When I began my academic career as a tenure-track professor, in August 1997, I harbored the varied emotions common to many a new faculty member: a sense of immense pride, a degree of anxiety. Would my students like and respect me? Would I have a good relationship with my colleagues? And of course: Would I get tenure?
With the benefit of hindsight, I know that I had my share of preconceived — and in some cases, misguided — notions about what it would take to reach the “promised land.” And especially about what additional pressures and hurdles I would face as a faculty member of color on the path to tenure.
Those of us who have been around the academic block a few times know that it is an often quirky, unpredictable place of rugged terrain and hidden minefields. To paraphrase Audre Lorde, the late, great, self-described “Black lesbian feminist warrior poet,” there are many places, including the academy, where people of color were never meant to be, let alone survive. Moreover, more than a few faculty of color relentlessly struggle with what W.E.B. Du Bois described as “double consciousness.” In the still predominantly Eurocentric world of American higher education, this dilemma is often unavoidable.
Things are not always as black and white as many of us were led to believe by graduate mentors who, while well-meaning, were often less than candid with their insights about academic life and culture. Junior scholars of color learn rather abruptly that some white academics, including a few who claim to be liberal and progressive, still harbor attitudes and perceptions of nonwhites that are far from enlightened.
Politics, in all its forms, is a mainstay in academe, and how you cope with the morass will be different depending on the person, the department, and the institution. That said, I would like to provide some advice for tenure-track faculty of color to consider as they embark on the inaugural stage of their faculty careers.
Be willing to accept constructive criticism. When you ask for any sort of assistance, be prepared and mature enough to expect honest and critical feedback. Of course no one should tolerate mean-spirited, unprofessional comments on the job. They are unacceptable and should indeed be challenged and reported. Yet regardless of rank, all of us in the professoriate have minor or major imperfections in our scholarship and, in some cases, other facets of our being. There is nothing wrong with constructive criticism. In fact, you should welcome it. Being seen as oversensitive, combative, and resistant to substantive critique can often cause potential allies to withdraw from communicating with you and to stop offering advice that could be invaluable in future situations, including tenure and promotion.
Don’t underestimate the importance of student evaluations. While the publish-or-perish mantra has been deeply etched in the psyche of most Ph.D.s, too many new assistant professors ignore the potential impact that course-evaluation ratings from students can have on their chances for tenure and promotion. This is particularly true at small, teaching-oriented institutions. While a semester of mediocre to poor evaluations may not be the kiss of death — especially in your first year or two on the tenure track — consistently poor evaluations can be damaging. In some cases, they might even lead to dismissal.
Limit your service commitments. Any competent and attentive department chair will make certain that junior professors — regardless of race or gender — do not get overextended with committee work. However, the operative words there are “competent” and “attentive.” Many of us who went through the tenure-and-promotion process are well aware of how often campus groups seek out faculty members of color to serve on committees. Looking to give back and to demonstrate that they are team players, many junior faculty of color say yes too often, without realizing the potential ramifications for their time and ability to pursue and maintain a healthy research agenda. The cold, hard reality is that at most colleges and universities, you do not receive tenure and promotion by serving on multiple committees, advising dozens of theses and dissertations, and deeply immersing yourself in a chronic level of service. By the time you realize this fact, it is often too late. You can’t and shouldn’t reject every service request. But it’s important to be able to say no to many. If you need help with that, don’t hesitate to turn to your chair or another senior colleague.
Learn the internal politics of your department. Don’t underestimate the importance of understanding the dynamic. Too many junior faculty of color assume that “if I just teach, research, do my service, everything will fall into place.” That scenario will actually be true for some, but for others, such a naïve mentality can result in surprise and eventual disillusionment over time. While no one wants to be perceived as “sneaking around” or “digging up dirt,” it is important to seek out people you can trust — within or outside of your department — to brief you on the history or the unspoken history of the place: Does your department value research over teaching, service over teaching, teaching over service, etc.? Are there warring factions? Who in the department has the most influence? Being aware of the political, social, and cultural climate of your department is necessary, even crucial.
