How to Be an Academic


Book Description

"Welcome to the world of university academics, where the Academic Hunger Games, fuelled by precarious employment conditions, is the new reality - a perpetual jostle for short-term contracts and the occasional plum job. But Inger Mewburn is here to tell you that life needn't be so grim. A veteran of the university 'gig economy', Mewburn - aka The Thesis Whisperer - is perfectly placed to reflect on her experience and offer a wealth of practical strategies to survive and thrive. Here, she deftly navigates the world of the working academic, from thesis and article writing and keeping motivation alive, to time management, research strategies, new technologies, applying for promotion, sexism in the workplace, writing grant applications, and deciding what to wear to give a keynote address. Constructive, inclusive, hands-on, and gloves-off, How to be an Academic is a survival manual for aspiring and practising academics that will confirm that no matter what your experience in academia, you are not alone."




How to Be a Happy Academic


Book Description

Want to be an effective, successful and happy academic? This book helps you hone your skills, showcase your strengths, and manage all the professional aspects of academic life. With their focus on life-long learning and positive reflection, Alex and Bailey encourage you to focus on your own behaviours and personal challenges and help you to find real world solutions to your problems or concerns. Weaving inspirational stories, the best of research and theory, along with pragmatic advice from successful academics, this book provides step-by-step guidance and simple tools to help you better meet the demands of modern academia, including: Optimising your effectiveness, priorities & strategy Workflow & managing workload Interpersonal relationships, and how to influence Developing your writing, presenting and teaching skills Getting your work/life balance right. Clear, practical and refreshingly positive this book inspires you to build the career you want in academia.




How to Be a Design Academic


Book Description

This book is about how to be a design academic. In another words, how to manage the various challenges, requirements, and processes that come with both the everyday and extra-ordinary parts of an academic role in design fields (from architecture, urban design, interior design and landscape architecture, to fashion, industrial, interaction and graphic design). The book is organised in two parts – Part 1, Starting out and Part 2, Becoming a Leader. It includes real-life experiences of actual academics and offers a wide range of experiences of authors from early career researchers to full professors and heads of schools. It contains all aspects of academic life, including the highs and lows of teaching, research, leadership, and managing your working life and your career. This book is perfect for academics, aspiring academics, and research students in a wide range of design fields.




The Professor Is In


Book Description

The definitive career guide for grad students, adjuncts, post-docs and anyone else eager to get tenure or turn their Ph.D. into their ideal job Each year tens of thousands of students will, after years of hard work and enormous amounts of money, earn their Ph.D. And each year only a small percentage of them will land a job that justifies and rewards their investment. For every comfortably tenured professor or well-paid former academic, there are countless underpaid and overworked adjuncts, and many more who simply give up in frustration. Those who do make it share an important asset that separates them from the pack: they have a plan. They understand exactly what they need to do to set themselves up for success. They know what really moves the needle in academic job searches, how to avoid the all-too-common mistakes that sink so many of their peers, and how to decide when to point their Ph.D. toward other, non-academic options. Karen Kelsky has made it her mission to help readers join the select few who get the most out of their Ph.D. As a former tenured professor and department head who oversaw numerous academic job searches, she knows from experience exactly what gets an academic applicant a job. And as the creator of the popular and widely respected advice site The Professor is In, she has helped countless Ph.D.’s turn themselves into stronger applicants and land their dream careers. Now, for the first time ever, Karen has poured all her best advice into a single handy guide that addresses the most important issues facing any Ph.D., including: -When, where, and what to publish -Writing a foolproof grant application -Cultivating references and crafting the perfect CV -Acing the job talk and campus interview -Avoiding the adjunct trap -Making the leap to nonacademic work, when the time is right The Professor Is In addresses all of these issues, and many more.




How to Be an Academic Superhero


Book Description

This thoroughly revised second edition draws on the author's decades of observations and experiences in academia, Written in a clear and concise style, the book provides fully updated, forthright and practical counsel on achieving and maintaining a successful, balanced career from PhD to retirement.




How to Be a Researcher


Book Description

How to be a Researcher provides a strategic guide to the conduct of a successful research career within a university environment. Based on the author’s extensive personal experience, it offers down-to-earth advice, philosophical guidance, and discussions of the political context of academic research. This is not a research methods book, and the topics it covers are rarely discussed elsewhere. The bulk of the book provides practical advice on the development of essential skills and strategic approaches, covering questions such as: how to decide which topics to work on how to read and review literature how to develop theory how to integrate research and teaching activity how to approach research design how to obtain and manage research funding how to collaborate and supervise effectively how to write up your research, and how to secure the best sources of publication. The final part of the book considers the philosophy and psychology of research work and includes an exploration of the cognitive biases which may affect researchers. How to be a Researcher will be particularly useful for masters and doctoral students in the behavioral and social sciences, and also for early career academics developing research within a university career.




