From the other side at AALS . . .
posted by Rachel Godsil
It has been a decade since I slept poorly at the Wardman in November – and I must admit to having some unpleasant flashbacks. Last night, like 10 years ago, I got lost on my way to an interviewing suite. I still find the bar scene a little anxiety producing. So – to those of you interviewing today – many of us on the other side of the couch do have empathy for you!
Needless to say, I acknowledge the difference. We on the interviewing side are happily (hopefully) ensconced as academics – a position that is frankly worth running from hotel suite to hotel suite. We are (hopefully) happy to talk about the benefits of our particular institution. And it has been fabulous to read the scholarship of those on the market.
I thought I’d post this morning mainly to wish you all good luck — and to explain why I am not posting anything substantive until next week. And a quick tip: when you are given the opportunity to ask any questions – find a question that allows for an interesting and idiosyncratic answer. I promise that every school will have an identical answer to the ubiquitous “what support does your institution have for junior faculty.” We all have colloquia, research stipends, and collegial sharing of documents. We all generally do try to give junior faculty reasonable teaching loads, etc. And if we don’t do any of these things, we won’t acknowledge it here!
November 6, 2009 at 5:34 am
Tags: academia
Posted in: Uncategorized
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New Website for the Michigan Law Review
posted by Michigan Law Review
The Michigan Law Review has a new and greatly improved website.
First Impressions, the Review’s online companion, now accepts submissions of essays on timely legal topics.
To view the submission guidelines, go here. For questions and comments, please contact Dean Baxtresser, Executive Editor of First Impressions.
September 29, 2009 at 1:20 pm
Tags: academia, call for submissions, Law School
Posted in: Law Rev (Michigan)
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Back in the Saddle Again
posted by Jon Siegel
Two hours from now I will teach my first class in 15 months. My sabbatical is over.
I’m actually looking forward being back in the classroom. I didn’t feel this way so much on my first sabbatical back in 2001-2002, or even in the first semester of this sabbatical, but beginning around January or so I started to think, hey, where are my students? I miss them.
The funny thing, which I do remember from my first sabbatical, is that the students have no idea. As I walk in today, they won’t be thinking, whoa, this is his first class in 15 months — I wonder how he’ll do — better cut him a little slack. No, they’ll just expect the same polished performance as always.
Which leads to a more general observation: That’s what the students always expect.
Think about a water tap. When you turn it on, you expect water to come out. It occurs to you only rarely, if ever, to think about the amazing amount of labor, planning, and ingenuity that went into bringing the water to that tap. You just expect it to work.
If you’re a professor, that’s how your students think about you. To them, you are a water tap. When they turn you on, they expect a class to come out. They never think about the preparation and planning involved. Your need to prepare a class while juggling your writing projects, committee responsibilities, and personal life, and the possibility that you may be ill or out of temper, are equally outside their consciousness. When I was a student, I was among the more academically minded (I did become a professor, after all), and still, I had only the dimmest notion that professors spent time preparing for class.
The result is that students will sometimes be insufficiently prepared to receive the benefits of the class you have worked hard to plan for them and they may show less appreciation than your efforts deserve. Professors, never resent this or expect it to be otherwise than it must inevitably be.
September 1, 2009 at 6:27 am
Tags: academia, Law School
Posted in: Uncategorized
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Breaking into Legal Academia with a Non-Top-5 J.D.
posted by Kaimipono D. Wenger
I get a variation of this e-mail at least once a year, from friends or acquaintances in law practice. It always starts out the same way. Basically, “I didn’t go to law school at Yale or Columbia, and I’m wondering whether that means I can never become a law professor.”
The short answer is “No, your non-Yale J.D. does not absolutely doom you. It does lengthen your odds, and it increases the importance of other factors, but it absolutely does not shut you out of the process.”
Really? Yes. Let’s go over it. Read the rest of this post »
May 13, 2009 at 8:45 pm
Tags: academia, hiring
Posted in: Law School (Hiring & Laterals)
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