I'm midway through the most stressful month of my academic career, so this is why I have been a little neglectful of the blog (though I've been on Facebook and Twitter plenty). I wish I could be as relaxed as Kipper, but in between teaching my classes (including a grad class and a team-taught course) I'm reorganizing the Women's Studies program with a new name, new certificate and some events to get us back in the public eye.Then there's the whole tenure package: due October 1st, this includes all my evaluations from both faculty and students for my time at Saint Rose, my CV and a letter which explains why they should give me tenure and (in my case) promotion to Associate Professor. While much of the package is assembling things that I (hopefully) already have, that letter is a very difficult piece of writing that has to boil my twelve page CV down to the essentials for a committee of scholars who know nothing about the kind of work that I do and explain succinctly why it's important and what I've accomplished and why they should value my work -- without putting them to sleep with excessive length.
Easy, right? And if I fail -- well, I'll be looking for a new job.
8 comments:
You are talented, amazing, and yes, a force of nature as Alexandra so eloquently put it.
You're going to get it! I would love to have someone with your energy and dedication teaching my children.
As Saranna said! Still, all good wishes and good luck!
Thanks, you two.
You have incredible writing skills so I bet you turn that tenure package into something they can't resist! Good luck.
You are amazing, talented...oh, and everything everyone else already said! Plus, inspiring.
Great thoughts going your way for this endeavor!
How interesting -- you get to write for yourself. I didn't have that luxury, so it meant coordinating my writers and making sure they were pressing all of the right buttons.
Read your Faculty Handbook, and push the buttons that document has labelled for you regarding successful teaching, scholarship, and service. Do sell yourself. Don't engage in special pleading. Be your most interesting self, but don't be too quirky. Make it easy for your committee to say yes.
Good luck, Kate, though I'm sure you won't need it.
I see lots of professors go through this every year...I'm the one who collects their portfolios for the dean.
But you have something most don't...genuine talent! You'll do just fine.
Good luck!
Thanks for the cheering words, everyone -- and the good advice, Crispinus. The only part we get to write is the letter of application for tenure -- there are five letters of support [none of which may come from outside the college which is unusual, to say the least] which I can't exactly control, though some of my evaluators have suggested that they might run drafts past me, which is nice. The scary thing is that I'm running out of time and haven't got everything together. I was hoping to devote this weekend to it, but my folks may be coming up to Albany this weekend.
I really appreciate the confidence everyone has in me!
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