Friday, December 27, 2019

How to Write a Tenure Letter

Why should graduate students and assistant professors get all of the attention? This post is for the associate professors out there being asked to write external tenure letters for the first time. 

David Boonin is a philosopher who has served as department head and associate dean at the University of Colorado, Boulder. He has written us a handy guide to writing these letters. Read it carefully before writing your letter. 

My favorite piece of advice here (besides, what to write): 

"...if you do not think that the candidate merits tenure, it is best that you come out and say so directly. But if for whatever reason you find yourself unwilling to do so, the second best option is not to say that you recommend tenure while at the same time trying to raise enough doubts to secretly signal your true intentions. Rather, it is to conclude by simply declining to make a specific recommendation. Something along the following lines will likely suffice: “There are clearly some significant positives in this case but also some significant negatives. I have tried to detail them and weigh them against each other here but, in the end, I find that the case is simply too close to call. If the candidate is sufficiently strong in teaching and service, then granting them tenure and promotion may well make sense all things considered. But depending on how the remainder of the evidence in the file is viewed, it may also be that the most justified decision is to decline to offer this candidate tenure and promotion.” This will most likely be treated as a negative letter on the whole even if it does not explicitly come out and recommend against tenure and promotion.

To be clear: I do not recommend this as a best practice. If you think the candidate does not merit tenure, it is best to simply say so. But given the reality that some people will be unwilling to simply say so, this is probably the best alternative."

Job Talk Time (The Real Job Talks, Not Practice)

I believe I've blogged about this before, but it can't hurt to point to these slides on academic public speaking once more.

My favorite piece of advice:

Nobody else knows what you wanted to get done but couldn’t. That information is not in their minds. Do not put it there.


And certainly do not put it there before you even say what you were able to do. It is definitely OK (actually, it is important) to anticipate people's questions and answer honestly that you may have wanted to do what they suggest but couldn't because XYZ. I also think it is fine to say that you had thought of that and that it is on your to do list. But first make sure your audience understands what you actually did do. 

Sunday, December 8, 2019

“Conclusions should be short and sweet.”

Read more general advice on how to write well here

Also, for those of you writing third year papers and job market paper: DO NOT WAIT UNTIL THE LAST MINUTE TO START WRITING UP RESULTS. It's OK that you didn't have time to make that last table. It's not OK if your introduction makes it impossible to figure out your contribution to the literature.