The Emerging Scholars Blog

On the road to listen to* Faculty & Student/Post-Doc’s at a major research university discuss Trusting in the Lord in a Secular Workplace or Job Security in Academia over lunch, description below.  If you were present for the conversation, what would you share?  Some of my thoughts later, gotta run. …

Proverbs 3:5 and Psalm 18:2 speak to the importance of trusting in the Lord in times of trial.  The recent Veritas Forum topic on truth and academia and the tragedy at the University of Alabama-Huntsville over a tenure denial bring up the important question as to whether trust in the Lord can give meaning, comfort, and contentment in the remorselessly results-driven academic profession.  Does (and should) faith make a difference while facing the zero-sum game of tenure review, funding applications, the supervision/mentoring of graduate students, and/or running a lab, particularly in a period of economic recession?

*and participate in as appropriate :-)

Two recent articles on the profession of education worth consideration:

1. In Search of Education Leaders, by Bob Herbert, NY Times Op-Ed, December 4, 2009
2. The Ph.D. Problem: On the professionalization of faculty life, doctoral training, and the academy’s self-renewal, by Louis Menand, Harvard Magazine, November-December 2009.  HT: Miller.

Anyone willing to take a stab at why the educational system is so leaky and how we find/develop educational leaders which serve their department, discipline, campus, education in the United States/beyond?

Questions which come to mind with the Harvard degree program, topic of In Search of Education Leaders, “Will this program include the philosophy, purpose, and joy of education? Or are these unable to be expressed in the pragmatic, secular context of trying to keep up because we need to?”  With regard to ‘residency’ models, these already exist in education, e.g., the undergraduate student teacher model. Stronger cross-grade & inter-generational mentoring with the potential for long term relationships would profit the whole educational system.

HT:  Nick who responded to my Facebook musings by referring to Diane Rehm’s discussion of Women in Science with

1. Dr. Elizabeth Blackburn, Morris Hertzein Professor of Biology and Physiology at the University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Blackburn was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine, along with Carol Greider and Jack W. Szostak.
2. Dr. Carol Greider, Daniel Nathans Professor of Molecular Biology & Genetics at The Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Greider was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine, along with Elizabeth Blackburn and Jack W. Szostak.
3. Melody Barnes, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, and special assistant to President Obama

Yes, higher education is leaky pipeline for women in the sciences.  Any responses by those part of the system?

According to Louis Menand in The Ph.D. Problem: On the professionalization of faculty life, doctoral training, and the academy’s self-renewal, the educational system is leaky in quite another way for the Humanities, but with a particular internal end in mind. Can/should higher education in the Humanities add practical skills and develop a specific graduation time line?  What about those who went through the system? Will they allow such changes (Note: Reminds me of the reduction of hours in medical training)?  Will the motivation for students in the Humanities become the pursuit and exploration of knowledge for the rich or those seeking direction later in life?  Even though the article seems focused upon the Humanities, especially English, does the article apply to all (or let’s say most) of higher education?

This week, two powerful quotes that question the current system of education. I hope that they won’t seem too negative put together like this, and maybe this is the wrong tone for the start of the academic year. On the other hand, perhaps you’re struggling to get excited about this year, being stressed on all sides, and feeling like you don’t belong. May these words affirm that it’s not just you.

First, commenter Hannah sent us this quote from Eugene Peterson. It was written to David Taylor, of the Diary of an Arts Pastor blog. Hannah notes that this is not quite her view of the PhD (nor mine, for that matter). As usual, though, Peterson raises good questions in a style only his own.

…what do you do when you are part of a system that is diabolical? Boycott it? Subvert it? do the best you can to survive privately through the process? I’m thinking primarily of the PhD process which seems to me to be truly diabolical–knowledge acquired with no rootage in the prayerful, the local and the personal, and at such a strenuous level that virtually no one has any enjoyment/play in the process.

Will there come a time when all the saint-intellectuals refuse to continue in higher education becuse they love learning and God too much? Has the time already arrived when the school is no longer a congenial or safe or holy place to cultivate the life of the mind?

Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome to this week’s Week in Review! If you have your own link or suggestion, please add it to the comments, or email it to Tom or Mike.

From Tom

Historic Bible pages put online (BBC News, July 6, 2009):  Check out “virtual re-unification” about 800 pages of the 1,600-year-old Codex Sinaiticus manuscript, i.e., the earliest surviving Christian Bible, at www.codexsinaiticus.org. Is it a The rival to the Bible (BBC News, Roger Bolton, October 6, 2008)?

