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New Faculty Workshop

Building an Academic Career:

Finding and Succeeding in a Liberal Arts College Position

Hope College Campus, Holland, Michigan

July 14 - 16, 2006

General Description: This workshop is designed to help new faculty make the transition to teaching at a liberal arts institution. Faculty often feel under-prepared and overwhelmed as they begin their academic career. Graduate schools and post-doctoral fellowships typically give excellent training in research, but little if any guidance on the other aspects of an academic career. The workshop will focus on the questions of balance including balancing work with one’s personal life, balancing teaching with research, and balancing the needs of the students with the needs of the department. The workshop will also address the issues associated with starting a career such as how to establish a research program and how to prepare to teach a new course. Another important tool that we hope to provide is assistance in establishing relationships with peers and mentors. Expenses (including travel, registration, lodging, and meals) are provided by the Pew Consortium for faculty at Pew Consortium institutions.

The format of the workshop will combine seminars, case studies, break-out sessions on specific issues, meetings with a mentor in the same academic discipline, and informal discussions with peers and more experienced colleagues. After the meeting, participants will be placed on a list-serve to facilitate long-term mentoring and peer support networks.

We hope to give participants, both new faculty and post-doctoral fellows, the tools to be productive and established in their first tenure-track position. There will be formal and informal opportunities to establish regional and disciplinary peer and mentor contacts. A further benefit of the workshop will be to increase involvement of new faculty and university members in the Pew consortium.

Workshop Schedule

The workshop will begin with registration at 4:30 pm on Friday, July 14 and continue through Sunday morning, July 16. Sessions will include "The Transition to a Full-Time Job in Academics," " Getting a job at a Liberal Arts Institution," "Teaching a Course for the First Time," "Establishing a Research Program," "Research with Undergraduates", "Balance: How to Stay Sane and Productive," and "Best Resources."  There will also be plenty of opportunity to interact informally with other participants.

The Pew Midstates Science and Mathematics Consortium consists of 10 liberal arts colleges and 2 research universities. The Consortium seeks to promote effective collaboration among faculty at the member institutions; to improve undergraduate science and mathematics education; and to assist with the research efforts of the faculty at the undergraduate colleges and of the undergraduate students at all of the member institutions.

The Consortium coordinates activities including symposia on undergraduate research, faculty development workshops, and a speaker series through which individual faculty members visit other member schools to share information.