This is the second of five installments of “How to Get an Academic Job,” a new guide on the tenure-track search from our Career Talk columnists. Previously the series explored what to do “Before You Apply.” Next up: “How to Manage Your Applications.”
What job-search materials will you need to prep, and when? Most applications will require a CV, a teaching statement, a cover letter (which generally includes a brief description of your research agenda), and letters of recommendation. Some places will require additional materials, such as diversity statements. First and foremost, follow any guidelines that the job ad gives about your application documents, both in terms of length and content. If the job ad says “two-page CV,” provide a two-page CV, even if your usual vita is six pages.
How to Get an Academic Job
We recommend that you start drafting your materials the summer before you intend to go on the market for the first time. It can be a time-consuming process and you want to leave enough time to gather feedback from a few trusted sources. Keep in mind as you write: There is no such thing as a perfect CV or cover letter. Variability in how candidates choose to present their accomplishments is typical.
The Curriculum Vitae
Your CV is the record of your scholarly accomplishments, and you want it to tell a compelling story. Create something that is easy to change — without a lot of extra tables or distracting bells and whistles. Make it easy to read — with plenty of white space, typical margins (1 inch), and a font that is standard in both style and size (avoid Gothic, Script, or the infamous Comic Sans). Play around with a few different formats and solicit feedback from trusted sources on which ones are preferred in your field.
How many pages should it be? There’s no reason to agonize over the length of your CV, as you might for an industry résumé. But neither should you pad it with incidental entries just to make it longer — that risks burying your achievements beneath layers of fluff. Some grant and fellowship programs (and the occasional job posting) will request a document of specific length — two pages, for example. In that case, follow the provided guidelines for length and content, and curate this shorter CV to highlight your most significant and relevant accomplishments.
What should you list first on a vita? If you are a recent Ph.D., we recommend starting with the Education section (most everyone else should start with the Experience section), followed by Publications and Experience. Let’s consider each section in turn:
- Education. List your degrees in reverse chronological order, with decreasing levels of detail. Include both the title and synopsis of your dissertation, along with the name of your adviser and any major fellowships you received. Certainly include any competitive postbaccalaureate fellowships, such as the Rhodes, Marshall, or Fulbright. Feel free to add your master’s thesis if you’d like but it’s fine to omit it if it is irrelevant to your current work. Your undergraduate entry should be short and sweet; you could choose to include one or two especially impressive academic awards.
- Publications. Unless you have decided to break out your awards and fellowships into their own section (more on this below), the Publication section generally comes next. List your publications in reverse chronological order, using the same citation format for each entry. The most-frequent questions we are asked about publications are: “What if I don’t have any actually published yet? Should I include ones that are forthcoming, that I’ve been asked to revise and resubmit, or that are under consideration?” Our usual advice is to list those future pubs — as long as the status of each is clearly listed and the claim is true. That said, if you have even one successful publication, your noting others in the works will appear more credible.
- Experience. This section is probably the most difficult to organize. It’s the one place on your CV that is not just a list but also brief descriptions of the work you’ve done. For some candidates, this will be a section focused primarily on teaching, while others may have professional or service experience they would also like to list. If you have two or three buckets of experience, you can separate them out and clearly label them (“Teaching” or “Fieldwork,” for example), and list your experience in reverse chronological order under each. This can be a place to explain in slightly more detail the research methodologies you’ve used or types of classes you’ve designed or taught at particular institutions (especially if it is not your doctoral institution).
- Courses Taught. This section is pretty straightforward: Just list the courses you’ve taught. Their titles may be self-explanatory (for example, first-year composition or introductory classes in your discipline), but if you think readers will need some clarification, include a sentence of description. You will also want to distinguish courses for which you were the instructor of record from those for which you were a TA.
There are several “optional” sections that you can include or not, depending on their relevance for your career:
- University Service. Here you might briefly mention (again, in reverse chronological order) any experience you have with campus governance, admissions committees, student life and undergraduate advising, or curriculum development. Sometimes a sentence or two explaining the work is helpful. This information is not something you would include in a cover letter for most faculty positions, but here on your CV, it gives a sense that you understand how institutions operate.
- Research and Teaching Interests. You might not need this section, but it can be useful for job candidates whose full range of teaching and research areas aren’t obvious from other sections of the CV. Its location on your CV is up to you. Your entries here should be short, recognizable fields of interest in your disciplines. Whatever you might include here, it should be something in which you truly have some expertise. Don’t use this section simply to make yourself look as if you fit a particular job description.
