Bone-Headed Naivete

When I decided to work on a Ph.D. in English literature, back in the early ’90s, I remember having a conversation with my wife that went something like this:

“Well, it will take me four or five years, but at least when I’m done, I will make a good living. I guess that professors start at, what, about $75K? I hear that full professors all make way over $100 grand.”

My wife, who went to a small, underendowed private college, just laughed. “Um, I think we need to drive through the faculty parking lot at a couple of campuses. There are a lot of very old, very used cars in them. I think you are way off on that starting-salary thing.”

She was right, of course. And was I wrong. The first job I interviewed for when I was A.B.D. was slated to start at $30K, with very limited benefits. I had earned that much back when I taught high-school English.

In a similar vein, I had a friend who was completely green about the way that higher ed worked, and he landed his first college teaching job after working at secondary schools for several years. The college had a formula in place (thanks to collective bargaining) in which secondary experience in the state system was transferable into the college setting. When he arrived for his first day of faculty orientation, he was furious to find that he’d been hired in as an “associate” professor. He marched straight to his vice president for academic affairs to complain, only to be met with laughter.

What’s the most naïve idea you had about the job market in higher education, before you finally gained the wisdom that only experience can bring?