In our ongoing job-market discussion thread, an anonymous reader writes:
I think the practice of the never ending job cycle needs to be fixed. It is utterly absurd to me that application deadlines for visiting positions are as late June 29th. That is, this is when they begin reviewing applications. I understand these positions may open suddenly and is beyond the control of the search committee, department, or university.
But . . . .
How is anyone applying for this kind of position supposed to make any decisions about their life?
Like signing a new lease? Having jobs ads continue to roll in this late makes it so that the cycle never really ends! As a consequence of the cycle never ending, neither does the anxiety.
Is there any remedy to this situation?
I'm not sure I entirely get this reader's worry about temporary positions. When I was on the market, I recall me and my friends who were desperate for a job being happy when a visiting position opened up late in the game. It meant there was still hope–and indeed, many people I know (including me) got visiting offers very late in the game, and were more than happy to! That being said, I very much do empathize with the reader's broader concerns about the never-ending job cycle.
I had the relatively unique experience of being on the market both before and after the market became "year round." When I first went on the market back in 2007–before there was philjobs and before academic posts were widely advertised on the web–the job cycle was much more limited in time. There were, if I recall, three "Jobs for Philosophers" packets sent out by the APA–one in early September, one in Winter, and one in Spring. One would apply for jobs in the fall or early winter, and expect to hear about interviews (by phone, not email!) in early December (the first three weeks of which were basically when you could expect to hear–or not hear–from everyone). Next, just about all interviews would take place at the Eastern or Central APA. Finally, there would be a much smaller, mainly non-TT job-market in the Spring.
There were a lot really terrible things about the way the job-market used to be. The first few weeks of December were terrifying. You were constantly waiting for the phone to ring. Whenever it rang, you hoped it would be an interview–and of course most of the time, it wasn't. As they days ticked by, you'd get more and more stressed out. Then there was having to fly out to the Eastern, where you would either have to run from hotel to hotel to interview (if you had interviews), pack yourself into elevators with dozens of other desperate candidates, and (if you had no or few interviews) walk around and listen to other candidates talk about all of their awesome interviews, talk about other candidates, and so on. Then there was the notorious "smoker"–the giant APA ballroom where candidates had to basically elbow each other aside to try to talk to tables of search committees. Good times. But I digress.
As terrible as the old job-cycle was, at least it was mostly packed into several months. Because I was on the job-market for so long, I happened to also weather the new, round-the-clock, round-the-year job-cycle–and I am honestly not sure what was worse. On the one hand, it is nice to know that a job can open up at any time. On the other hand, as our anonymous reader points out, it is basically a recipe for non-stop, year-round stress. Which I can firmly personally attest is awful.
Is there anything that can be done about this? Should we try to do anything about it? The APA put out a statement a few years ago that read in part, "For tenure-track/continuing positions advertised in the second half of the calendar year, we recommend an application deadline of November 1 or later." I take it the intent here was to advocate for a more "regular" job-market calendar, where applications for TT jobs at least would be due around the same time (and especially avoid deadlines creeping earlier and earlier to snag candidates before other schools have an opportunity to interview them). However, it does not seem like this statement has done much (if anything) to address the "never-endingness" of the cycle. What do you all think?
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