Is Having More Than 2 Children an Unspoken Taboo? (Robin Wilson, Chronicle of Higher Education, 7/10/2009):   The article begins

By academic standards, Rebecca R. Richards-Kortum has it made. She is a full professor of bioengineering at Rice University, runs a thriving cancer-research laboratory, and is a member of the prestigious National Academy of Engineering.

But with four children at home, she sometimes feels like an academic outcast. In fact, Ms. Richards-Kortum says she is most comfortable in her dual roles as professor and mother during the research trips she takes several times a year to southern Africa.

“Here I’m this weird, freaky person because I have four kids,” she says in Houston. “There I can establish rapport and credibility with people because big families are much more common. It’s the only time I feel like it’s a real professional advantage.”

Ms. Richards-Kortum is one of a very small number of academic women with three, four, or more children. In academe, where having even one child can slow down success, trying to manage multiple kids can be a career-stopper.

The article ends with a number of tips on how to manage a big family and a big career. I asked a friend who has four kids and recently served as an adjunct professor at a major university for her thoughts on the topic.  Her comment, “Um, yes.  I don’t personally know anyone in academia with more than two children.”  How about you?  Do you know exceptions and if so, how do they navigate all the pressures and responsibilities of their position?

The Faculty of the Future:  Leaner, Meaner, More Innovative, Less Secure (Forum, Chronicle of Higher Education, 7/10/2009): demands more attention. I asked a business professor to comment on the Forum, below’s a glimpse.  Any first reactions?  More from my friend next week.

I have to agree with the third author (ANTHONY T. GRAFTON), unless there is a significant change in how knowledge is valued and expertise is assessed, the humanities are screwed.  However, it is possible that a collapsed job market will dissuade universities for focusing on “career value” (i.e. incremental salary increase in your next job) as their basis for why people should come to college.  If the focus moves back to education for the sake of being a better person, participant to society, better able to adapt to changes (i.e. long term) then there might be an increase recognition of the value of the humanities [but I wouldn't but your food money on this shift happening quickly].

PETER N. STEARNS says exactly what you would expect someone who has been a Full time Dean/Provost/Department Head for 20+ years to say.  (He was at CMU as Dean of H&SS in the mid-1990s).  The primary issue with his comments is the internal contradiction between saying that academic careers will be more home/family friendly and that there will be less facilities support for faculty (i.e. anyone who has tried to do writing or meetings from home know that this it is very difficult when there are children in the house), greater teaching loads at non-standard times (i.e. working two nights a week teaching an evening class – not so great for  family life), and a significantly greater emphasis on “productivity” (i.e. measurement of outcomes that an individual has only minimal control over – and hence a significant increase in uncertainty and stress – again, not so good for supporting family oriented folks).
Other than this he’s probably right…. :-)

From Mike

So You Want My Job: College Professor – The Art of Manliness continues of a series about (supposedly) dream jobs with an interview of Hunter Baker, Director of Strategic Planning, Assistant Provost, and Adjunct Faculty member at Houston Baptist University. If you are already a faculty member, I don’t think Hunter shares anything you don’t already know, but undergraduates or mid-career professionals who think that academia might be a good career choice might get some useful insight. Hunter has some practical advice about finding a job:

The job prospects differ tremendously based on your field. I think those who get their doctorates in professional fields like business or public administration will typically have a very good opportunity. I also believe the scientific and technical fields have good outlooks. My area, which is in the social sciences or the humanities depending on how you see it, is very competitive. People who study things like political science or history do it because they love it. The one thing that protects you in the job market is that there are lots of people who get as far as the ABD (all but dissertation), but far less who actually grab the brass ring.

If you do it, get your degree from an established institution. I would not recommend getting an online Ph.D. and then trying to find work. That is going to be an uphill battle. The situation may change, but right now it is the reality.

Fast Tracking a PhD – Can you finish a PhD in 3 years? Judy Beth Morris did, with some very careful planning, lots of motivation, and some luck. She admits that it’s not possible in all disciplines, but she shares some good advice about dissertation strategy:

It’s essential to zero in on a dissertation topic as soon in the process as you can. I figured out pretty quickly what I wanted to do with my dissertation; I had the first chapter by the end of my first semester. The professor of the film history class I took that first semester assured me that it was a worthwhile dissertation topic: the “extended adolescence” of Mickey Rooney in the Andy Hardy films and how and why the films resonated with Depression-era audiences. I knew that I would have fun researching this topic, so getting it done was not going to be a problem. Thus, the “dissertation topic” piece fell into place for me.

