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[airball]

Hi All,

I'm not sure what kind of response I want or need to this, but I thought I'd put it out there.

I'm a few years into a TT job in the humanities at a regional uni in the deep south. I was one of a bajillion applicants, so I felt lucky. When I moved here, I thought I could be happy, but it has turned out otherwise. I find that after some bumps and bruises, I like my job, but there are enough non-job issues that I am looking at leaving after next year. We just don't like it here, and can't envision a long-term future. Does anyone want to be counting the days until retirement so they can get the hell out of town? Do I really want to spent my career thinking, "When I turn 65, then I'll start my life!"?

Given the realities of the job market in my field, staying on the tenure track is a long-shot. There were two jobs in my field this year. I was a finalist for my dream job, but finished second. Talk about depressing. I imagine that part of what I say here is a product of this. You can be freaking awesome, books, articles, great interview, and not get a job because someone with more books, and articles decided to give up tenure to move. If I find another position in academia, lovely, if not, well, that's the way it goes.

The largest issue is family. I just can't raise my kids here. I'm not worried that they'll grow up to be bad people, but I just don't want them to be from here. Perhaps some of this is Yankee prejudice, but there's more to it. It's the fact that this place is so insular. The top grads from the top high schools go to, not Harvard, or Berkeley, Williams or anywhere else that has an essay portion of the application, but to Southern State University because they have a famous football team and that's the only school on anyone's radar. Hell, when people hear where I teach they say, "Oh, that's a good school," and it is not. It aspires to mediocrity, and falls short. But people around here think that a degree is a degree is a degree. I'm sorry, it isn't.

The long term financial health of my family is also a factor. My wife has had no luck finding work. It's a great region for some fields, but not my wife's. While our starting pay is just fine, promotion brings virtually no financial benefits - when I get tenure the raise is a whopping $3000, which (given the fact that our salaries are frozen) will leave me making less than when I arrived. I don't want to be the sad sack from English, teaching two summer classes so he can afford to send his kids to the above-mentioned state college. (How crappy are our benefits? Faculty kids don't even get to attend our own school at a discount.)

Less important, but still on my mind, is the fact that while the university funds some travel for pre-tenure faculty, once you get promoted, it disappears entirely. I get a $3k raise, and lose $4k in research funds. Unless the NEH starts throwing money at me by the buckets-full, in three years my research program comes to a screeching halt. For two years I felt superior to the folks who haven't published in ten years, but now I understand why.

So as of last week, after I got the rejection phone call from Dream U, my wife and I were miserable, stressed, and angry at each other, and at the world. Who else could we blame for the fact that we live in a city we don't like, she can't find work, and I have a a job that feels a lot like an underwater mortgage?

Then we realized that - holy crap! - we don't have to stay. We're smart people with advanced degrees. If we want to, we can go to a city where we want to live, and find jobs! Our city of choice has several large unis, so I may not even have to leave academia. (I have some admin experience and connections.)  There are things about my job I like, but if I miss the teaching, I can do that part-time. If it's the research, I can do that on my own time. (As noted, I'll be doing it on my own dime, regardless.)

It may seem obvious, but this was a revelation to us. Suddenly, we had wrested control of our lives away from the search committees.

So maybe this letter is a break-up note to Academia. Guess what, asshat,  I can walk away, any time I want! (Assuming I or my wife finds a job. says Reality. STFU, I say.) Yeah, you have a lot to offer, with your flexible schedule. And I do love teaching. But Christ you ask for a lot in return. And you know what? I'm no longer convinced that it's worth it. We'll see what the next year brings, but you're on notice - I don't need you.

Defiantly,

airball

[farm_boy]

Best of luck to you.

I was once tenured at a very very rural university in the south.  I tolerated it, even liked it at times.  My wife did not.  So we moved.  She has a good job, but I'm still looking...

[alleyoxenfree]

Hi All,

I'm not sure what kind of response I want or need to this, but I thought I'd put it out there.

I'm a few years into a TT job in the humanities at a regional uni in the deep south. I was one of a bajillion applicants, so I felt lucky. When I moved here, I thought I could be happy, but it has turned out otherwise. I find that after some bumps and bruises, I like my job, but there are enough non-job issues that I am looking at leaving after next year. We just don't like it here, and can't envision a long-term future. Does anyone want to be counting the days until retirement so they can get the hell out of town? Do I really want to spent my career thinking, "When I turn 65, then I'll start my life!"?

