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She goes on about her hopeless job search, but she never mentioned where she got her degree (Department of German at the University of California-Irvine). I wo

She goes on about her hopeless job search, but she never mentioned where she got her degree (Department of German at the University of California-Irvine). I wonder if her perspective were different had she graduated from an Ivy.

freyr 14y ago
"After four years of trying, I’ve finally gotten it through my thick head that I will not get a job—and if you go to graduate school, neither will you." Clearly, her personal experience can be extrapolated to everyone everywhere looking for a tenure track literature professorship. If she can't do it, nobody else should bother trying. I wouldn't have hired her either.
- ryguytilidie 14y ago
  Reading this the same morning as that high school girl ranting about how no white kids will get into college because of affirmative action has really kind of soured my feelings on humans for the morning.
- cdjk 14y ago
  True, the article is heavy on personal experience, but the numbers really don't look good if you want to be a tenured professor in the humanities. Just look at the number of open positions each year compared to the number of graduates. And don't forget to include the graduates from all the previous years who also want the one tenure-track job in early modern literature (or whatever your field is). Yeah, the success rate for startups is low, but at least there are different routes to success (side project, bootstrapping, angel, VC, etc). If you want to be a professor the only option is to get a job at a university.
PeterisP 14y ago
Well, statistically speaking, most people don't graduate from Ivy, so if you're making a general point to the whole American audience you can assume that they're aiming for a non-Ivy school.
fyi80 14y ago
To everyone: Take a look at the faculty roster of UCI, and look at where they got there PhDs I don't know about German, but in math and science, most of the top-50 or top-100 university faculties got their PhDs at top-15 universities. If you run the numbers and look at the ratio of PhDs to professors, it's obvious why.

freyr 14y ago

"After four years of trying, I’ve finally gotten it through my thick head that I will not get a job—and if you go to graduate school, neither will you." Clearly, her personal experience can be extrapolated to everyone everywhere looking for a tenure track literature professorship. If she can't do it, nobody else should bother trying. I wouldn't have hired her either.

ryguytilidie 14y ago
Reading this the same morning as that high school girl ranting about how no white kids will get into college because of affirmative action has really kind of soured my feelings on humans for the morning.
cdjk 14y ago
True, the article is heavy on personal experience, but the numbers really don't look good if you want to be a tenured professor in the humanities. Just look at the number of open positions each year compared to the number of graduates. And don't forget to include the graduates from all the previous years who also want the one tenure-track job in early modern literature (or whatever your field is). Yeah, the success rate for startups is low, but at least there are different routes to success (side project, bootstrapping, angel, VC, etc). If you want to be a professor the only option is to get a job at a university.

PeterisP 14y ago

Well, statistically speaking, most people don't graduate from Ivy, so if you're making a general point to the whole American audience you can assume that they're aiming for a non-Ivy school.

fyi80 14y ago

To everyone: Take a look at the faculty roster of UCI, and look at where they got there PhDs I don't know about German, but in math and science, most of the top-50 or top-100 university faculties got their PhDs at top-15 universities. If you run the numbers and look at the ratio of PhDs to professors, it's obvious why.