Archive for the ‘tenure’ tag
Week in Review: Christo et Ecclesiae Edition
What are you reading, watching, thinking about this week? As usual, here’s a few which have been on our mind. Let us know your thoughts on any/all of them. If you have items you’d like us to consider for the top five, add them in the comments or send them to Tom or Mike.
1. Why Harvard Students Should Study More Religion (Lisa Miller, Newsweek): A look at Harvard’s (lack of) religion in its undergraduate curriculum, with special attention to Louis Menand’s attempt to include a course called “Reason and Faith” in Harvard’s revised education requirements. The article quotes a couple of very interesting, and very different, points of view;
“My colleagues fear that taking religion seriously would undermine everything a great university stands for,” the Rev. Peter Gomes, Harvard’s chaplain and a professor of Christian history, told me. “I think that’s ungrounded, but there it is.”Steven Pinker says his main objection to the 2006 proposal that students be required to take a course in a Reason and Faith category was that it seemed to make reason and faith equal paths to truth. “I very, very, very much do not want to go on the record as suggesting that people should not know about religion,” he told me. “But reason and faith are not yin and yang. Faith is a phenomenon. Reason is what the university should be in the business of fostering.”
2. More religion in higher education: Inside Higher Ed featured two opinion articles about the role of religion and theology in academic disciplines – “On Teaching Christianity” by Adam Kosko, who argues that religion classes need to spend more time studying the actual theology of religious figures and movements; and “Everywhere and Nowhere” by Kevin Schultz and Paul Harvey, which takes another look at the place of religion within historical studies.
More links after the jump.
Review: Life on the Tenure Track
James Lang's Life on the Tenure Track
I have a terrible confession to make: I’ve been giving away copies of a book that I had never read. For the past two summers, we’ve surveyed ESN members about their past year, and members who had made a recent career transition – earned a degree, started a new job, received tenure – have been offered the free book of their selection. I included among our offerings a book, James Lang’s Life on the Tenure Track: Lessons from the First Year
But my shame has been lifted. This afternoon, I finished reading the final chapter. Even better: I’m glad that I’ve been giving it out.
Lang’s book is not meant to replace the myriad other advice books that are available to young and aspiring faculty. While Lang has studied the art and science of teaching, his book is primarily a memoir of his first year as an assistant professor of English at Assumption College, a Catholic liberal arts college in Worcester, Mass. The book takes the reader through the entire first year, with each month matched up with a dominant theme of academic life from that time period: teaching, grading, writing, and so on. While Lang includes general advice to new professor, he mostly focuses on his own experiences of learning how to teach a full schedule while trying to fulfill service and writing commitments, balancing his work with the needs of his young family, navigating relationships with faculty colleagues, and learning his way around a small college in an unfamiliar city. Read the rest of this entry »
The Future of Faculty Driven by Technology & Organizational Efficiency?
Some final thoughts on The Faculty of the Future: Leaner, Meaner, More Innovative, Less Secure (Forum, Chronicle of Higher Education, 7/10/2009) from a friend who offers his gifts to Christ by serving as a business professor. Do any readers have comments on technological determinism and/or the striving for organizational efficiency in higher education?
There are a few elements of the second commentary (TIMOTHY CARMODY) which make sense – but it reads to much like standard technological determinism predictions of “changes in technology change everything”. The model of a knowledgeable teach leading inquiry into a topic by providing information/explanation, prompting questions, and recognitions/correction of participant contribution is very old and has endured through many technology shifts (the distribution of print bibles does not eliminate the value of inductive bible studies with a leader who is at least minimally trained :-)). So while some changes will happen are not likely to be the ones this author is predicting. …
The changes described by the 4th author (JOSEPH C. HERMANOWICZ) are already happening. There is a marked difference between how my senior colleagues and my junior colleagues see their career prospects and their role in the university. One point I would make here: I doubt the claim that this is an less expensive way to run a university. Read the rest of this entry »
Week in Review: Science, Religion, and Waffles Edition
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
I received a forward of the First Things online survey of religion at America’s colleges and universities. What do you think of on-line surveys? Below’s the point of the survey First Things on-line survey. Question: Do you have any stories to share, like the one in the comments section, i.e., Seal of approval? Presence of Moses on KU symbol gives rise to burning questions.
We’d like to come up with a list of schools that provide (1) a solid academic training, (2) a diploma that will mean something at the end of day, and (3) an environment where faith, if not actively supported, is at least approved of and not discouraged inside and outside the classroom.