- Languages. If you’re in a field that values foreign languages, this is a place you can list the ones you have, with descriptions of your level of fluency. Be honest. You never know when you might be asked to demonstrate your proficiency in a job interview, and you won’t make a good impression if you’ve overpromised.
- Skills. Here is a place to list additional skills that are relevant to your teaching and research. They should be so-called “hard skills,” such as coding languages, video or audio editing, qualitative or quantitative data-management systems, software programs, and experience with scientific equipment or techniques. This is not generally a place to list “soft” skills (i.e., that you excel at public speaking, organization, or leadership); nor is it a place to list hobbies that are irrelevant to the job you’re applying for. We also recommend against listing “research,” “teaching,” or even “grant writing” because those skills should speak through the other achievements on your CV.
- Professional Memberships. List any current memberships you have in relevant professional or scholarly associations. If you have not yet joined the relevant societies, it’s good to look into doing so before you begin applying for academic jobs.
For more advice about this all-important document, read our recent Chronicle column on “Dos and Don’ts of Creating Your CV.”
Cover Letters
Think of a cover letter as a complementary document to a CV: Whereas your CV shows what you have done, your cover letter is about what you will do. In writing your letters, you are projecting yourself into the role of a faculty member and demonstrating your promise as a scholar. A few basic rules of the genre:
Use the cover letter to flesh out your story. Contextualize your professional and scholarly experiences. Don’t just describe your dissertation; show how it fits into a research agenda that is in conversation with your field. Don’t just list courses that you’ve taught (your CV already does that); give letter readers a sense of who you are as a teacher — the learning goals you’ve set, the types of courses you are best positioned to teach, and the ways in which you connect with a diversity of learners.
Resist banter and sycophancy. Clarity in prose and careful editing are essential in a cover letter, as is avoiding effusive language (“I would love to teach on your incredible campus”) and over-praising your advisers (“the honorable Dr. Smith, my adviser, shared with me her expertise on …”). Such writing tics make you sound like a student and undermine your projection of yourself into the faculty role.
Yes, you have to tailor each letter to the job opening. Not tailoring your letter shifts the work of trying to understand why you want this particular job into the hands of a stranger. Why do you want to come to our institution? Why are you a fit for us? Which aspects of your experience will help you to succeed here? Stand-out candidates are often the ones who make those connections clear. A search committee wants to know why you want this academic job, not why you want any academic job.
Do your best to keep your cover letter to about two pages. However, this is field-dependent; in the sciences, letters tend to be shorter, and in the humanities they tend to be a little longer. Be aware of what the conventions are in your discipline. For details on what to include, read our previous columns on “How to Write a Persuasive Cover Letter” and “How to Tailor Your Cover Letters for Faculty Jobs.” Here we’ll sketch out the basic components:
- Two paragraphs on your research. In the first, balance a concise statement of your research interests with a description of your current project (the dissertation, for ABDs and new Ph.D.s). Usually your second paragraph touches on your publication plans and future goals.
- Two paragraphs on your teaching. Summarize the teaching you’ve done, give your reader a sense of your learning goals for students, and discuss the kind of courses you’d like to teach.
- A paragraph on service or leadership experience. There’s some debate about including this in a cover letter. Some faculty advisers recommend leaving out any mention of community activism or public-facing work, for fear of it “diluting” the candidate’s profile. However, some hiring committees might be interested in reading about your service work, particularly if it lines up with the institution’s mission statement. A strong community-engagement profile can help distinguish you. Remember: In a competitive market, the goal is to stand out for the right reasons, not to simply blend in with everyone else.
We recommend drafting the core paragraphs of a template for your cover letters. Then gather some initial feedback from your advisers (summer is a good time to ask) before you go on the academic job market for the first time. Once the job ads appear in late summer or early fall, you can begin the process of tailoring your cover letters for particular positions. Tailoring your letter can be time consuming, and it is tempting to think that no one will notice if you don’t — we assure you, they will. More on the nuts and bolts of tailoring in the section below on sending out applications.
Research, Teaching, Diversity, and Other Statements
One of the most challenging aspects of a faculty job search is the sheer amount of writing it requires. Besides a lot of carefully written cover letters, you’re often expected to submit a research statement, a teaching statement, and possibly a diversity statement as part of your application. Some religious institutions may ask you to submit a statement about your faith. Very recently and for the first time, a candidate we worked with was asked to submit a “sustainability statement.” It’s too early to say whether that will become “a thing” in future applications.
