into them with eyes open and due diligence -- they are quite different than standard academic positions in the civilian sector.
re: military teaching.
The requirement to go out to the fleet to do teaching is specific to Naval Postgrad (some of them really enjoy it, some not). I'm at one of the war colleges, and most of us haven't travelled except for academic conferences and self-initiated research trips. Fewer junkets than I'd hoped for, actually.
Stability varies. In terms of job stability there's generally lots; non-renewals are very rare at all the schools. Curriculum can be in turmoil though, and that gets old fast. Particularly true for the Army as they grope for Iraq solutions and management positions turnover frequently. At my institution, you can't use ancient lessons over and over but we're not starting from scratch all the time either.
Bottom line: if you interview for a military teaching job, ask LOTS of questions. There's much that works differently, even from one DoD institution to another.
Since there seem to be some folks here who could answer this question....here goes:
Should a woman even consider applying for a job at the Citadel? What is the climate like there or at any other military institutions for female faculty?
I know a female faculty member who teaches at the Naval Academy. She has been there for more than 5 years and likes it a lot. I have no idea about the Citadel.
I have a female colleague at a war college who is perfectly content. Of course, the Citadel is more akin to USNA or USMA than the follow-on colleges. Important consideration -- these are NOT research jobs. You're there to teach, teach, teach.
re: Citadel
Keep in mind also that the Citadel and VMI are private colleges, vs federal institutions. Citadel and VMI are much more self-conciously all-emcompassing cultural/social experiences than even the service academies, are more politically conservative, and were male-only much longer than the service schools (late 1990s vs 1970s). Federal employment rules also provide greater protection vs discrimination/harrassment. Pay is also what you expect for small schools, not the Defense Dept. numbers given earlier.
For the record, VMI is a public institution. Even so, 1:36's comments comparing to it to federal service academies probably still apply.
Moderator: Can we start a new thread specifically for discussing job rumors {ie, "campus invites issued", etc. Lately, with both the USC housing discussion and the VMI/Citadel gender discussion {both interesting in their own right} there has been a lot of distraction for those who merely wish to get updates about the status of their applications.
Does anyone know anything about the Cleveland State IR theory job beyond what's in their ad?
What the place is like, what they might be looking for, etc.?
For the junior position at Colorado, Scott Wolford has a job talk scheduled 10/8 and Jessica Weeks has a job talk scheduled 10/12.
They sure seem to be moving fast.
There's a lot of interest in the supply side of the job market. What about the demand side? I wonder how many people are on the job market searching for jobs at the junior level and at the senior level?
Only two at Colorado? Any others?
I heard Catholic has invited candidates for interviews. Any confirmations? That was fast.
Huh?
In a labor market workers supply labor, firms demand it.
If you want an "update" on your application, why don't you just ask the department to which you have applied for an update on your application.
I know the discussion of teaching in military environments has been shut off by the blog police, but if anyone is still interested (and by the way, there are a considerable number of IR jobs open in such places, if not the one you applied for), there's a very nice article relevant to the topic in the 30-Sept New York Times Magazine. Try this link:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/30/magazine/30WestPoint-t.html?hp
which probably won't work; just go to the Times web site; article is titled "In the Valley of the Shadow."
"I know the discussion of teaching in military environments has been shut off by the blog police..."
We haven't rejected a single comment on the subject.
We have, however, set up two new threads -- one for traditional rumors and one for these kinds of discussions.
Apologies: I wasn't referring to the monitor as the "blog police", rather to the comments of <3:32 AM, September 27, 2007>.
No objections whatsoever to the monitoring of this blog -- in fact it is quite commendable. Objections rather to the folks who appear to believe we have an electron shortage and seek to quash all discussions not relevant to how their application at Harvard is going.
Any news re: Notre Dame's search for a junior IR position (not the Kroc Institute but the Poli Sci dept)? My impression is that they were looking for a more theory friendly IR candidate (theory as in political theory, not formal theory). Anything would be appreciateed. Thanks.
Bond did *NOT* interview for the CIAS lecturer position at UNC. That information is false.
Interviews at uOttawa have been partially concluded (source: myself, a candidate)
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