Another crucial piece of the puzzle involves working on the dissertation as part of your coursework. I was able finish the bulk of the work while I was taking classes because I chose my classes with the end project in mind: my goal was to use class papers as eventual chapters in the dissertation. This worked much better than I could have hoped; I seemed to choose just the right seminar classes with research paper assignments that would allow me to cover the different facets of my topic.

Take a look at the article, and let us know what you think. How realistic is it to finish a PhD in 3 years?

Charity in Truth – Pope Benedict XVI has released a new encyclical, Caritas in Veritate, “Charity in Truth,” which offers a Christian perspective on economics and society. Here’s the NY Times’ article about it. I have not read the 144-page document, but I expect that there will many connections that one can make between Christians’ role in society and Christians’ role on campus, particularly in seeking the good of the campus and our local community. One passage jumped out as I skimmed the beginning:

To love someone is to desire that person’s good and to take effective steps to secure it. Besides the good of the individual, there is a good that is linked to living in society: the common good. It is the good of “all of us”, made up of individuals, families and intermediate groups who together constitute society. It is a good that is sought not for its own sake, but for the people who belong to the social community and who can only really and effectively pursue their good within it. To desire the common good and strive towards it is a requirement of justice and charity. To take a stand for the common good is on the one hand to be solicitous for, and on the other hand to avail oneself of, that complex of institutions that give structure to the life of society, juridically, civilly, politically and culturally, making it the pólis, or “city”. The more we strive to secure a common good corresponding to the real needs of our neighbours, the more effectively we love them.

Are there implications for our common life on campus?

Inside Higher Ed reports on two interesting studies about which students complete a PhD and why. Read the rest of this entry »

In our next Emerging Scholars Review, we’re planning on highlighting accomplishments of ESN members, as a way of recognizing your personal achievements and encouraging other ESN members who are still in the middle of their degree, research project, or tenure process. Read the rest of this entry »

Way back in January (ancient history for most blogs, but we at ESN are committed to learning from the past), the Chronicle of Higher Education published the column “Graduate School in the Humanities: Just Don’t Go” by Thomas H. Benton (the pen name of William Pannapacker, an English professor at Hope College). After reviewing the dismal (and diminishing) prospects for tenure-track jobs in the humanities, Benton recommends pursuing a Ph.D. in the humanities only if you fall into one of the four following categories: Read the rest of this entry »

If you are completing your PhD, part of the process is completing forms to copyright your dissertation. danah boyd, a researcher who studies online social networks and recent PhD recipient herself, has written an interesting post about licensing her dissertation under Creative Commons, instead of the standard “all rights reserved” copyright. Creative Commons is a nonprofit organization that provides free licenses for creative works, generally to make it easier to share those works. (I use CC’s search tool frequently to find CC-licensed artwork for the ESN and Faculty Ministry websites.) The post provides a couple of reasons why you might want a CC license (e.g. it will make it easier for someone to use your dissertation as a classroom text), but also potential hurdles you might face from your school administration. It’s an intriguing idea, and I’m now considering following danah’s example with my master’s thesis.

Inside Higher Ed reports today on National Science Foundation’s data on 2007 earned doctorates. Overall, 48,079 doctorates were awarded by U.S. institutions last year, an increase of 5.4% over 2006. This is the fifth straight year of increases.

Humanities Ph.D.s, however, declined 4.6%, led by “Letters” (English literature & language, classics, etc.), which declined by 6.9%. Wow. What this means for literature fields, I’m not sure. I’d be interested in seeing how the MLA or other associations interpret the data.

Here’s a good opportunity to help you finish your Ph.D.: The Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship. From their website:

The Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowships are designed to encourage original and significant study of ethical or religious values in all fields of the humanities and social sciences, and particularly to help Ph.D. candidates in these fields complete their dissertation work in a timely manner. In addition to topics in religious studies or in ethics (philosophical or religious), dissertations appropriate to the Newcombe Fellowship competition might explore the ethical implications of foreign policy, the values influencing political decisions, the moral codes of other cultures, and religious or ethical issues reflected in history or literature.

Each one-year fellowship is worth $24,000, and you must be planning to submit your Ph.D. or Th.D. by summer 2010. The deadline is November 14, so you need to apply soon.

Link: Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation (HT: Gail Neal at Biola, via Stan Wallace)