Higher Education Careers Beyond the Professoriate

by Karen Cardozo (Editor), Katherine Kearns (Editor), Shannan Palma (Editor)

Overview

Higher Education Careers Beyond the Professoriate is one of the first collections to explore PhD career versatility within higher education. The twenty-three contributors represent diverse disciplines, institution types, professional roles, and intersectional identities. Each thoughtful and personal essay explores firsthand what it means to remain in higher education, yet not in the traditional role of a professor. Topics include establishing new career paradigms, well-being and work-life balance, blended roles and identities, and professional work around advocacy and inclusion. Unifying the essays is the idea that career diversity is intertwined with other diversity discourse, yielding a broad-based but critical examination of careers in higher education administration.

Though the doctoral landscape continues to change, a self-determined, values-driven attitude remains essential. This book offers powerful insight into cultural and structural barriers that inhibit institutional transformation and obscure the real range of PhD futures. Frank about both challenges and opportunities, these essays reveal how letting go of “track” thinking opens a constellation of possibilities and many paths to meaningful work and a fulfilling life.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781612498973
Publisher:	Purdue University Press
Publication date:	03/15/2024
Series:	Navigating Careers in Higher Education
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	374
Sales rank:	388,762
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Karen Cardozo is the founder of Leap Here Consulting, providing consulting, coaching, and editing services for individuals and institutions since 2016. First trained in career services, she earned a master’s degree in higher education administration at Harvard and a PhD in literary studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She worked across the Five College Consortium before gaining tenure in interdisciplinary studies at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, then leading career development at Hollins and Northeastern universities. She has published intersectional feminist studies of culture, labor, science, trauma, and higher education in the American Studies Journal, Critical Sociology, Journal of Asian American Studies, Pedagogy, Profession, and Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society.
Katherine Kearns is the assistant vice provost for Student Development and director of the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs for the University Graduate School at Indiana University Bloomington. She earned her PhD in ecology at the University of Georgia. She is a coeditor of the book Teaching as if Learning Matters: Pedagogies of Becoming by Next-Generation Faculty. Currently, she focuses on cultivating graduate student communities—especially for students with marginalized identities—that promote well-being and skill development in scholarly and creative activity, teaching, and preparation for careers in a variety of post-degree professions.
Shannan Palma is co-executive director of the Autistic Self-Reliance Support Network and vice president of continuing education for HER Academy. She earned her PhD in women’s, gender, and sexuality studies from Emory University. Her research has been published in Marvels&Tales: The Journal of Fairy-tale Studies and various edited volumes. She has appeared on numerous panels advising graduate students on industry and higher education careers beyond the professoriate.