Each of those documents should be one to two pages (although research statements sometimes run a bit longer). Word of warning: Some institutions may have specific requests for particular documents, such as a cover letter that includes your approach to diversity in the classroom. Such requests require further customization. Be careful to follow the instructions for each application closely.
Come up with new language to describe your work for each genre of statement. (Don’t just cut and paste phrasing from your cover letter!) Although you may have basic drafts of each type of document, they should be flexible enough to be tailored to a particular job posting. Craft them with the principles of good writing in mind: Each draft document should have an introduction and a conclusion, and the first sentence of each paragraph should give readers a sense of what it will be about. Clarity and concision will serve you well here. Prepare these drafts in the summer before you go on the market.
The research statement. The goal is to give your audience — search committees — a sense of the research agenda that might get you tenure at a given institution. This statement should offer a broad sense of your scholarship, focusing primarily on your current research and plans for future work. It’s OK to mention past projects you’ve worked on, but it should be primarily forward looking.
To get started, think about the larger themes that your research seeks to answer. What is the gap in the knowledge that your work will fill? If your research covers several areas, what is the thread that connects them? Answering such big-picture questions can help you outline the relevant details to include in the statement.
Key to writing a research statement is making it legible — and intriguing — to faculty members outside your field. As you write, interrogate the words you choose to describe your objects of study. Are they well known, or jargon? Will your readers need additional context? Is this a term of art in your field, or of your own creation?
That can be hard to sort out when you’re very close to your research topic. It’s often most useful to work on this statement with the help of your campus writing center, career-services office, or even a group of peers. Once you have a draft that feels right, share it with your faculty advisers who can help to make sure you’ve articulated the impact of your research clearly.
The teaching statement. Sometimes called a teaching philosophy, this statement is strongest when it shows how you approach courses in your field. A good statement should have specificity. It should include details relevant to your own career, so far, as an instructor. It should not be so jargon heavy and generically written that it could apply to any job candidate, in any field. It’s not meant to be an abstract discourse on pedagogy.
For some students and postdocs, this is one of the more difficult job documents to write, as it asks you to draw more on personal experience than on rigorous analysis. In your cover letter, you’ll briefly describe your approach to the classroom and name some courses you’ve taught and some you hope to teach. A teaching statement should expand on that and answer questions such as:
- Why is it important that students learn your subject? What does it offer them that other areas of study might not?
- How do you use or manage technology in the classroom?
- How do you approach teaching an introductory course in your subject? An advanced course? A course for majors? For nonmajors?
- How do you include all types of learners in your classroom?
- What is your approach to online instruction? Hybrid instruction?
- How do you manage difficult topics and conflict in the classroom?
A two-page statement is not enough space to answer all of those questions. Just pick the ones that demonstrate your strengths as an instructor. Where you can, use relevant examples from your own teaching. If you lack teaching experience, base your statement on what you’ve found effective as a student.
Don’t forget: Your campus teaching center can be a tremendous asset in helping you write an effective teaching statement. Most centers can assist you in pulling together the parts of a teaching portfolio (syllabi, sample student assignments, teaching evaluations). They may have a series of workshops that can help you build familiarity with best practices in teaching at the college level. It’s worth connecting with staff members there, well before you begin your job search.
Sometimes, in addition to providing a teaching statement, you might be asked to submit course proposals. These may be courses you’ve already taught, or hope to teach. The proposal would typically include a course description and an abbreviated syllabus with topics and suggested readings. Aim to write a one-page proposal, unless the job ad specifies otherwise.
If you have been in the weeds of your field writing your dissertation, you may have a hard time knowing what is interesting about your discipline to people outside of it — and that includes undergraduates. It is vital that your proposed courses appeal to your prospective employer’s students. It is worth running your ideas past some nonspecialists for their advice.
The diversity statement. This genre has only been around for about 10 years but has become an essential piece of many faculty job applications. Yet many candidates find it difficult to write, often because they aren’t sure how much of their own narrative needs to be shared. The diversity statement has also become controversial: The New York Times has covered both the debate and the supposed demise of the document. Some states, as reported in The Chronicle, have made it illegal to require them of candidates.