Refrain from divulging too much about your private life. It’s healthy to have a few close personal friends and trusted confidants in your department. But outside of that small circle, it is better for faculty of color, and female faculty members for that matter, to maintain a zone of privacy. As a member of one or both groups, you are often a curiosity magnet, especially in departments where there are few if any people like you. Wanting to feel included and land in the good graces of colleagues, you may share too much about your private life. That can backfire if closet bigots who already dislike you due to your race, ethnicity, religion, or sexual affiliation (and other rivals who may not have your best interests at heart) use or twist the information to undermine you. The best strategy is to keep your personal business just that: personal.
Conduct yourself in a professional manner — both in person and on social media. This is about making the transition from graduate student to faculty member. Things you used to do in graduate school (date students) and places you used to go (student bars) and even certain clothes you used to wear on the campus are no longer acceptable once you are on the tenure track. Your colleagues may not confront you directly when they see a problem on this front, but rest assured: They will notice and discuss it among themselves. A pattern of immature behavior can easily derail your advancement. Likewise for social media: Anything you post that is obscene, inflammatory, or explicit on your Facebook or Twitter page, or on social, political, and entertainment websites, may well land you in a situation that will be hard to overcome. For faculty of color, what may seem acceptable commentary to one another or to people within your ethnic group can be perceived as hostile and unprofessional or, in some cases, antiwhite. Like it or not, being seen as uncollegial can hamper your prospects for success. By all means, express yourself — just accept that you are no longer a student, and use common sense.
Don’t assume that only faculty of color can be your mentors. Just as it’s misguided to think that everyone in your department is holding hands and singing kumbaya, so, too, is the attitude that your only allies are other faculty of color. To be sure, there are white faculty members who have internalized preconceived notions about people of color (in particular, about Black Americans) and who allow such prejudices to be manifest in their attitude toward and treatment of their nonwhite colleagues. However, there are also white faculty members who are among the strongest supporters of faculty of color. Those white professors have demonstrated genuine commitment to diversifying their departments, colleges, and universities as well as promoting the work of nonwhite scholars. Take good mentoring wherever you can find it. Moreover, do not fall prey to the belief that just because people share your racial, sexual, religious, or economic background, they are your immediate allies. That sort of myopic thinking can hurt your career as well.
How often should you confront bigoted colleagues? Academe is not immune to racism, sexism, antisemitism, homophobia, xenophobia, and all the other isms and phobias. If you have a problem with an individual, talk to that person, not about them. Don’t tolerate blatantly racist, sexist, homophobic, anti-religious slurs and comments or outright disrespectful behavior. Those speakers need to be confronted directly and aggressively, and reported. For faculty of color this is an extremely sensitive and delicate issue, given the frequency with which we encounter such vices. Sometimes it is important to overlook and ignore certain mildly annoying comments and behavior, and keep your eyes on the prize. In such cases, you will have to ask yourself: “Is his or her insensitive comment or generalization really worth the effort to go to war over?” Sometimes it will be. At other times it may be better to let fools alone.
Don’t assume that being average is good enough. Those of us over 40 or 45 years old — and particularly Black people — have no doubt heard the following words a lot: “To succeed you have to be twice as good to receive half as much.” That remains true in 2022. The danger lies with younger faculty of color who have grown up (at least in theory) in a society indoctrinated with multicultural, diversity, post-racial, colorblind, everyone-is-equal, hard-work-is-rewarded rhetoric. In fact, nonwhite faculty members are denied tenure at higher rates than their white counterparts are. Moreover, the faculty of color who do obtain the rank of associate professor often fail to reach, or take longer to achieve, the rank of full professor. It is important for faculty of color to know: You need to go that extra mile, put in that extra effort, be more prolific as a scholar, and be just as strong as, if not stronger than, your white colleagues in the classroom. Is that fair? No. Will that convince the bigots? Probably not. But it certainly can shut up some of your critics and make it much more difficult for them to justify denying you tenure and promotion.
Academe can be a vibrant, flourishing environment for those who have the drive, support, and resources at their disposal. But if you don’t, the road from graduate school to tenure can be arduous, often lonely, and filled with occasional pain and setbacks. Indeed, many people fail to complete the journey. I hope this advice can help mitigate the added burdens that faculty of color face, on the tenure track and beyond.