Table of Contents

Foreword, by Natalie Lundsteen
Introduction: Navigating Disruption, Redefining Success, by Karen Cardozo, Katherine Kearns, and Shannan Palma
PART 1: CREATING, FINDING, AND OPENING CAREER DOORS
1 Let’s Stop Saying “Career Path”: Meandering Through a Career in Academia, by David A. McDonald
2 “This Isn’t What I Thought It Would Be”: Building New Identities and Skills in the Academy, by Heather Dwyer and Katharine P. Walsh
3 Getting from Here to There: Navigating Career Crossroads as a Black Woman Scientist, by Diedra M. Wrighting
4 Contingencies and Possibilities, by Alyssa Stalsberg Canelli
PART 2: INTER/DISCIPLINARY TRANSFER
5 Applied Humanities at Work in STEM Graduate Education, by Jessica A. Hutchins
6 From Humanities Tenure Track to Medical School Communications, by Leigh Tillman Partington
7 PhDs Going Rogue: From the Bench to the Library and Beyond, by Stacey E. Wahl and Carrie L. Iwema
8 Finding Neverland: From Chimpanzee Research to Career Services, by Sarah K. Barks
PART 3: CRAFTING BLENDED POSITIONS AND IDENTITIES
9 Embracing Both/And: Reflections from a Boundary-Spanning Pracademic, by Barbara Jacoby
10 On Our Own Terms: Becoming an Independent Researcher and Writer, by Lee Skallerup Bessette
11 Ambivalent in a Good Way: On Both Staying In and Leaving Academia, by Clare Forstie
12 From Stuck to Satisfied: Creating a Joyful, Balanced Life, by Kristine Lodge
PART 4: CENTERING PERSONAL VALUES, CULTIVATING WORK–LIFE FULFILLMENT
13 Finding Your Place, Finding Your Voice, by Alexis Boyer
14 Well-Being as a Guiding Light Toward a Fulfilling Career, by Kristine M. Sikora
15 Embracing Uncertainty: Following My Values Toward a Career in Faculty Development, by Ryan Rideau
PART 5: NAVIGATING INSTITUTIONAL STRUCTURES AND CULTURES
16 Horizontal Mentoring: The Positive Impact of a Diverse Graduate Student Professional Development Community, by Marisella Rodriguez and Sarah Silverman
17 When One Door Closes, Another Door . . . Also Closes: The Rewards and Challenges of Work in
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, by Jacob McWilliams
18 Cultivating Community as an Administrator, by Sarah Chobot Hokanson
19 Queering Careers: LGBTQ+ Advocacy on Campus and Beyond, by Kimberly Creasap and Dorian Rhea Debussy
Afterword: Fostering Career Versatility in PhD Education, by Trevor M. Verrot
Appendix A. PhD Characteristics of Essay Contributors
Appendix B. Current Employment Characteristics of Essay Contributors
Appendix C. Personal Identities of Essay Contributors
Annotated Bibliography
About the Contributors
Index

Editorial Reviews

"Satisfying and impactful work for PhD holders can be found in a wide range of roles in today's colleges and universities—teaching and learning, diversity programs, academic affairs, faculty development, communications, institutional research, and career coaching, to name a few. This book provides inspiration for those exploring non-faculty careers within academia. The authors of these first-person essays candidly describe their own journeys—from discovering new possibilities, to refashioning a professional identity, to thriving in a previously unimagined job. If you are expanding your view of what is possible, read this book for pragmatic advice and encouragement." —Chris M. Golde, Career Coach for PhDs and Postdocs, Stanford Career Education

"This important book explores the 'constellation of possibilities' for PhDs within the higher education landscape, identifying not just the push away from faculty jobs, but also the pull toward work that can be joyful, flexible, and meaningful. Among its many powerful contributions, the collection reveals how these roles allow PhDs—who vary by academic discipline, race, gender, gender identity, class, and sexuality—to center values of equity and inclusion, creating communities of care in their workplaces. This is the rare book that offers hope as well as concrete approaches to creating a better life!" —Joya Misra, President, American Sociological Association

"Too many doctoral students think their career choices are limited to a tenure-track job or leaving higher education. Higher Education Careers Beyond the Professoriate makes clear that higher education depends on PhDs in myriad ways—in advising, in deans' offices, in libraries, in DEI offices, and in many other functions. More importantly, the book offers advice that focuses not simply on the practicalities of plotting career paths, but also on the financial, family, emotional, and identity issues with which we all must wrestle when making choices about how to move consciously through our careers and our lives. Graduate schools should purchase multiple copies!" —Paula Krebs, Executive Director, Modern Language Association

"This book goes well beyond simply outlining career options for PhDs in higher education, providing substantive engagement with what those jobs look and feel like in a changing higher education landscape. Blending personal narrative and critical insight, the essays offer not only useful windows into particular kinds of work, but also new perspectives on living one's values over the course of a nonlinear career." —Derek Attig, Assistant Dean for Career and Professional Development, Graduate College, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

"Nothing teaches better than a story, and Higher Education Careers Beyond the Professoriate is filled with good ones, and with good data, too. Career diversity lies at the center of this splendid book, and the many inventive storytellers in its pages show that 'pracademia' leads to lives both creative and satisfying. Academics of all stripes—inside and outside the academy—should read this book." —Leonard Cassuto, coauthor of The New PhD: How to Build a Better Graduate Education

From the Publisher