The Motivated Belief of John Polkinghorne (Edward B. Davis, First Things, 7/17/2009) came to my attention after reviewing the First Things online survey of religion at America’s colleges and universities. If you’re not familiar with Polkinghorne, a world-class mathematical physicist who resigned his chair at Cambridge in mid-career to study for the Anglican ministry, Davis encourages you to swing by here. Davis summarizes Polkinghorne’s overall message as:
Science cannot provide its own metaphysical interpretation. As he says with typical precision, “Physics constrains metaphysics, but it no more determines it than the foundations of a house determine the precise form of the building erected on them.” This is especially true in a post-Newtonian world characterized by greater epistemological humility. “The twentieth-century demise of mere mechanism,” he says, provides “a salutary reminder that there is nothing absolute or incorrigible about the context of science.” Some questions lie “outside the scientific domain,” and here “theology has a right to contribute to the subsequent metascientific discourse.” Anyone familiar with the writings of such preachers of scientific atheism as Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, or Christopher Hitchins will immediately appreciate the very different world in which Polkinghorne dwells. “The tendency among atheist writers to identify reason exclusively with scientific modes of thought,” he notes pointedly, “is a disastrous diminishment of our human powers of truth-seeking inquiry.”
Theology in turn has something to say to science. “Science offers an illuminating context within which much theological reflection can take place, but in its turn it needs to be considered in the wider and deeper context of intelligibility that a belief in God affords. …”
P.S. Do you agree/disagree with Pace’s cartoon The Descent of the Modernists, see The Motivated Belief of John Polkinghorne?
While visiting Pittsburgh last week, I came across The Waffle Shop (connected with Carnegie Mellon University). Due to it’s limited hours and my packed schedule, I wasn’t able to visit. Reading up (6/27/09 post and A Reality Show) and watching video at The Waffle Shop [Note: Inappropriate content to a number of the clips. Viewer discretion advised], I was struck by what an environment this would be to share the Word/Life of Christ! Do other campuses have similar experiments …
The Waffle Shop is an experimental platform for media production and public dialogue that combines a restaurant with the production of a talk show directly on the premises.
At Waffle Shop, our customers are also our stars, as we film each night, inviting interested patrons to express their unique opinions and personalities. These recordings are streamed live through this very website during our open hours, and then produced into episodes which are broadcast publicly 24 hours a day in the windows of the storefront, and made available through our online archive.
Upcoming plans include: a changeable analog phrase system designed for the vacant billboard space above the shop, a live weekend world news show, an independent record label that produces and distributes music recorded live during our nighttime show, and a weekly radio show.
From Mike
Silicon Brains (WSJ) – I love science writing. I just can’t get enough of it. Here’s a very interesting look at the “Blue Brain” project at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland. Henry Markram’s team is attempting to replicate a rat’s brain in a computer, but that’s only the beginning.
The scientists behind Blue Brain hope to have a virtual human brain functioning in ten years — a lengthy time period that underscores the scientific challenge. The human brain has 100 billion neurons that send electrical signals to each other via a network of at least 100 trillion connections, or synapses. How could this dizzying complexity ever be recreated in a virtual model?
I’m not so sure that ten years to recreate the human brain is all that “lengthy,” but that’s just me. Many questions struck me as I read this article. How would John Sommerville’s question of the human consider this project? If Blue Brain is successful, could it be considered positronic? Could the brains of rats – though cats would be better – pilot the next generation of spacecraft? Is the beginning of reality for Ray Kurzweil’s vision?
Post-Tenure Review (Chronicle) – Kevin Brown of Lee University revisits a pseudonymous essay he’d written while preparing for tenure, both whether his expectations met reality and how the essay itself impacted his tenure review.
Science and Religion – A couple of good articles from Books & Culture about science religion. First, “Squaring God’s Books,” a review by Timothy J. Burbery of The Word and the World: Biblical Exegesis and Early Modern Science
From the Community
Also from Books & Culture, JTG points us to a conversation between Karl Gilberson and Francis Collins about science, religion, evolution, and other matters. Mike’s comments on the article: Very interesting reading, and a good introduction to both men, though I wish B&C had arranged a conversation between Collins and someone a little bit more removed from Collins’ inner circle. (Gilberson sits on the board of Collins’ new Biologos Foundation.) Gilberson raises the question of whether Collins has been fair to the ID movement, but Collins could have been pushed much harder on that issue.
JTG also directs us to an editorial by Michael Gerson in the Washington Post about Collins’ appointment to be Director of the NIH in which Gerson calls Collins “Obama’s Scientific Peacemaker.”
Future faculty must “Show me the money”?
