One of the perks of academia is the opportunity for occasional travel to conferences, archives, or field-work.  But keeping travel plans organized can be difficult amidst writing deadlines, grading, and the blizzard of email that we all sort through on a daily basis.  If you have a Smartphone, there several apps out there that might help simplify things for you. I recently discovered TripIt, and it was love at first use.

TripIt is a free program for BlackBerry, Droid, or iPhone that organizes all of your travel information (flights, hotel reservations, rental cars, etc.) into a single itinerary.  It is easy to use from the get-go and does not require account numbers for your reservations.  You will, however, need a map application on your Smartphone (if you do not have one pre-installed on your phone, GoogleMaps is a free option).  Once you have installed TripIt, all you need to do ...

Here at ProfHacker, we encourage balance between the mind and body. See Kathleen's "Prioritizing Exercise," Nels's "The Whole Life Grid," and "Nurturing the Mind-Body Connection" by guest author, Meagan Timney for just a few examples of these posts. Today, I want to think about a slightly different kind of balance: the balance between the personal and the professional. Maintaining a life outside of our professional obligations and responsibilities can be challenging for all of us no matter what stage of our careers we have achieved. These challenges can vary depending on several factors: our own personalities and the kind of institution where we spend our time are perhaps two of the biggest variables, but in addition, whether you are partnered or single, whether you have children or not, and whether you must commute to campus and how far also all contribute. Finally, whether you are...

The shift from graduate school to either the adjunct pool or the tenure-track brings with it a lot of changes—some more obvious than others. Maybe you had to relocate. Maybe you are teaching at multiple institutions. Perhaps you finally have your own office or are finally instructor-of-record for your own classes. Maybe you now have to teach multiple courses, each with different preps. But another important shift that catches some of us off guard is how we should dress for this new part, especially since the new job probably didn’t include a shopping spree at Barneys.

It can be hard to feel confident in a new environment when you are continually mistaken for a student. Part of the confusion might be the result of age, which will change on its own soon enough. Part of it might stem from the fact that people (students, staff and other faculty) might not know you yet, so they mistakenly...

There have been many ProfHacker posts dedicated to helping our readers choose a Smartphone, but all of them focus on one particular choice: Droid v. iPhone. Amy has offered the pros and cons of these devices, while Julie has written exclusively about Droids in "Using Super Smartphones for Productivity" and "Update on My Productivity with a Super Smartphone." Alex, too, has weighed in on the subject and offered his thoughts on the Android OS. I'd like to offer a different perspective: RIM and BlackBerry. In the high-tech world of super Smartphone apps and operating systems, BlackBerry is often an afterthought, but for many consumers, they can be very a good choice.

Almost three years ago, I was all set to buy an iPhone. I love Apple products. I find them intuitive and sleek, and it's not at all hyperbole to say that the iPod changed my life when I first bought one in 2001. Not only did ...

A conversation on Twitter earlier this week reminded me that the first round of the Job Information List (JIL) for MLA fields will be published soon, and with it comes the beginning of the job market season for those of us in language and literature fields. Other disciplines, undoubtedly, will not be far behind (and some may well have started their searches already). Bearing in mind the incredible stress and anxiety that can dismantle even the coolest of job-seeking cucumbers, I would like to offer you five things that helped me survive the job market.

Address Labels

Before I did anything else, I printed out several pages of address labels with my campus return address on them. I used them to mail all of my application materials, and I also used them on the postcards I included with my applications to indicate that my application file was complete. Not every department returned the...

As the semester quickly approaches, I find myself trying to shift gears from summer-writing mode to semester-juggling mode. In the summer, I have the luxury of devoting the majority of my time and energy to my research agenda. There are no courses to prepare, no papers to grade, no committee meetings to attend, and no students to advise. The writing can take as long as it takes, which is often the better part of a day. During the semester, however, many of us aren't so lucky. We have to find a way to balance research with teaching and service, and that can be very difficult to do.

Often, because the research goals are long-term rather than immediate, they get the short end of the stick. Elsewhere on ProfHacker, Kathleen Fitzpatrick has talked about The First Half Hour of the Morning, and Billie Hara has written about 750words.com, both of which can help writers make progress and maintain...

As the new academic year approaches, there are probably several things on your to-do list: finalizing new syllabi, straightening up the office, course prep, and putting the finishing touches on your summer writing projects. But whether you are still in graduate school, starting a shiny, new post-doc, out on the tenure-track, or further along in your career, this is a also a good time to take stock of your finances. Specifically, before you get into the throes of a new term, you should take a look at your retirement account(s) and make sure that you are where you need to be in saving for the future.

It can be disorienting and strange to think about retirement when you begin your academic career. Retirement seems like another lifetime from now, something in the far off distance that we can worry about later. But when I began my current position, I was determined to learn about financial...

Recently the Chronicle ran a column asking “Do All Faculty Members Really Need Private Offices?” Over 100 comments and several pages of discussion on the CHE Forums suggest that having a “Room of One’s Own” is an important part of the job for many academics. But if you are lucky enough to have a room of your own, what do you put in it?

How we arrange our workspaces can make the difference between a productive afternoon and an unproductive one. It can enable us to work free from distraction. It can provide us with a surface or surfaces on which to spread our research materials as we work on that manuscript. Lastly, it can provide us with a place to store our books, our research, and the stacks of papers that we must retain for a semester (or sometimes an academic year) after a class has ended.

My college provides us with a desk, a computer, 2 chairs (an ergonomic one for me, one for...

No matter what stage we are at in our careers, and no matter what our discipline, everyone in academe from first-semester graduate students to full professors has one thing in common: we read. And we don't just read a little. We read a lot. We read primary sources. We read journal articles and monographs. We read emails and meeting minutes. We read student papers and lab reports. We read conference abstracts and grant applications. And that doesn't take into consideration the other things we read: CNN, the New York Times, Facebook, Twitter, ProfHacker, and that was just this morning. Given that so much of our lives is consumed with professional reading, it can be difficult to find time for pleasure reading. Or even if we do make time for pleasure reading, it can be difficult to enjoy it. It isn't always relaxing to read for pleasure simply because the list of professional...

When I was in graduate school, little did I imagine that part of my job as an English professor on the tenure-track would involve whitewater rafting, hiking, or a ropes course. And yet, earlier this summer, I found myself doing exactly those things: paddling down a 55 degree river, sweating on a 5.5 mile hike, and launching myself off a 40-foot tower supported only by a cable and harness.

This is the third year that my college has offered its Summer Orientation and Advising Program (SOAP), which offers incoming students the opportunity to come to campus for a few days in June to meet other members of their class and begin to become a part of the campus community. While here, they can choose to participate in one of three different programs: Summer Serve, Summer Scene, or Summer Adventure. Summer Serve students work with the local affiliate of Habitat for Humanity. Summer Scene...