Ever since I started my last
round of graduate study (I took a 3-year hiatus to run a writing center
in between my master's and PhD), I have been preoccupied by issues of
professionalization. I took a directed reading course just so I could
learn more about it––how we define it, what people's attitudes are toward
it, how we might make it a valuable part of our graduate education. It's
not surprising that I'm interested in this issue as I'm getting ready
to go out on the job market next year, but for me, thinking and studying
about professionalization is about more than making sure I get a good
job. It's about trying to understand the academic culture and my place
in it. It's about trying to figure out what academics value, what the
institution I'll be working in as a faculty member values, and how those
values match up (or not) with mine. When I first began to investigate
issues of graduate student professionalization, I was coming from a pretty
good place. Both of my graduate institutions had done a good job of making
sure I understood the academic world I would be entering as a faculty
member. But I also knew that there were many, many other graduate students
out there who hadn't been as fortunate as I had been. I wanted to figure
out why some programs weren't doing as much as I felt they could—in fact,
that they should––do to help graduate students learn as much as possible
about what it means to be not only a member of a particular discipline,
but of a department and wider university community. What I hope is that,
more and more, graduate students and faculty have open discussions about
what it is that's valued in the university and why and that we talk more
about how we can learn to function successfully within the institution
as future faculty members.
What I'd like
to do here is share some of what I've learned in my work on professionalization
and to invite you to join me in thinking through what it is that we want
from our graduate education. Because of the numerous, very public “Johnny
Can't Read” crises, a great deal of attention was paid to teacher preparation,
particularly at the college level. That attention, though certainly uninformed,
led to a really good thing––we now have many really good teacher education
and mentoring programs in our graduate schools. It's time to turn our
attention to academic and institutional culture as well. We shouldn't
have to learn these other important aspects of being a faculty member
“on the job.”
Responses
to Professionalization
Academic
Cliques
Job-driven
Professionalization
Kinds
of Professionalization
Professionalization
and the WPA
Some
Beginning Questions:
On Professionalization:
-
Is professionalization
just job-driven, things we do to ensure a chance at a better job,
or is it about something more? What might that “something more” be?
-
What were some of the more
valuable professionalization experiences you have had in graduate
school—both as part of the curriculum or extra-curricular? What have
those particular experiences taught you about professional academic
life?
-
What concerns do you have
about becoming a faculty member? What do you not know that you wish
you did?
-
What role do you think
professionalization should play in your graduate education? How much
time and energy should be devoted to it? Should it be a topic that
gets covered in our classes, or is it something extra? At what point
(if ever) do professionalization concerns take away from time spent
learning the content” of your discipline?
-
What more would you like
to see your own department do to help you learn how to become a successful
member of your discipline and member of a university faculty? What
more do you think organizations like CCCC, NCTE, or WPA could do?
-
For those of us interested
in writing program administration, what kind of preparation would
we like to see? What can we reasonably expect to learn while we're
still in school?
On Tenure
Expectations
-
Do you believe that tenure
expectations have risen to an unreasonable level for new faculty?
-
Should the tenure system
be changed? If so, how? How might the changes you propose change the
institutional culture of universities?
-
How do you think tenure
expectations (with pressure to produce more and more scholarship,
serve the institution through advising and other committee work, teach
as many as 4 courses per semester at some schools, and in some cases,
serve in an administrative capacity) will affect your quality of life?
How might these rising expectations affect your family life, community
life, etc.?
Works
Cited
Beginnings
of a Professionalization Bibliography
Web
Resources
Teaching
Composition
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