I enjoy visiting new faculty members in their offices during the first semester of teaching. For many of these folks, their office is the first non-cubical space they've ever been granted. That decor gives me some fresh insights into their personalities, interests, and even work habits.

The cultural-studies geek in me enjoys reading office space as a kind of text that provides me with insight into its "author." When I was in the business world, I briefly had a creepy boss who kept a collection of "nudie" coffee mugs on his shelves. Over the years, I've seen academic leaders whose offices held personal athletic trophies, elaborately framed newspaper articles, and taxidermy-prepared animals. I've seen staff offices with loads of cross-stitch work, sun catchers, antique book collections, and family relics. I've seen faculty offices with mementos of foreign travels, student-produced artwork, ...

The job market for language and literature scholars, already weak before the recession hit, is likely to leave job seekers chasing a rapidly shrinking pool of jobs for the next several years.

A new analysis of employment advertising conducted by the Modern Language Association, to be released on Thursday, projects a 37-percent drop in faculty positions advertised in the association's electronic job list this academic year, compared with last year. The projection is based on a comparison between the number of jobs listed in October 2008 and October 2009.

The decline would top last year's drop (26 percent), which, at the time, was the steepest in the list's 35-year history.

Read more.

Recently I had the opportunity to visit a campus where I had taught for seven years. I hadn't been back in almost six years and it was a little surreal to see my old office, my old classrooms, and my dear colleagues (who somehow did not look old). I enjoyed my visit immensely, leaving campus thankful for the friendships that had been forged during that time. We still exchange e-mail occasionally, making sure everyone knows of family deaths, professional successes, and other news. I am glad whenever their e-mails show up in my inbox; they are like members of my extended family.

I think that of all professions, teaching creates one of the strongest senses of fraternity/sorority. Something about those committee meetings, shared grading assignments, and curriculum battles bonds us closely. Add in personal tragedies and family emergencies and the bonds are strong indeed.

When I left that...

• Edward A. Snyder, dean of the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business, announced last week that he will resign next year after nine years on the job, the Chicago Tribune reports. Coincidentally, Snyder's announcement comes only about a week after The Harvard Crimson reported that Dean Jay O. Light of the Harvard Business School said he would vacate his post in June. Meanwhile, as the Tribune article notes, Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management is also still searching for a new dean.

• Radford University's embattled provost, Wil Stanton, who endured a no-confidence vote by the faculty senate in October, will step down on December 31 to return to the faculty, The Roanoke Times reports.

• Ryan C. Crocker, a former U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, Kuwait, and Lebanon, will become dean of Texas A&M University’s George Bush School of Government and...

A student comes to the dean's office to complain about a professor's temper/political rants/harassment/dementia/use of profanity/racism/(you fill in the blank). The student notes, "I have a voice recording app on my phone, as well as a video camera. I am going to start documenting these events. If you won't do anything about this, I am going to upload this to the Internet. I don't care what the syllabus or the student handbook says about recording in class, I'm fed up with all of this behavior."

You'd be amazed at how often such threats come up. Certainly there are legal issues attached, but once such a recording or video is uploaded, it's a part of the infamous "permanent record" that now has fresh meaning in the age of digital records. I'm surprised, in fact, that such uploads haven't happened more frequently.

We all have heard the lessons of e-mail and social-networking sites: always as...

Since we are approaching the end of the year, the season for "asking" is in full swing. Donations to institutions have never been more necessary, even as the funds that provide such gifts have never been so stressed. I've noticed that many institutions are postponing capital campaigns, which caused me to ponder my experiences as a faculty member regarding fund raising among campus employees.

Each institution with which I've been affiliated has run a capital campaign that has included a faculty/staff element. I've always given gladly to these, in part because I have believed in their specific missions and in part because I know that it really does have an effect on donors when they hear that on-campus folks are participating. As a junior faculty member, I chose to designate my gift to my department, figuring that my dollars could be used by the department chairperson to supplement our...

There is a tremendous amount of discussion in administrative circles, and in higher education more generally, about the rise of the so-called "global university" and the need for institutions to develop a significant presence in the world beyond the United States. This discussion often centers on countries like China and India, where a growing, education-hungry population and rapidly developing economies promise great opportunities for American institutions that manage to create and maintain a strong presence in those places.

At my previous institution, we had a large program in Singapore, which is, conveniently enough, a kind of cultural crossroads between China and India. We had several hundred students from the region enrolled, and the program was highly successful academically and financially for the university.

The challenge of such a program lies in its management. We had a...

Several health-care providers over the years have employed my title when I was in their offices, even correcting their assistants from time to time, emphasizing that I should be called "Dr." One dentist in particular noted, "This guy studied as long as I did for his doctor's degree. He deserves that title just as much as I do." He even gave me a professional discount on his services. I thought that was pretty nifty.

Having said that, there is one experience that drives me crazy: I can't count the number of times that most of my time spent with a doctor has been spent fielding questions about grammar, writing, literature, or even motivating children to do better in their high-school subjects. As one English professor lamented, "One time I actually clocked the conversation: the doctor spent 14 minutes on my checkup and 19 minutes asking me for my professional opinion, which was based on my ...

I received a couple of private responses to my last entry on the efforts of Iowa's private colleges and universities to strengthen recruitment of diverse faculty members. I'm grateful for those responses and appreciate the ideas and suggestions from my correspondents.

One mentioned the tendency of search committees to eliminate or give lesser consideration to diverse candidates because the committee members are more comfortable with colleagues who are like themselves. This is a concern often expressed when recruiting diverse faculty members is discussed. For one thing, it calls into question another truism of faculty recruitment, which is that there aren't that many strong multicultural candidates to be had, particularly in fields that are not grossly overproducing Ph.D.'s.

There is a lot of truth in the point that search committees often tend to gravitate towards candidates who resemble...

Somewhere in my mother's files, she still has a copy of the "What I Want To Be When I Grow Up" essay that I wrote in second or third grade. Even that far back I declared that I wanted to be a college professor. I have no idea where I got the idea. My folks aren't academics, though they both hold degrees, and while many of my relatives are teachers, none are professors. All I can think of is that I was living in a college town and had one friend whose father was a math professor. In any case, I made my mind up early and it was my plan all through school.

I'm always amazed at how many colleagues likewise knew at an early age that they wanted to be professors. Sometimes there are other stories, which sound like semi-religious conversions to the profession, but in my network, at least, I keep running into other early deciders.

So, when did you decide that you wanted to be a professor? Do you...