Links for 2011-02-17

"My department has run a search for at least one faculty member every year for the last 10 years. I literally cannot remember how many search committees I have served on, let alone how many candidates I have interviewed. A few years ago I was the chair of a single search committee that hired four tenure-track professors at the assistant or associate level. This year we have two separate search committees going.

Institutions and departments have different policies and cultures, so I certainly cannot speak for search committees everywhere, but I have personally received or indirectly heard a lot of frustrated queries from applicants so I thought it might be helpful to try to demystify the process a bit for them. Here is how I would answer four of the most common questions."

"Last May, I mourned the end of L&O by announcing a crowdsourced effort to catalog the outcome of all 456 episodes. At first, the responses poured in, as bountiful as Lenny's wisecracks. After a month of so, everyone trailed off... except for a reader named Josh Kyu Saiewitz, who decided that this was the perfect opportunity to watch every Law & Order episode, in order. (If you think that's impressive, you should check out Josh's blog, where he's attempting to consume every comic, TV show, movie, and video game featuring Batman, all in chronological order. He's up to 1941.)
Josh recently made it through the halfway mark of the series. I won't say he's a hero - because what's a hero? - but this post would be impossible without his efforts."