I remember the date well: It was August 13, 2001, when I officially started over as an assistant professor of biology. This was hardly the scenario I would have envisioned seven years ago when I was just beginning as a newly appointed assistant professor at Loyola College in Maryland. To think that less than a year after earning tenure and promotion at Loyola, I would surrender both, to start over at Butler University, was unimaginable. But I did, and here I am.
In my first column, I explained why I gave up tenure; basically my family wanted to move back to the Midwest to be closer to our relatives and I wanted my family to be happy. Now you may ask, What is it like the second time around as an assistant professor? Same good times as the first? Not quite.
Starting over is not like starting new. When a department hires an experienced teacher, the expectations are substantially different than for a new junior faculty member. The veteran is expected to plug into the new department as if this was merely a continuation of yesterday; there really is no period of adjustment or mentoring. Take me for example. At Butler, I began advising students by the second day of fall semester -- which of course means I must have already become an expert on the curriculum. I had already "volunteered" for two university committees by the end of week 1, and had been offered -- I believe at knife point but there is some disagreement about this -- the opportunity to join two departmental committees -- one on the curriculum and one assessing our academic journal subscriptions.
One of the joys of the curriculum committee was that I could use my "vast" experience (and apparently time) to help design new introductory laboratory courses, and possibly expand the effort into a revision of the curriculum for freshmen by Christmas. And if I behaved, perhaps "we" could then tinker with the remainder of the biology program before spring break. Throw into the agenda the development of a departmental internship policy and the evaluation of new course proposals, and my "transition" period was complete.
End of week 2. Welcome to Butler.
Did I mention that I was also teaching during this period of time? The content of my courses at Butler was not necessarily new to me. However, the logistics of running them were different. I taught an introductory biology course, but it was one of six sections of the class, meaning five other instructors also taught it. Course content, examinations, policies, laboratory assignments, etc., needed to be coordinated among this group. Ownership of the course was collective, and compromise became a component of developing the course.
In contrast, my other course was an upper-level physiology class that was solely mine to develop. Yet I had to compromise here too. My new department did not possess the same equipment for performing laboratory experiments as my old one. Consequently, I had to develop an almost entirely new laboratory curriculum, and acquire all of the items necessary to conduct these new exercises, before the beginning of the fall term. My point in describing this is that for anyone moving into a new situation, even with a lot of experience, you do not simply plug in and hit the "resume" button. Whether new or seasoned, you must walk before you run: The veteran teacher does, in fact, need a transition period to integrate into the department and the university.
Now, since I was hired to be the animal physiologist in the department, it was generally assumed that I would bring several students into my research program, and serve as their mentor. I did this for years at Loyola, and it was a task that I enthusiastically embraced. There was an important difference, however, between my initial appointment at Loyola and my start at Butler. At institutions like Loyola and Butler, where undergraduate education is the top priority, a new faculty member is typically encouraged to focus on the development of their courses, teaching style and/or philosophy during the first year or two. Much less emphasis is placed on the research program until the teaching is in place. The experienced new hire, however, is expected to hit the ground running. I cannot say that any pressure was applied to get my research off to a quick start at Butler. But there really was no period of time given to someone like myself to re-establish a research laboratory.
Students and professors alike just sort of expect that you will start serving as a research mentor for students sometime in the fall or spring semester of the first year. Again, the idea is that the veterans need little time to resume doing what they had done previously, but that depends on the individual and the type of research. For me, I began having students ask to do research with me by the third week of the first semester, and by spring term, my student entourage had grown to six -- an insane number for an established lab, let alone one in transition.
To say no to a student with an interest is something I just cannot do. And my untenured status is also a factor: What would the senior faculty members think if they learned I had turned away students? Any junior faculty member knows exactly what I mean. During those first couple of years as an assistant professor, you joined every committee that was "suggested," filled every hole in the course schedule that was needed, gave a research home to every student that was "sent" your way, and ate every slug put in front of you (or maybe that was just me?).
Not only am I now untenured and thinking about these issues, but I also keep dealing with the feeling that I have something to prove to my new department. After all, I gave up rank and tenure to make the move for family reasons. Does anyone really believe me? Or is everyone thinking, deep down, that maybe, leaving was not a choice? Are we going to read about the bloody trail he left behind in the mid-Atlantic?
These images are ones that I have created, but they still represent a fundamental difference between my appointment and that of most entry-level faculty members. The new assistant professor is allowed to grow into his or her position, with the mistakes of maturation being mostly forgivable. I, however, am a transplant and am expected to be at full maturation after a short adjustment period. If not, then the transplant will figuratively wither and die. What seems to be lost in this scenario is the fact that someone like myself is a new hire and holds a junior rank. There is a definite need for mentoring of a faculty member in this new role. But my guess is that it rarely happens at most institutions.
Perhaps the harshest transition of my new position was that I had to build new bridges to my students. They were not interested in the experience I brought from Loyola. I was the new guy that still had to earn their trust and respect. This was a tough reality for me. The strength of my teaching at Loyola was the relationships I had formed with my students. I could push them harder than many faculty members and they would respond by moving to a higher level. The advice I offered them had meaning, because they knew me and what I was about.
What I found out this year was that trust does not move with you. Butler students did not know me. From day 1 at Butler, I wanted to have the same student relationships that I had just left, but it just does not work that way. I should have known that, but I put desire ahead of reason.
Individually, all of the issues I have mentioned are relatively small bumps in the road. Collectively, however, they can appear daunting mostly because each was not anticipated. My focus was on making the move, not on what starting over would be like. Of course, if you truly enjoy what you are doing and are surrounded by people with a similar attitude, then becoming an assistant professor for a second time is quite manageable. I cringed at the thought of rejoining the junior ranks (and I still do), but it has worked out OK professionally.
Next: Was the move worth it?
