Request Advice Regarding VAP in Sociology

[Applicant]

Good afternoon dear colleagues,

Although I have been in the US for 14 years, the American academic job market is still a mystery to me. I would like to request your advice. Thank you in advance. I was told multiple times in my program that higher ranking schools (I am getting a PhD from a school ranked # 81) will not accept a person from a lower ranking school for a TT. So far I applied for 60 positions (TT, VAPs, and a couple of postdocs) and wanted to ask if it is futile to apply for a VAP at a more prestigious school or a good liberal arts college. I am NOT talking about Ivy Leagues lol just something in 40s or 50s in terms of ranking. So far, all my VAPs did not produce even a Zoom interview. My VAPs were: Hamilton College, Davidson College, Simmons University, Oberlin College. Am I shooting too high?  Are these Any advice is greatly appreciated! 

[Who knows]

It doesn't hurt to try, right? I've heard the same thing in general and I'm sure on the average it's true. But also I think there's a lot of heterogeneity in how departments conduct their searches, so there are plenty of individual experiences outside the "on the average" pattern. Some places probably care more about PhD institution than others. There seems to be a very large "fit" component in all of them, which can scramble things. Maybe some member of some search committee knows a recommender of yours and gives you a second look. It's people, not an algorithm, and it's always possible you luck out.

[less true for VAPs]

For VAPs, we care most about fit with our teaching needs. Someone who's in an area we need to cover and seems like they'd be a great teacher would be competitive coming from a lower-ranked school. An "exciting" dissertation topic might help. Apply!

[insider]

I formerly worked at a nationally selective SLAC. For TT, usually highly ranked SLACs prefer IVY or other top school graduates as families pay tuition love those conditions. IVY league graduates without publications, but decent teaching and contract of book proposal often weighed better than other candidates with impressive records, unfortunately. But for VAPs, that's a totally different track, and did not care that much like TT. So you could keep trying, as no one knows the correct mechanisms of the hiring process.

[fvv]

I am curious why SLAC schools hire so many VAPs every year.

[Yeah]

Surely there are exceptions, but it's very clear pattern that new TTs are mostly from higher rank program graduates. In terms of the highly ranked liberal arts (SLACs), I echo the previous comments - no publication but graduated from IVY or top programs are largely preferred. At least from my experience worked at the highly ranked SLAC. Hamilton College, Davidson College, Simmons University, Oberlin College are national top level SLACs so they would have quite large number of applications from everywhere, and have enough pool of candidates from IVYs...

[state_school]

Mar 26, 2024 15:15:09 GMT -5 Yeah said:

Surely there are exceptions, but it's very clear pattern that new TTs are mostly from higher rank program graduates. In terms of the highly ranked liberal arts (SLACs), I echo the previous comments - no publication but graduated from IVY or top programs are largely preferred. At least from my experience worked at the highly ranked SLAC. Hamilton College, Davidson College, Simmons University, Oberlin College are national top level SLACs so they would have quite large number of applications from everywhere, and have enough pool of candidates from IVYs...

yeah, I taught a lot in grad school and I phone interviewed at a good few higher tier SLAC's, but only had one campus interview of the lot.  It was not lost on me that every last person on many of these skype interviews--seriously, at many places, no exceptions!--had either an ivy phd or some other fancy name brand, private place like chicago or stanford.  I've otherwise been a state school person my whole life (undergrad to my phd program to now where I landed a TT).

Good people who want whats best for their departments from what I could infer at all turns, but I could not help but think they feel--possibly even direct--pressure to not bring people like me aboard b/c it ticks down the % phds awarded from a certain elite ring of institutions that admin can put on like a brochure or website.  After all, what makes these places run at a point is selling a bag of high priced distinction to rich parents.  

[hhha]

Maybe not that bad..Hamilton, Davidson, Simmons, Oberlin college all hire APs from non-ivy schools in recent years.

[true]

"After all, what makes these places run at a point is selling a bag of high priced distinction to rich parents."

This is unfortunately true. It also impacts the expectations of the students since they are paying such high amounts of money to be catered to. Certain aspects of higher ed can feel like such a scam sometimes. But it's still a net positive overall.

[bump]

Will the VAP search move more quickly than the TT line search?

[spring time]

if it is this late in the semester, generally yes. But then you also have to remember there are finals so that can slow things down a bit.