These days, it may seem somewhat improper to write about the stresses of the fortunate few who have found tenure-track jobs, since, without question, the people who haven’t are surely suffering most. But, as Ari Kelman points out in a recent post over at The Edge of the American West, one of academe’s “dirty secrets” is “how much it can suck to land [an academic] position.”

He explains why:

Precious few people, even in times of plenty, are offered jobs they really want, at least not straight out of graduate school. This means they’ll have to move to a place they don’t want to move. Or they’ll have to work at an institution that bears little resemblance to the temple of knowledge they associate with higher education. Because, after all, few people get jobs at schools like the ones where they received their BAs or PhDs. The conditions of employment, in other words, aren’t great in ...

Citing a need for continuity during budget challenges, Bruce D. Benson, president of the University of Colorado system, yesterday named Philip P. DiStefano as the sole finalist for the chancellor’s job at the system’s Boulder campus. Mr. DiStefano has served as the flagship’s interim chancellor since the departure of G.P. (Bud) Peterson, who became president of the Georgia Institute of Technology in April.

A search committee conducted the speedy process. In a written statement, Mr. Benson said the decision to search internally allowed the university to tap into talent on the campus and provide continuity as the university works on tight budgets, a national reaccreditation process, and a strategic plan. “Mr. DiStefano will provide a steady hand as we deal with these important issues,” Mr. Benson said.

During his 35 years on the campus, Mr. DiStefano has served as a provost, dean, and...

According to an article in the Las Vegas Sun, some law professors at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas are jumping ship because of fears about the huge 36-percent higher-education budget cut proposed by Nevada’s governor, James A. Gibbons, the newspaper writes.

Three well-regarded law professors — Raquel Aldana, Michael Higdon, and Tuan Samahon — have already found jobs elsewhere (they’re headed to the University of the Pacific, the University of Tennessee, and Villanova University respectively), the Sun reports. And by Samahon’s count, another six UNLV law professors, out of a total of about 40, may soon follow suit. That adds up to nearly a quarter of the faculty, the newspaper notes.

Nevada’s William S. Boyd School of Law currently has a “top 100 ranking among law schools and has become known for recruiting both up-and-coming and veteran legal scholars,” but the faculty exodus...

When I started teaching, someone gave me a piece of invaluable advice: Never forget that secretaries and facilities folks are the ones who will make your job go smoothly. After almost 25 years in the profession, I can say that truer words never have been spoken.

I’ve had the incredible good fortune to have some wonderful department secretaries through the years. I now have the best dean’s assistant I’ve ever seen; she is the gold standard on our campus and I live in terror that a vice president will lure her to another position.

This Wednesday, April 22nd, is National Administrative Professionals Day. The clock is ticking quickly folks: Don’t forget to make sure that your staff members know how much you appreciate them.

In honor of the occasion, I thought I’d ask a simple question: How do secretaries or other staff members make your life easier?

Many on-campus interviews are marathons, plain and simple. Often they include meetings over breakfast, lunch, and dinner on a single day, with a teaching demonstration and a wide range of individual sessions. In the rush to keep the interview to a single day’s activities, the schedule is packed tightly.

One area where I wish search committees would be more proactive is the scheduling of breaks for candidates. Not to be crass, but for most people’s metabolisms, a nice break for a “pit stop” after meals would be awfully helpful. Sitting in the dean’s office trying to calm a gurgling stomach is very difficult for everyone involved. Similarly, allowing a candidate to have at least 20 minutes to compose herself before the teaching demonstration would be more likely to result in a better reflection of her talents. Rushing in five minutes late from an interview with the vice president for...

A while back we wrote about a study that showed that while men have no qualms about asking for what they want in salary and benefits negotiations, women are more reluctant to do the same, and are often penalized when they do. In the latest issue of the Committee on the Status of Women in the Economics Profession’s newsletter, Linda C. Babcock, an economics professor at Carnegie Mellon University and an author of that study, counsels women on how to negotiate without penalties:

First off, she writes, realize that many things besides salary are negotiable, then consider what you really want and “not just what you can get by with.” Ask yourself, what would make you happy?:

More money? More time to concentrate on your research? A more equitable distribution of household chores and child care? Think about your goals, wishes, dreams, desires, hopes, and fantasies. Stop accepting...

Hardly a day goes by without news of layoffs or pay cuts. (In fact, about the only thing not being cut these days is workloads.) But wages and jobs aren’t the only casualties of the recession. Those who still have jobs are curtailing time normally spent with friends and family, and postponing research and travel opportunities, out of fear of ending up unemployed themselves, a recent article by David Shieh in The Chronicle notes. And that’s hurting workers’ morale and leaving them stressed out.

Shieh talked with Michael K. McBeath, an associate professor of psychology at Arizona State University, who likes to burn off steam in the middle of the day by playing basketball with his colleagues. For years, he and roughly two dozen faculty and staff members hit the gym for a game around noon, three days a week.

Now their roster has been chopped in half — by anxiety, Shieh writes:

As...

Faculty members at Montana State University at Bozeman, both full-time professors and adjuncts, have voted to join a union. The institution was the lone public college in the state without a faculty union, and previous efforts to unionize were voted down.

Under the proposal whose approval was announced late Tuesday, tenured and tenure-track faculty members at Montana State will form one union, and adjunct professors will form another. According to the Bozeman Daily Chronicle, voter turnout was high. Among tenured and tenure-track faculty members the vote was close, 168 to 156, the newspaper reported. Adjunct professors, who have little job security, especially in this economy, voted in favor of forming a union, 101 to 51, the paper said.

Both bargaining units will be affiliated with the state’s largest union, the MEA-MFT. It represents 17,500 members, including schoolteachers and...

At my first academic conference, I was astounded to hear how many screening interviews took place in nearby hotel rooms. I heard a young woman describe sitting on a barely made bed while two members of the search committee sat in side chairs asking various questions. I’ll never forget what she said: “They met me in a hotel room, for gosh sakes! They worked me over and then they promised that they would call me later and they never did. I felt so cheap!”

She said that with the knowing laugh of experience, but it is startling to hear about some of the off-campus interview locations that are employed in the search process. I’ve heard of them taking place in airport bars in neutral cities, of breakfast interviews that competed with a local civic club for aural space, and even a golf-course interview.

The funniest ones I ever heard about involved vehicles. One was in the backseat of a...