Job hunting
What with my Ph.D. nearly in hand, I’ve been applying for college teaching jobs. Long shot, I know …
This involves writing cover letters and other supporting documents for dozens or even hundreds of schools. Naturally, if a school’s application requirements are too onerous, I simply choose not to pursue employment there.
Several times, I’ve submitted an application and then been asked, on short notice, to submit more documents not initially requested.
A couple of these schools made their second request after I’d survived the first cut in the application process. It was onerous, but I complied.
This last time, though, I’d filled out a twelve-page application form that included several essay questions. Then, when I emailed it (along with the other documents specified in the job advertisement) to the search committee’s representative, she replied with another series of essay questions for me to answer – questions she said were required of all faculty job inquirers.
When I have received this document, she said, I will forward [your application] to the search committee for their review.
I know that schools can get away with doing this because they receive hundreds of applications for each job they advertise. But how is it not frowned upon?
I took it as a sign of how the school treats its employees and decided not to complete the application. (Besides, I have lots of other work to do.)
I composed this reply:
No. If [your school] requires all faculty job applicants to submit answers to these five questions, it should include the questions in the job advertisement or in the application form.
I don’t think I’ll send it, though. The representative is only a secretary. Her job is to pass materials back and forth between the applicants and the search committee, not to decide what the search committee should require the applicants to do.
This ordeal is giving me lots of ideas about how to conduct reasonable job searches. Not that I expect to ever be in a position to implement them. The initial hurdles may well prove too overwhelming.
This involves writing cover letters and other supporting documents for dozens or even hundreds of schools. Naturally, if a school’s application requirements are too onerous, I simply choose not to pursue employment there.
Several times, I’ve submitted an application and then been asked, on short notice, to submit more documents not initially requested.
A couple of these schools made their second request after I’d survived the first cut in the application process. It was onerous, but I complied.
This last time, though, I’d filled out a twelve-page application form that included several essay questions. Then, when I emailed it (along with the other documents specified in the job advertisement) to the search committee’s representative, she replied with another series of essay questions for me to answer – questions she said were required of all faculty job inquirers.
When I have received this document, she said, I will forward [your application] to the search committee for their review.
I know that schools can get away with doing this because they receive hundreds of applications for each job they advertise. But how is it not frowned upon?
I took it as a sign of how the school treats its employees and decided not to complete the application. (Besides, I have lots of other work to do.)
I composed this reply:
No. If [your school] requires all faculty job applicants to submit answers to these five questions, it should include the questions in the job advertisement or in the application form.
I don’t think I’ll send it, though. The representative is only a secretary. Her job is to pass materials back and forth between the applicants and the search committee, not to decide what the search committee should require the applicants to do.
This ordeal is giving me lots of ideas about how to conduct reasonable job searches. Not that I expect to ever be in a position to implement them. The initial hurdles may well prove too overwhelming.