As of this writing, we’ve seen the name of this document change slightly; some job ads are now asking for a “mentoring statement” –– a variation in title that gets at the intention of a diversity statement. View this document, not as a moment to recount a personal history, but as a forum to discuss how your teaching, service, and research have helped to ensure student success, particularly for underrepresented students. For most candidates, that will involve reflecting on direct experiences with students, in the classroom or one-on-one. Other job candidates will have research programs that have direct bearing on issues of race, ethnicity, gender and sexuality, socioeconomics, religion, or disability. Still others may have worked broadly to increase equity within their discipline as a whole.
To understand your efforts on this front, search committees may need some context about the places where you’ve taught and worked. Too often, job candidates leave out details that would make their DEI efforts comprehensible and significant to readers. If you’ve been an adjunct instructor at a college that serves many first-generation college students, share that information in your diversity statement. The same is true if you’ve worked to broaden curriculum or increase diversity in your field.
Once you’ve thought through the background that your statement’s readers need to know, take a close look at your CV. Where are the moments in which you’ve tried to make your work more inclusive? Perhaps you have:
- Included diverse voices in the curricula that you teach.
- Served on committees seeking to broaden your program’s recruitment efforts.
- Developed ways for all students to succeed in your classroom or discipline, particularly those from underrepresented backgrounds.
- Mentored students through research projects or graduate-school applications.
- Helped with institutional challenges to diversity and inclusion through on-campus service.
It’s important to review the inclusivity goals of the department and the institution you are applying to, and mention any points of alignment in your statement.
If there’s some personal detail that you’d like to share on your diversity statement — about your own background or life — it’s often best to include that in a conclusion, rather than to lead with it.
Candidates who are applying to private, religious institutions may be asked to submit a statement of religious beliefs. (If that feels uncomfortable to you, you may not be the right fit for this job opening.) Some religious institutions may be looking for someone whose beliefs align closely with those of their own denomination, while others institutions may expect you to commit to service and community engagement without adhering to a specific credo. Your approach to this kind of statement can be similar to that of your diversity statement. Think carefully about your own practices and read the institution’s mission statement. Then draft a statement that uses detailed examples to demonstrate your level of religious engagement, share how a strong faith infuses what you do, or describe how your set of ethical beliefs align with religious practice.
Letters of recommendation. Be prepared to feel more anxiety over these letters than for any other element of your application. They are a major piece of the job-market puzzle but one over which you have little direct control. Many of us have been in the position of watching the clock countdown to an application deadline without confirmation that the final required letter has been submitted on our behalf.
If you’ve been teaching for a while, you may have written letters for your own students. If so, you know how time-consuming they are to draft. You can’t prevent your recommenders from submitting their letters at 11:59 p.m., for a midnight application deadline. However, you can take steps to make the letter-writing process a little easier for them and, thus, increase the odds that the letters will be submitted on time. To that end:
- Carefully consider who you want to approach, and for what kind of recommendation. Most job ads ask candidates for three letters, but you do not need to use the same mix of recommenders for every application. Your adviser is usually first on the list, and can generally speak to your research better than anyone else. But you may also want a recommender who can comment on your teaching or your work in a relevant subfield. For example, an English Ph.D. who is applying for gender-studies jobs may want a gender-studies recommender among the three.
- Give your recommenders plenty of time and information. They’ll need four weeks, at minimum, before the first application deadline. Provide them with drafts of your application materials and of the job ad(s), as well as clear instructions on where they should submit their letters (often but not always through Interfolio) and by what deadline. Most faculty members will not be able to fully tailor each letter they write for you, but if there are certain things you would like them to emphasize, say so. And definitely do not be afraid to send a reminder 72 hours before the deadline. It is much better to say something and be told that they’re working on it than to say nothing and have the letter fail to arrive.
Now you may have heard tales of faculty members who expect candidates to write their own recommendation letters –– so that all the professors have to do is sign. We would love to say that scenario is apocryphal and never happens in real life, but unfortunately, it does. (Faculty members: Please don’t do this to candidates.)
Writing your own recommendation letter is ethically murky at best, not to mention just plain awkward. If you find yourself in that unfortunate position, offer to provide your recommender with descriptions they can use of your research, teaching, and other professional experience. Then ask them to write the “frame” around the descriptions — in other words, the actual recommendation part of the recommendation. Just be sure the phrasing you provide is substantially different from that which appears in your cover letters and job statements.