The New Education


Book Description

A leading educational thinker argues that the American university is stuck in the past -- and shows how we can revolutionize it for our era of constant change Our current system of higher education dates to the period from 1865 to 1925. It was in those decades that the nation's new universities created grades and departments, majors and minors, all in an attempt to prepare young people for a world transformed by the telegraph and the Model T. As Cathy N. Davidson argues in The New Education, this approach to education is wholly unsuited to the era of the gig economy. From the Ivy League to community colleges, she introduces us to innovators who are remaking college for our own time by emphasizing student-centered learning that values creativity in the face of change above all. The New Education ultimately shows how we can teach students not only to survive but to thrive amid the challenges to come.




How to Fix Your Academic Writing Trouble: A Practical Guide


Book Description

Are you confused by the feedback you get from your academic teachers and mentors? This clear and accessible guide to decoding academic feedback will help you interpret what your lecturer or research supervisor is really trying to tell you about your writing—and show you how to fix it. It will help you master a range of techniques and strategies to take your writing to the next level and along the way you’ll learn why academic text looks the way it does, and how to produce that ‘authoritative scholarly voice’ that everyone talks about. This book is an easy-to-use resource for postgraduate students and researchers in all disciplines, and even professional academics, to diagnose their writing issues and find ways to fix them. This book would also be a valuable text for academic writing courses and writing groups, such as those offered in doctoral and Master's by research degree programmes. 'Whether they have writing problems or not, every academic writer will want this handy compendium of effective strategies and sound explanations on their book shelf—it’s a must-have.' Pat Thomson, Professor of Education, University of Nottingham, UK




"So What Are You Going to Do with That?"


Book Description

Graduate schools churn out tens of thousands of Ph.D.’s and M.A.’s every year. Half of all college courses are taught by adjunct faculty. The chances of an academic landing a tenure-track job seem only to shrink as student loan and credit card debts grow. What’s a frustrated would-be scholar to do? Can he really leave academia? Can a non-academic job really be rewarding—and will anyone want to hire a grad-school refugee? With “So What Are You Going to Do with That?” Susan Basalla and Maggie Debelius—Ph.D.’s themselves—answer all those questions with a resounding “Yes!” A witty, accessible guide full of concrete advice for anyone contemplating the jump from scholarship to the outside world, “So What Are You Going to Do with That?” covers topics ranging from career counseling to interview etiquette to translating skills learned in the academy into terms an employer can understand and appreciate. Packed with examples and stories from real people who have successfully made this daunting—but potentially rewarding— transition, and written with a deep understanding of both the joys and difficulties of the academic life, this fully revised and up-to-date edition will be indispensable for any graduate student or professor who has ever glanced at her CV, flipped through the want ads, and wondered, “What if?” “I will absolutely be recommending this book to our graduate students exploring their career options—I’d love to see it on the coffee tables in department lounges!”—Robin B. Wagner, former associate director for graduate career services, University of Chicago




How to Be a Dean


Book Description

The essential guide to the hardest job in higher ed. A deanship in higher education is an exciting but complex job combining technical administration and academic leadership. On one hand, the dean is an institutional leader, standing up for the faculty, staff, and students. On the other, the dean is a middle manager, managing personnel, curriculum, and budgets and trying to live up to the expectations of the governing board, president, and provost. But what is it really like to be a dean? In How to Be a Dean, George Justice illuminates both of these leadership roles, which interact and even conflict with each other while deans do their best to help faculty members and students. Providing tested advice, Justice takes readers from the job search through the daily work of the dean and, ultimately, to the larger questions of leadership, excellence, and integrity the role provokes. He also explores the roles of "different" deanships in the broader context of academic leadership. Based on the author's experience as a dean at two large research universities, How to Be a Dean is clear, engaging, and opinionated. Current deans will use this book to reflect on the work they do in productive ways. Faculty members considering administrative work will find in this book some idea about the day-to-day work required of their institutional leaders. And finally, readers who are simply curious about what deans do will find pointed analysis about what works and what doesn't.