Gigs everywhere

I found out today and yesterday that two of my colleagues have landed jobs. The first has been a lecturer in my doctoral department for 3 or 4 years now. She's finally landed a t-t gig at a good state school. And a cohort of mine, who's apparently finished his dissertation, and will receive the PhD this summer, has been offered a job at a smaller state school. I'm especially pleased by this latter one, since, well, he's a cohort and a friend of mine. He's in a different subdiscipline from me, but we took quite a few classes together.

Interestingly, he credits one of the more recent graduate students in the department for having gotten him the interview. This second grad student had attended that school as an undergraduate. Apparently, the committee was interested in my cohort, and gave this other student a call, to find out what he knew. Curious, eh? But, also apparently, the committee had some reservations about my friend, since they offered a one-year (with the possibility of conversion) rather than the t-t post that was advertised. Cohort explained that it was mostly concern over his inexperience teaching. How common is this?

I'm also a bit worried for him, since he's so eager for the job that he seems willing to agree to just about anything they offer or request. He was saying that he's having trouble getting over thinking like a student. He was also quite shocked that I have six publications and I'm still having trouble getting interviews. Ah well. I guess his subdiscipline isn't expecting the same things as mine.

I have to remember my task is to get famous, to build up my credentials, to publish, publish, publish, and present as often and as widely as I can. At the moment, all I'm looking at are temporary posts, so I need to remain focused on that three year plan. From what I can tell, I'm not in the running for any of the t-t jobs I've already applied for, and I'm not seeing any more coming up these days.

That means, I've got to get a leg up on the next cycle, remaining as busy as I can. There are still possibilities for the coming fall (though I can't say I'm happy with the logistics of any of them). For my protection, I need to be prepared to say no if it really won't work out. I really don't want to be so far away from my family. But, if I can convince myself that sacrifice is to the long-term benefit of my career, and hence to our family, I'm willing to consider it. We'll just have to see, one step at a time.