My Academic Job Search Postmortem, Part Two

In Part One, I shared nine observations made during my recent job search. 

Before I begin Part Two, in which I’ll compare myself to five writers hired this year instead of me, I want to say that I’m (fairly) happy in my current position as a full-time, non-tenure track professor with a 4/4 teaching load. I have an admin position, so the load is reduced to 3/3. I teach partially online every semester, either hybrid sections (50% online) or fully online courses. My department is very considerate of my scheduling needs, which is just great. And, while I (like everyone) would like to be paid more, the department chair took to the dean a proposal I helped develop that argued for higher salaries, and it worked (sort of)—we got a 3% raise. Not great, but certainly not nothing.

So why the job search?

In short, I’d like the writing time afforded to TT creative writing faculty. A TT faculty member’s writing is institutionally rewarded or supported. Obviously, some institutions do a better job of that than others. My 3/3 plus admin load (still a 4/4, basically) is a lot of work. Teaching two courses a semester for a lot more money sounds good. Or, to put it another way, I want to make my writing a priority in my life, which is hard to do with a 4/4.

The job market is brutal. I’m confident I could land a TT job in the next year or two, but I also don’t want to move. I like our house. I like the affordable city in which I live. Yadda yadda. And, truthfully, there are only a few things I can do to rise above the pack now. One is to get a Ph.D., which I don’t really want to do. Another is to publish another book (let’s be honest, a novel), ideally with a big press. I could also try to win a big award, but since I haven’t applied for any recently, that’s not likely. 

The five positions below aren’t necessarily the ones I most wanted. For many of the jobs, I don’t know who was hired. In other cases, I don’t know the writer who landed the job. But these five positions in particular help paint a more accurate portrait of me as a candidate for such positions. Departments can afford to be hyper-selective—if not about overall credentials, then about their own particular needs, however idiosyncratic they might appear to outsiders.

Without further delay…

Hire #1—West Coast

This position was “open genre,” which means all manner of applicants might have applied. There are more poets out there than you can imagine, and they are all conditioned to live off of the academic ecosystem. By contrast, at least some fiction and nonfiction writers can—or think they can—make a living from their writing. In the end, this department hired someone with two books in genres that aren’t mine (one poetry, one nonfiction). This hire also has a Ph.D. in creative writing and appears to be three years younger than me, FWIW. Sports teams have to decide if they should draft for specific needs (cornerback, third baseman, etc.), or grab the best player currently available. Did this department want a poet/memoirist? If so, they likely got a good one. I’ve never heard of her before, but her credentials are solid. The Ph.D. could be a huge factor here, too, especially since the committee was comprised of something like 15 people, I later learned, and only a couple of those were creative writers. One writer on the committee let me know that I was out of the running early on, which I appreciated. I reviewed his book a few years ago, and a quote from my review can be found on his faculty website. I don’t think the committee really knew what they wanted when they placed the ad. Therefore, there’s almost nothing I could have done to better present myself. A simple culling of the herd—by deciding, after applications are in, to only consider writers with a Ph.D., or writers with two or more books—could have kept me on the outside looking in.

Hire #2—East Coast

I wanted this job for a number of reasons—it’s a short train ride from Manhattan, and is lodged in a community I’ve been to before and like, one where a few of our friends live. The department member who shared the job ad on Facebook is a talented writer and a nice guy, as far as I can tell. But I had to say no to his story collection a few years ago when he submitted it to Engine Books. Here’s the thing: I have to say no to almost every submission, and some of those writers are going to be in a position to affect my teaching career. Will all of them hold a grudge? No. But a few might, which is fine. This guy likely didn’t do that. The writer hired is young, but has excellent story publications and editorial experience. The writer hired, however, does not have a book. Is one under contract? Maybe. I can’t know that. But this hire suggests that some departments (not many, but some) still think about potential, not production. That should be encouraging, but it’s not.

Hire #3—West Coast

I knew there would be tons of applicants for this gig in a popular literary city. In the end, the department hired a writer with more books than me who already lives there. Whaddya gonna do? I had no shot at this one.

Hire #4—West Coast

Department hired a writer with one book. That one book—flimsy as it is—has done quite well for the author. I wish my own flimsy book had garnered such attention. This writer’s reputation has exceeded his actual abilities. The buzz around his first book reminds me of the hype surrounding Junot Diaz before Oscar Wao was finally published. That is, this writer’s second book will have huge expectations, and if he can deliver—as Diaz delivered—his career will go supernova. Can he teach? He appears to have little to no experience. But some programs care more about reputation that anything else. I’m sure he’s good at a cocktail fundraising event.

Hire #5—Planet Texas

One of the long-tenured professors in this department often talks to me about teaching, and she gave me some excellent feedback on my CV a few years ago. Not long before I applied, this professor asked me if I could share PDF files of the stories I teach because she wanted to change things up on her syllabus. But guess what? She wasn’t on the hiring committee, and I don’t ever ask someone for that kind of favor. The department hired a writer with two books (one collection, one novel). I remember her from when she was an editor at a literary journal. I don’t feel bad about this missed opportunity. It’s still in Texas, for one, and I wasn’t sure about living in Texas. The department hired a talented writer who is probably good in the classroom. She might be a mini-version of the tenured professor I mention above, which is a good thing for the program’s future.

There’s a lot more I could say, of course. In Part I, I mentioned some of the other reasons why I might not always land an interview. Over and over again, though, I see a pattern: Writers who put their writing first are rewarded in academia. Not writers who put their teaching first. Not writers who put their university or community service first. And, whatever else I may have accomplished over the last 15 years, I can’t honestly say I always put my writing first.

But that’s going to change.