In a couple of weeks, California State University system faculty — over 26,000 of them — are preparing to strike for five days. This infographic does a nice job of explaining why; the short version is that CSU faculty are not being paid as much as their peers (alarmingly, most […]
I’ve recently started watching The Great British Baking Show*. I’m a bit late to the game, because, despite calling myself a foodie, I am not a fan of cooking shows. The American ones, at least, are so cutthroat, competitive, and nasty that I find them stressful. The trash-talking, sabotage, and antagonism […]
It’s hard to believe it’s been two years since I moved to Vacationland to start a faculty position! One sign that time has passed is the dwindling funds in my startup account. When you get a new faculty position, you negotiate for things like start date, teaching, spousal hires, and […]
I love words. I’ve been an avid reader since I was a kid, and I worked in bookstores throughout my late teens and early 20’s to pay for my habit. I play Scrabble, and I collect vocabulary the way some of my colleagues collect bird sightings or rocks. I married […]
Dear Gov. Walker, Last week, you told professors at the University of Wisconsin that they needed to “work harder.” You were making a case that the Wisconsin state budget crisis could be ameliorated by increasing employee efficiency, and you suggested having faculty teach at least one more class. I’m not going to talk about […]
It’s no secret that science funding rates are, in a word, abysmal*. As a pre-tenure faculty member, this has been weighing heavily on my mind, and I’ve devoted a substantial portion of my year to grant writing (fingers crossed!). There’s a running joke that you typically get funded to do […]
I recently returned from ScienceOnline, a meeting for journalists, scientists, artists, teachers, and others who discuss (and do!) science on the internet. This was my second time at the conference and, like last year, I came home with a mind full of ideas about effective outreach, open science, and teaching […]
I love Twitter for a lot of reasons (community building, outreach, networking, finding great content), but one of best quick-and-dirty ways to show an academic the power of Twitter is to crowd-source advice on an important topic. A couple of weeks, ago, Sandra Chung at NEON and I were invited […]
Today’s post is by Dr. John W. (Jack) Williams, a paleoecologist and climate scientist in the Geography department at the University of Wisconsin. Jack is the Bryson Professor of Climate, People & Environment, and the Director of the Center for Climatic Research. You can follow him on Twitter as @IceAgeEcologist. Hi everyone. At […]
The Contemplative Mammoth 