You probably think of summer as the easiest time of year to focus on research and writing. You’ve probably been looking forward to it for months because of that. So why would you want to join the Studio? Some people who attend A Meeting With Your Writing regularly during the main part of the year, […]
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Starting your academic writing year in mid-summer
Jo VanEvery, Academic Career Guide · Starting your academic year in mid-summer When do academics celebrate the new year? This is a serious question for those of us who live in the northern hemisphere, where the beginning of the calendar year in January is more like the middle of the academic year. It seems like […]
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Thoughts on wrapping up your teaching for summer
Jo VanEvery, Academic Career Guide · Thoughts on wrapping up teaching for the summer Academic work is cyclical. There are seasons to the work. You need to account for those cycles when you plan. Summer may feel like the research & writing part of the year. If you value teaching and being a good teacher, […]
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Managing your energy.
Jo VanEvery, Academic Career Guide · Managing your energy The academic year varies in intensity. The typical structure of an academic year has 2 teaching semesters, or 3 teaching terms with shorter breaks between them and then a long break in the summer. Everyone involved needs time to recover and recharge, and to integrate knowledge. […]
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The value of intellectual engagement
Jo VanEvery, Academic Career Guide · Valuing Intellectual Engagement Burnout and stress are not just about the quantity of work you have to do. Lack of control and a sense of meaninglessness are major contributors to burnout. It has become very clear that your difficulty managing your workload is not a personal failing. You are […]
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Asynchronous teaching and setting boundaries
Jo VanEvery, Academic Career Guide · Asynchronous teaching and setting boundaries I’ve noticed in various conversations on Twitter that there are some issues with setting boundaries in the context of pandemic teaching conditions. In this post I address a particular issue with asynchronous teaching. Never in class and never not in class When you taught […]
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Where does teaching preparation fit in your summer plans?
Jo VanEvery, Academic Career Guide · Where does teaching preparation fit in your summer plans? In April I wrote about Writing and Research in the Summer of the Pandemic because I know a lot of academics look forward to summer as a time when they can make that their primary focus. My focus there was […]
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Transitioning to summer
Note: I wrote this just before the pandemic situation started to impact academic workloads in the UK, US, and Canada. I am re-publishing it now as a reminder that things would already have been in transition at this time of year. For more on the specific impacts of the pandemic response on academic life… …head […]
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What’s YOUR ideal academic job?
When you are looking for an academic job it is hard to imagine that you could get one and be unhappy, even miserable. And yet, I’ve met unhappy academics.
An academic career incorporates a wide range of activities and uses a lot of different skills. Even those who love it, and are successful, love different things about it, or excel at different aspects.
It is important to determine what is important to you. Your actual job may never match your ideal exactly, but knowing what your ideal looks like enables you to choose better compromises.
Read More »Being available, with limits
There are all kinds of reasons why you need to be available to students outside the classroom. You have various means of enabling those students to ask questions outside of class time: Fixed hours when you are available in your office for this purpose An e-mail address where they can contact you A space in […]
Read More »Managing your workload by creating containers
One way to get some control over how much time and energy you give to certain kinds of legitimate requests is to create a container for that kind of work.
Just as it is easier to store flour if you pour it into something with firm sides and a lid (so it doesn’t just flow all over the counter), some tasks can benefit from being contained in particular time periods or particular spaces.
Read More »What you can change
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference. (The Serenity Prayer, Reinhold Niebuhr) Whether you believe in that god or not, the sentiment of this prayer is just good advice. You can always just cut out the first […]
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