Has the faculty search gotten worse?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Those are fine professors. No, they aren't household names, but everyone has to start out assistant and make themselves known. There's an economist from UChicago, a Princeton classicist, and a legal studies professor from Harvard. An uninteresting lineup but they'll make themselves known.

I'm checking through their pages and it looks like they are amateurs. Sakeef Karim, one of the new full time faculty, has only published 3 articles, has only gotten small grant funding, and has less research experience than a newly minted PhD student...How this person is getting a position at Amherst College is very very suspicious.

This seems very troll-y. He got his PhD in 2022, had two articles published in 2024 with a half dozen more publications in progress and he’s in sociology so the noise about “grant money” and “research experience” seems pretty off base.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's very disappointing OP! The best researchers have all gone into industry from Harvard, Stanford, Berkeley, etc. Being a professor doesn't have the "perks" it used to, so now everyone-even the humanities PhDs-are not even attempting postdocs and moving into industry. Academia is rotten.

Cry me some more tears. As a new faculty at UVA everything is fine, and the DEI rot has begun to abate. Normalcy returns.

How can you seriously say this when there's clearly a ton of action that is affirmative in this group of new hires. They hardly have a publication record while other "overrepresented" demographics have always had to publish and teach an insane amount to land Amherst.

[Anonymous]

I have a friend who is a biologist (not saying their specialty) who has worked at R1 schools, has extensive field experience, published, and was working for the Smithsonian (along with another school) for a while.

They applied for over 100 faculty positions. Maybe had 10 on-campus interviews. No offers.

They're now doing their research in industry.

Faculty searches are brutal and highly, highly competitive. If someone makes it through, they are probably pretty awesome.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Those are fine professors. No, they aren't household names, but everyone has to start out assistant and make themselves known. There's an economist from UChicago, a Princeton classicist, and a legal studies professor from Harvard. An uninteresting lineup but they'll make themselves known.

I'm checking through their pages and it looks like they are amateurs. Sakeef Karim, one of the new full time faculty, has only published 3 articles, has only gotten small grant funding, and has less research experience than a newly minted PhD student...How this person is getting a position at Amherst College is very very suspicious.

This seems very troll-y. He got his PhD in 2022, had two articles published in 2024 with a half dozen more publications in progress and he’s in sociology so the noise about “grant money” and “research experience” seems pretty off base.

In progress doesn't mean complete. Many humanities people make grant money-Guggenheim, NEH, etc. Scrapping for funds with no released books and a scarce publication record in general is really uncommon for the humanities at a Liberal Arts College this high profile.

[Anonymous]

I don't know anything about Amherst, but at a lot of schools there has been a tilt toward teaching (non tenure track) faculty members.

The tenure track faculty have the same pedigrees and publication expectations as before (often higher tenure standards, in fact) but they are a smaller portion of the faculty as a whole.

[Anonymous]

They look OK to me. You will note that prestige doctoral institutions (Ivies, Chicago, Stanford) are prevalent, which reinforces the message "don't bother getting a PhD unless it's from an elite school."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't know anything about Amherst, but at a lot of schools there has been a tilt toward teaching (non tenure track) faculty members.

The tenure track faculty have the same pedigrees and publication expectations as before (often higher tenure standards, in fact) but they are a smaller portion of the faculty as a whole.

These are tenure track faculty being discussed with really low publication records

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Those are fine professors. No, they aren't household names, but everyone has to start out assistant and make themselves known. There's an economist from UChicago, a Princeton classicist, and a legal studies professor from Harvard. An uninteresting lineup but they'll make themselves known.

I'm checking through their pages and it looks like they are amateurs. Sakeef Karim, one of the new full time faculty, has only published 3 articles, has only gotten small grant funding, and has less research experience than a newly minted PhD student...How this person is getting a position at Amherst College is very very suspicious.

This seems very troll-y. He got his PhD in 2022, had two articles published in 2024 with a half dozen more publications in progress and he’s in sociology so the noise about “grant money” and “research experience” seems pretty off base.

Agree. Why are we bringing up names of individual faculty members at some random university? I didn't bother to look this person up but I'd care more about the journals than the number of pubs. For example, 3 AJSs would be great for a new faculty member. Someone has an axe to grind with this person.

