Three Challenges of Early-Career Faculty and the Importance of Self-Care

This chapter presents three challenges associated with being an early-career faculty member: learning to teach in the context of higher education, learning to advise in the context of higher education, and learning to cope with organizational change. After describing the nature of these challenges in detail, the framework of self-care is introduced. Seven strategies are presented: insisting that your students take responsibility for their actions, learning to say no, learning to identify burnout in your colleagues, establishing a network of family and friends, scheduling breaks throughout the day and doing things you enjoy, taking care of yourself physically, and not trying to be perfect. The aim of this chapter is for readers to understand more comprehensively (some of) the challenges associated with becoming an early-career faculty member and to acquire some strategies that can help one to cope with these challenges before, during, and after experiencing these challenges.

Exploring the Post-Doctoral Journey

The purpose of this chapter was to promote a supportive journey of the postdoc candidates to collaborate and discover a career position upon the completion of a doctoral degree. Examples of safe harbors for moving through the post-doctoral career experiences will also be provided. Specifically, this chapter will focus upon post-doctoral education program graduates, of which there are minimal research and programs available directly related to education doctoral graduates. There is a decline of PhD students entering the academic career. Additional career options beyond the academia will be discussed. Lastly, the postdoc career development plan will be recommended along with viable services for the postdoc who remains in academia.

I Graduated. . . . Now What?

This chapter is a reflection upon the author's journey from completing a professional degree program until present day. It is the intent of the author to share lived experiences of a professional who has completed the doctoral degree with emerging completers, and those new to the profession. Having a relationship with multiple mentors can significantly enhance development in early adulthood and in the mid-career stage of the more experienced person. Existing research tends to focus on how mentoring can influence graduate student attrition rates. However, there is little evidence that researchers have approached the issue of navigating career placement after the doctoral degree. The aim of this chapter is to provide an overview of how new doctoral completers can be supported in post-doctoral career placement.

Sisyphus Leans Into the Professoriate

Four faculty at different points in their professorial careers come together to share their own experiences, from doctoral studies through the current point in their professional career path within higher education. The faculty include a tenure-track Assistant Professor, a tenured Associate Professor submitting her initial bid for promotion to Professor, a tenured Associate Professor completing a successful bid for promotion to Professor, and a tenured Professor. These four faculty come together to share their diverse experiences, although patterns and themes are highlighted. The questions and prompts to which the authors responded fell into the specified topics of doctoral study reflections, tenure track faculty reflections, promotion and tenure reflections, professional landscape reflections, and looking back, looking forward.

Navigating Mentorship, Scholarship, Teaching, and Service

There will be an abundance of new and unique experiences for a new faculty member during their first years in the academy. Understanding the expectations for scholarship, teaching, and service is a major portion of this experience; however, there are additional policies, procedures, opportunities, and expectations for junior faculty. Developing relationships for mentoring will be imperative to the successful navigation of each of these areas. This chapter will provide ideas for obtaining a mentor; developing as a responsible and successful mentee; ideas for navigating scholarship, teaching, and service requirements in the university setting; as well as provide voices from the field to offer additional perspectives.

Navigating Teaching Evaluations

The number of articles mentioning student evaluations of teaching is in the thousands, with research pointing to the positive and negative aspects of these evaluative measures. The use of the collected data from both students and peers may be used for merit raises, awards, yearly performance reviews, and the promotion and tenure process. Therefore, a new faculty must demonstrate effective teaching and their incorporation of student feedback in order to meet their institutional requirements. This chapter explores the basics of student evaluations of teaching, peer in-class observations, formative and summative purposes, and ways to utilize and cope with student and peer feedback regarding your teaching.

Adventures on the Golden Road

Two mid-career university professors with quite diverse areas of specialization and expertise come together to discuss their own professional journeys that they describe as the winding golden road. Embedding their own experiences and mentoring opportunities towards sharing information and hard-learned lessons with others offers a natural pay it forward progression. The two authors take a historical look over their careers that have already spanned almost 50 years together, offers the opportunity to reflect on opportunities and ruminating over lessons learned. Professional options and opportunities that directly impacted career choices will also be discussed. With a sometimes tongue-in-cheek recognition of “do as I say and not necessarily as I do” is how these two colleagues have attempted to guide and influence talented colleagues. An analysis of the professional landscape is a priority, considering the impact of a professional career upon one's work-life balance as well as sense of wellness.

Voices From the Field

The chapter will center on exploring the perspectives of higher education faculty around the challenges and opportunities that develop while navigating a successful career transition from PK12 to higher education. The authors will survey and conduct focus groups with colleagues from universities across the United States to capture their voices and authentic experiences. Emphasis will be placed on unpacking the personal, professional journeys of faculty in the areas of teaching, service, and scholarship. Potential lenses and themes that may emerge from the data collected include teaching (andragogy, managing the workload and time, academic freedom, course schedule, accountability, accreditation, evaluation), service (leadership responsibilities, defining service [campus and community, committees, partnerships, professional organizations]), scholarship (publishing, presenting, time for your own research, grant writing, guiding student research).

Turkish Academicians' Doctoral Processes

The purpose of this chapter is to examine the doctoral adventure of academicians working in Turkish higher education institutions within the framework of boundaryless career theory. Qualitative method was used to collect in-depth information. A two-stage process was followed in determining the participants of the study. Firstly, academicians who have completed their doctoral studies abroad will differentiate in social and human capital care, the ones who completed their doctorate in Turkey. Secondly, as the foundation of the independent identity of academicians, which is the most fundamental basis of boundaryless career theory, may change according to the institutionalization level of the universities. Participants were selected from a university with high-level institutionalization and a university with low-level institutionalization. The topics that stand out in the research can be listed as enjoyable aspects and difficulties of being an academician, competence of academics, relationship between advisor and academic career, meaning of the doctorate thesis, academic resistance.

After the Storm

This chapter describes the experiences of two Black women that have earned doctoral degrees from predominately white institutions, through their narratives. The authors described their experiences using the metaphorical backdrop of a storm. The beginning of their doctoral program represents the calm before the storm. Their experiences within their doctoral program symbolize the authors' movement through the eye of the storm. Finally, the description of the aftermath of the storm symbolizes their post-doctoral journey. They use Tinto's student integrations model as the lens to view their narratives. They describe their institutional experiences by elaborating on their goal and institutional commitments, and their academic and social systems. One of the social aspects of the institutional experience that helped them successfully navigate their doctoral program was inclusion in the Brown Gurlz. The Brown Gurlz is a group of Black women who need a space and place to collaborate and share experiences to benefit all that are in the group.