In the last Week in Review, I highlighted The Faculty of the Future: Leaner, Meaner, More Innovative, Less Secure (Forum, Chronicle of Higher Education, 7/10/2009). You may remember, I’ve asked a business professor to comment on the piece. The faculty member graciously offered some time while writing a grant proposal, wrapping up a paper to be sent out (the 6th one of the summer), grading the exams and papers from an international class, summarizing of Business School IT/New Media innovation projects, handling some administrative issues for a conference, and briefly reflecting on how neither of us works as hard as our wives ;-) For his thoughts on the material written by ANTHONY T. GRAFTON and PETER N. STEARNS visit Week in Review. Next week we’ll conclude with TIMOTHY CARMODY and JOSEPH C. HERMANOWICZ.
Before turning to professor’s comments, I’d like to share that I’m not surprised that the research university model has taken us to a grant money approach (collective, entrepreneurial bureaucracy) where faculty/administrators must Show me the money. It would seem to me that mentoring/discipling students in the ethics of securing/using such money would be of significant value and lead to the value of applying lessons learned from history, literature, philosophy, pyschology, sociology, etc. But I went to a liberal arts college ;-)
In addition, the pressure to Show me the money is not just within the organization, but incoming students call for high job placement (undergraduate and graduate/professional schools). Job acquisition and maintenance involves not just strong training in one’s field but also good communication skills, another humanities offering worth the investment. … All the more necessary in a difficult economic time such as we’re currently in/entering. What do you think? In the future, I’ll return to the history/philosophy of the research university. But now let’s turn to a few insights offered by my faculty friend. … Read the rest of this entry »
Week in Review – Recession, Tenure, N. T. Wright, and More
In this week’s Week in Review, new graduates dealing with the recession, some notable reviews of N.T. Wright’s new book, Justification, a new website for Christian lawyers, some additional coverage of A. N. Wilson’s conversion, and more! If you’d like to contribute to next week’s Review, add your link(s) in the comments, or send them to Tom or Mike directly.
Reminder: We start our ESN Book Club on Your Mind Matters next Tuesday, June 9. We’ll start with the forewords and Chapter 1. If you haven’t gotten your copy yet, you can download next week’s selection directly from IVP’s website as a PDF. Read the rest of this entry »
Week in Review
From Tom
‘Angels & Demons’ May Help Physicists Explain What Matters. Question: Do you agree with Mr. Izen?
“Life presents just a couple of these opportunities when the public is paying attention, really paying attention to science, and in this case it’s a movie which talks about antimatter and is set at CERN,” Mr. Izen says. The film is “a chance to tell our story.”
A Marriage Made in History, a review of Eugene D. Genovese’s Miss Betsey: A Memoir of Marriage (ISI Books) for the Chronicle of Higher education, places this story of academics who find love and faith on my too read shelf. Here’s a quote from Gene’s blind date with Elizabeth-Fox. Beautiful.
“When I arrived at five p.m., Betsey looked terrible. At six or so, she wasn’t all that bad. At seven she had become sort of nice-looking. By eight, sitting across a table at Restaurant le Maître Jacques, she had blossomed into lovely. When I left her at one a.m., she was radiantly beautiful. Almost 40 years later, she was in immeasurably worse shape than when I first laid eyes on her. Physically broken and fighting for life, she was unable to get out of bed by herself; barely able to walk; wracked by relentless, searing pain. Still radiantly beautiful.”
Slump Revives Town-Gown Divide Across U.S. Question: How have the campuses with which you are connected tried to address these concerns?
“As endowments everywhere sink with the economy, town-gown relationships, often carefully nurtured during the boom years as colleges and universities sought to expand, are fraying.”
The Two Sides of ‘Star Trek’ Question: Is this how we approach higher education or do we address the big questions through our work in higher education?
“On the Starship Enterprise, men and women, blacks and whites, Americans, Russians and Asians — with names like Uhura, Chekov and Sulu — worked side by side, reflecting Mr. Roddenberry’s belief that ‘when human beings get over the silly little problems of racism and war, then we can tackle the big problems of exploring the universe,’ said David Gerrold, a writer for the original ‘Star Trek’ series.”
When a Twittering College President Is Not Who He Seems. Question: How do we know what to trust in these new forms of communication? What mental and/or technological filters do you use? Note: I’m not going down the road of Terminator Salvation (2009) ;-)
From Mike
From Inside Higher Ed — Did appearances on The O’Reilly Factor cost a Syracuse professor tenure?
