Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Please let me get one of the jobs in adopted-home state...

Forecast for Small College Town:
A Winter Storm Warning remains in effect until 7 am EST
Wednesday.

A mix of sleet and freezing rain will continue this morning. Infiltration
of warmer air will cause much of the precipitation to change rain
this afternoon. As the low moves past the area... colder air will
cause the wintry mix to change back to all snow before tapering
off this evening.

By tonight... 3 to 5 inches of snow and sleet is expected to be on
the ground with ice accumulations of around a half inch.

Remember... a Winter Storm Warning means severe winter weather
conditions are imminent or highly likely.


D has a snow day today- I don't teach today, but am considering canceling class tomorrow morning, as I will have to dig out and don't see how I can do that before it's time to go to school! (since it is supposed to snow until 7AM) My U NEVER closes. All the universities down in Major City are shut down today, but ours is business as usual.

I'll tell you a little more about my interviews...

As I said before, I think things went well at both places. I think they were pleased with my teaching (I taught classes at both places), but felt like some people were bored during my research talk. My research is very methodology-driven (comparing techniques, etc.) and explaining it can be a bit convoluted- especially when most of the audience is not familiar with my specific area. Both universities are teaching-oriented, with heavier teaching loads than my current U, so maybe that will be less of a concern. Maybe I'm just being paranoid, though- my research has been published and the work I presented was actually from a paper that is currently forthcoming. I also presented the same research at two conferences over the past couple of years and got good questions from the audiences. I'm sure I will continue to second-guess everything as I wait to hear (or not hear) from them.

Even though I've lived an hour or so from both campuses, I had never visited them before these interviews. The facilities are MUCH nicer than what we have here and unlike my current department which refuses to buy faculty new computers (we can get a hand-me-down from our computer lab- only new hires get new computers), these places replace computers every few years (which seems the logical approach to me!) The jobs have advantages over my current job, too. Job #1 is focused on my general area of research (the methodological stuff), so I'd be teaching those courses- which I do now, but student interest is fairly limited at my U. There are several people in the department that I could see collaborating with (also not the situation in my current department). Job #2 is focused on an area of research that I have been trying to get into, so it would provide a great opportunity for that- which is really cool. I would be teaching similar courses to what I teach now, too. I think I'd be happy with either one, so I hope, hope, hope that I get an offer. I think the next weeks will be torture waiting to hear!

3 comments:

Ianqui said...

Ooh, I can imagine the torture. But hang in there, and good luck!

Anonymous said...

fingers crossed for you!!

Arbitrista said...

The waiting is the worst. But good luck.