Given the realities of the job market in my field, staying on the tenure track is a long-shot. There were two jobs in my field this year. I was a finalist for my dream job, but finished second. Talk about depressing. I imagine that part of what I say here is a product of this. You can be freaking awesome, books, articles, great interview, and not get a job because someone with more books, and articles decided to give up tenure to move. If I find another position in academia, lovely, if not, well, that's the way it goes.

The largest issue is family. I just can't raise my kids here. I'm not worried that they'll grow up to be bad people, but I just don't want them to be from here. Perhaps some of this is Yankee prejudice, but there's more to it. It's the fact that this place is so insular. The top grads from the top high schools go to, not Harvard, or Berkeley, Williams or anywhere else that has an essay portion of the application, but to Southern State University because they have a famous football team and that's the only school on anyone's radar. Hell, when people hear where I teach they say, "Oh, that's a good school," and it is not. It aspires to mediocrity, and falls short. But people around here think that a degree is a degree is a degree. I'm sorry, it isn't.

The long term financial health of my family is also a factor. My wife has had no luck finding work. It's a great region for some fields, but not my wife's. While our starting pay is just fine, promotion brings virtually no financial benefits - when I get tenure the raise is a whopping $3000, which (given the fact that our salaries are frozen) will leave me making less than when I arrived. I don't want to be the sad sack from English, teaching two summer classes so he can afford to send his kids to the above-mentioned state college. (How crappy are our benefits? Faculty kids don't even get to attend our own school at a discount.)

Less important, but still on my mind, is the fact that while the university funds some travel for pre-tenure faculty, once you get promoted, it disappears entirely. I get a $3k raise, and lose $4k in research funds. Unless the NEH starts throwing money at me by the buckets-full, in three years my research program comes to a screeching halt. For two years I felt superior to the folks who haven't published in ten years, but now I understand why.

So as of last week, after I got the rejection phone call from Dream U, my wife and I were miserable, stressed, and angry at each other, and at the world. Who else could we blame for the fact that we live in a city we don't like, she can't find work, and I have a a job that feels a lot like an underwater mortgage?

Then we realized that - holy crap! - we don't have to stay. We're smart people with advanced degrees. If we want to, we can go to a city where we want to live, and find jobs! Our city of choice has several large unis, so I may not even have to leave academia. (I have some admin experience and connections.)  There are things about my job I like, but if I miss the teaching, I can do that part-time. If it's the research, I can do that on my own time. (As noted, I'll be doing it on my own dime, regardless.)

It may seem obvious, but this was a revelation to us. Suddenly, we had wrested control of our lives away from the search committees.

So maybe this letter is a break-up note to Academia. Guess what, asshat,  I can walk away, any time I want! (Assuming I or my wife finds a job. says Reality. STFU, I say.) Yeah, you have a lot to offer, with your flexible schedule. And I do love teaching. But Christ you ask for a lot in return. And you know what? I'm no longer convinced that it's worth it. We'll see what the next year brings, but you're on notice - I don't need you.

Defiantly,

airball

Great post - it should be spammed far and wide to slap Ph.D. candidates upside the head until they say, "I get it!  It's not me!  It's you!"

[jonesey]

+1 on great post, and the clear lesson here is that location matters.  We always get told to "take that TT job wherever it is!" but the reality is that some places just suck (that place varies, of course, depending on who you are). 

Don't apply for a job in NYC if you hate traffic, crowds, and loud people. 

Don't take the job in Florida if you can't stand heat, humidity, and loud people from NYC.

 

[parispundit]

Agreed. Move to Paris (or your personal equivalent).

[drpud]

So maybe this letter is a break-up note to Academia. Guess what, asshat,  I can walk away, any time I want! (Assuming I or my wife finds a job. says Reality. STFU, I say.) Yeah, you have a lot to offer, with your flexible schedule. And I do love teaching. But Christ you ask for a lot in return. And you know what? I'm no longer convinced that it's worth it. We'll see what the next year brings, but you're on notice - I don't need you.

Love it! I'm starting to feel the same way and I'm not even on the TT yet. (Is that a bad sign??) I have interviews lined up but I've been writing the SAME letter--or a variation thereof--in my mind for the past few weeks. BTW, I am from the South and my #1 goal in life was to get out of dodge. How sad that 7-8 yrs later I find myself applying for jobs in places I know I would hate like Alabama and Florida. Shiver. Thank you, SCs, for not inviting me to campus!! Dodged a bullet there.