[Anonymous]

People will say I'm trolling, but Williams (https://faculty.williams.edu/about/new-faculty-2024-2025-introductions/) coincidentally does have new faculty with more publications and research activity. Amherst may just be less interested in research compared to its peers.

On another note, holy cow colleges have cracked up the amount of visiting faculty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know anything about Amherst, but at a lot of schools there has been a tilt toward teaching (non tenure track) faculty members.

The tenure track faculty have the same pedigrees and publication expectations as before (often higher tenure standards, in fact) but they are a smaller portion of the faculty as a whole.

These are tenure track faculty being discussed with really low publication records

Having publications doesn't make one a better instructor. Do you want good teachers or just impressive research? It's hard to do both.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's very disappointing OP! The best researchers have all gone into industry from Harvard, Stanford, Berkeley, etc. Being a professor doesn't have the "perks" it used to, so now everyone-even the humanities PhDs-are not even attempting postdocs and moving into industry. Academia is rotten.

Cry me some more tears. As a new faculty at UVA everything is fine, and the DEI rot has begun to abate. Normalcy returns.

How can you seriously say this when there's clearly a ton of action that is affirmative in this group of new hires. They hardly have a publication record while other "overrepresented" demographics have always had to publish and teach an insane amount to land Amherst.

Here we get to the OP’s real agenda. 🙄

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know anything about Amherst, but at a lot of schools there has been a tilt toward teaching (non tenure track) faculty members.

The tenure track faculty have the same pedigrees and publication expectations as before (often higher tenure standards, in fact) but they are a smaller portion of the faculty as a whole.

These are tenure track faculty being discussed with really low publication records

Having publications doesn't make one a better instructor. Do you want good teachers or just impressive research? It's hard to do both.

The top LACs have always had both. So have the top universities. You shouldn't be a bad researcher as a Professor, unless you're at a community college. Amherst is a research-teaching expected load. You will get a 2/2 and be expected to release books, have a publication record, and work with students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's very disappointing OP! The best researchers have all gone into industry from Harvard, Stanford, Berkeley, etc. Being a professor doesn't have the "perks" it used to, so now everyone-even the humanities PhDs-are not even attempting postdocs and moving into industry. Academia is rotten.

Cry me some more tears. As a new faculty at UVA everything is fine, and the DEI rot has begun to abate. Normalcy returns.

How can you seriously say this when there's clearly a ton of action that is affirmative in this group of new hires. They hardly have a publication record while other "overrepresented" demographics have always had to publish and teach an insane amount to land Amherst.

Here we get to the OP’s real agenda. 🙄

There's nothing wrong with pointing out that the publication records have tempered a bit to boost diversity hiring, not a bad thing, but can be argued to not be a good thing either.

[Anonymous]

Hard to attract faculty to middle of nowhere Massachussetts. They want to be in Boston making 200k, not in a senior citizens' city

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know anything about Amherst, but at a lot of schools there has been a tilt toward teaching (non tenure track) faculty members.

The tenure track faculty have the same pedigrees and publication expectations as before (often higher tenure standards, in fact) but they are a smaller portion of the faculty as a whole.

These are tenure track faculty being discussed with really low publication records

Having publications doesn't make one a better instructor. Do you want good teachers or just impressive research? It's hard to do both.

The top LACs have always had both. So have the top universities. You shouldn't be a bad researcher as a Professor, unless you're at a community college. Amherst is a research-teaching expected load. You will get a 2/2 and be expected to release books, have a publication record, and work with students.

If you want published books for a new faculty member, you're looking for someone who's adjuncted or postdoced for years after their PhD, not a new grad...because even for humanities and social studies scholars with minimal revisions to their dissertations, it takes a couple years to get to print! OTOH some colleges prefer to hire shiny new grads or "prestige postdocs" (e.g. Princeton, Michigan societies) who have a ton of potential and haven't disgraced themselves with non-TT jobs yet. Often a book contract is enough. Also, journal timelines in these fields can be awful compared to physical sciences - I submitted an article based on my MA research that didn't come out until three years later. Horrible for the CV.

I don't think it's fair to say someone who got their PhD two years ago is a "bad researcher" because they have a couple articles but their book isn't out yet, and I also think it's mean spirited to pick on individuals in an anonymous forum. And I'm not even in academia anymore, so I have no stake, I just don't like the direction of this thread.