Gay in the Academy — Career advice from a gay faculty member at Inside Higher Ed. I found it instructive to hear from this perspective from another minority group (for example, good advice on being yourself during the interview process) and to remind myself that Christians have it easy in many ways (I don’t think I’ve ever been told that Christians on campus gather clandestinely in a secluded bathroom). [Please note: any comments about homosexuality that aren't on topic to this article will be deleted without exception.]
Blog-Based Peer Review — Noah Wardrip-Fruin allowed his book to be part of an experiment comparing traditional peer review with chapter-by-chapter review on his blog, Grand Text Auto. Here, he shares his experience and findings. For example, traditional peer review was better at following the overall argument of the book and comparing one section with another, but the blog comments were much more detailed and collaborative (e.g. commenters would affirm, correct, and nuance criticisms from others).
Week in Review (Updated)
[Editor's note: This is a new weekly feature from your blog contributors. Each week, we'll be posting articles, books, news, etc., that Tom, Mike, and the ESN community have been pondering. If you have a book or article you'd like us to add to next week's Review, add it in the comments or send it to either Mike or Tom. Thanks!]
The Harvard disadvantage – The Boston Globe takes a very personal look at students from poor backgrounds at Harvard and their struggles to fit in with the children of privilege.
In the Chronicle, Audrey Williams June provides two looks at the changing world of tenure: a report on the rapid decrease of tenure-track instructors (73% of instructors, including graduate assistants, are now off the tenure track) and a profile of St. John’s 2008 decision to move 20 contingent writing instructors to tenure-track positions.
A few weeks ago, Inside Higher Ed published this advice on managing large writing projects from John Gastil. I (Mike) am working on a large writing project myself at the moment, and plan to take Gastil’s advice about outlining, scheduling, and setting deadlines.
A fine tuned universe? At Scot McKnight’s Jesus Creed blog, RJS (a science professor) reviews some high profile opinions on the Anthropic Principle.
From the community
Dave Snoke submitted this very interesting article from the UK, about an Oxford researcher, Justin Barrett, who claims that belief in God (or at least, a god) is ” built into the natural development of children’s minds,” not something learned from the culture around them.
Books
N.T. Wright’s Justification: God’s Plan & Paul’s Vision (InterVarsity Press, 2009). Here’s a quote to ponder:
“Knowing God for oneself, as opposed to knowing or thinking about him, is at the heart of Christian living. Discovering that God is gracious, rather than a distant bureaucrat or a dangerous tyrant, is the good news that constantly surprises and refreshes us. But we are not the center of the universe. God is not circling around us. We are circling around him. It may look, from our view, as though “me and my salvation” are the be-all and end-all of Christianity. Sadly, many people — many devout Christians! — have preached that way and lived that way. This problem is not peculiar to the churches of the Reformation. It goes back to the high Middle Ages in the Western church, and infects and affects Catholic and Protestant, liberal and conservative, high and low church alike. But a full reading of Scripture itself tells a different story. God made humans for a purpose: not simply for themselves, not simply so that they could be in relationship with him, but so that through them, as his image-bearers, he could bring his wise, glad, fruitful order to the world.” — pp.23-24.
Where the tenure track jobs are. …
Some news related to Mike’s earlier post Hard Times, Come Again No More. … According to the Chronicle of Higher Education article For Some, Hard Times Make Hiring Easier:
some institutions are going against the grain of the poor economy and appointing new professors. This decision has given those campuses an edge, yielding top-quality candidates who might not have been within reach in a more-competitive job market. — by Robin Wilson, from the issue dated March 13, 2009.
Of course, the competition is high at these colleges and universities. As such,
“This is an opportunity to find the very best people,” says Michael J. Chajes, dean of the University of Delaware’s College of Engineering — which had more than 500 applications each for two of its eight faculty job openings. — by Robin Wilson, For Some, Hard Times Make Hiring Easier, Chronicle of Higher Education, from the issue dated March 13, 2009.
Want to know the campus hiring the most? Take a moment to guess before you look. Read the rest of this entry »
Hard Times, Come Again No More
Last week, the NY Times published a depressing story about the state of tenure-track jobs. This gives you feel for the article:
Fulltime faculty jobs have not been easy to come by in recent decades, but this year the new crop of Ph.D. candidates is finding the prospects worse than ever. Public universities are bracing for severe cuts as state legislatures grapple with yawning deficits. At the same time, even the wealthiest private colleges have seen their endowments sink and donations slacken since the financial crisis. So a chill has set in at many higher education institutions, where partial or full-fledge hiring freezes have been imposed.
Marc Bousquet, however, calls the whole thing a sham. The problem isn’t the economy, he argues, because this has been the trend for the past forty years. Bousquet’s position: Read the rest of this entry »