And with an academic partner, I, too, have moved here and there so said partner could enter the TT stream. And thus far everywhere we have moved has sucked. Bad. And I'm further from finding employment than ever before in our current location. And we haven't bettered our financial situation or made many friends or put down roots or saved money. We've spent nearly all our efforts plotting and scheming our next move. I like what you say: To hell with SCs and their whims, we'll write our own future. Assuming someone out there decides to pay me. I agree with the poster who said, somewhere, that the love affair with scholarship loses its luster when you're always working for free and forced to be somewhere you don't want to be for its--scholarship's-- sake. Sours the relationship . . .

[mathspice]

Good timing. Just this weekend MathSpice Jr. found a box from our previous home, my last tenured job. It was full of wine corks -- many of them had writing on them. The first one I picked up said "First Mother's Day" and the second one said "Last day of class at ***". THAT was a celebration.

[klausk]

+1 to the OP's post.

[guvvie]

I broke up with academia 5.5 years ago, and I have never looked back. I found that I disliked many parts of my TT job (also humanities), and I was also not thrilled with the location. I could not see myself encouraging my kids to come back to Former City to settle after college. There simply were not enough good opportunities. My husband was able to find a good job, but it took him 6 months.

In some ways, the subpar location was a relief, making it much easier for me to jettison the job. I don't know if I would have been able to quit the way I did if I were living in a city that I loved.

For the right person, my former job was actually a very good one. I was not the right person. I now have a job that suits me much better in a fantastic, though much much more expensive, location. It was freeing when I realized that leaving academia meant that I could potentially choose where would live.

[tmeao]

I did this. 3 years ago. For so many of the same reasons (especially the thought of raising my kids there).  I know have an engaging and interesting job, partly admin, partly outside academic world (its a hybrid and a little tough to explain).  I live in a great place.  My kids are growing up to be multicultural, multilingual people.  My spouse has an interesting job with smart coworkers.  It felt excruciatingly hard to say goodbye to TT because I worried so much what everyone would think.  But it is exactly the thought you mention - we are two smart people, we can make our lives what we want - that finally made me do it. 

Cliche, but life is way too short and is not just about achieving tenure at all costs.

[arts4ever]

I love teaching. I've had one happy year on the job in over 20. Have not liked the state, have hated everything about the job except the teaching. GET OUT if you can. I wished I'd never taken the first job, but held out for what I really wanted. Retirement, now, is happily close. But if I had it to do over again...I am now an intelligent, well-educated person who is probably now too OLD, in this market, to find another job doing anything.

[desert_rat]

And I learned the lesson too late-  I'm stuck with the State's retirement plan (defined benefit, and rather generous), but eligible to retire in only 4 more years.  So I stay due solely to continuance commitment. 

But I do like the town/city (pop. 100,000 or so), so we will probably stay here, just not in academia.

[ann05]

Thanks for this. We're sort of doing the opposite, we're buying a house and staying in our current city, where we love living and my spouse has a good job. This means no tenure track job for me, but I hope to figure out something else engaging to do with my life. And meanwhile, I count my blessings that all of those jobs I applied to in scary outposts ignored me.

[katherineparr]

Airball! My long-lost twin brother!

Your post = me. Except that last summer I decided that I don't have to keep inviting rejection. And I don't have to raise my son here. And I don't have to force my spouse to live in a place that makes him sick (literally - allergies).

So we're leaving, and I'm saying goodbye to all that. And the liberating elements of not worrying about tenure, my annual merit pay file (HA! No merit pay in the memory of anyone in my department. Yet we do it, year after year "just in case." Oh, did I mention that you and I get about the same tenure bump?), my annual faculty self-evaluation, and all that other stuff? I can't exaggerate how good it feels.  My husband is happy happy happy for the first time in a long time.

And the best part? The job I found is in a field that allows me to move easily. So if it works out, great! And if not, I can move again without any angst. Or, if I decide to try for a promotion, I can move easily for that. Can you tell I'm giddy?

[drpud]

Brilliant, KP! Congrats. Would you please tell us, if you don't mind, what non-academic job (generally) you were able to find? I always read these threads and feel a sense of hope but have no idea what most former academics are actually doing or how they went about their job search. Because most posts simply say "I found this great job and now can move where I want. Goodbye academe . . ." I applied for a slew of non-academic, or at least non-faculty, positions last year and din't get a single interview. Must be something I am doing wrong.