Anyone want a general chat?

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

By which title I mean, of course, that I am procrastinating and if I can't rise above it I'd love to drag you all down with me.

What are we all doing this term, and how's it going?

I'm trying to kick my book proposal into shape after yet another set of comments. I've lost track of how many times it's been 'nearly there' but I think it really is nearly there. Honest.

Oh, I like open plan when it's colleagues at your own level. Though granted, in my subject area few people work 9-5 in the office, so when we do, it's usually because we fancy the company.

I am probably being slightly nostalgic as I cleared out my desk at the end of last year and am currently freelancing, aka, working out of home/wherever I can scrounge a teaching space.

No, the dean was talking about sharing with UG, TPG and research students . He didn't answer the question of what we do to discuss confidential issues. We're hoping that the response he received to this idea will make him change his mind. Most of us have at least 70 or more books, plus piles of research, in our office--they haven't said where we would store all of it in a shared office.

Storage: easy. Our books were sent to the tip and we were told to use a shredder for the papers.
But i cannot see how you can share with UGs - bonkers!!

Were the books your own? We buy all our own books--I must spend at least £50 per month. I have in the region of 200 books spread across home and work. They are all needed for teaching and/or research. And some of these are quite valuable so I wouldn't want them left out in an open office (think rare books from late 19th century).

The papers are what we have collected from archives (i.e. the basis of all our research). I am still using archival material that I collected 10 years ago. They would have to have all of this readily available or we couldn't do any research.

I'm too of this madness, they were wanting to build seminar rooms that hold a maximum of 8 students, but we have a rule that modules must have a minimum of 12 students.

Hi everyone, what I'm doing right now is looking at MN as a source of procrastination (have 7 minutes until a meeting and just can't think of doing anything productive...)

purple - I don't think a standard academic load is possible to 'promotable' standards within a working week. I'm hoping it's possible to 'let's not fire her' standards, because my health means I can work 45hrs/week max. I am falling so far behind. I am struggling with dealing with the outlook of my future, as I did so want to progress. But at the moment am trying to look at things as I'm bringing in a salary, and that's what my family needs (DH has had worse health problems for longer, and can't manage a traditional job).

I have gotten very efficient though - I can do a lot more in my 40 hrs a week than I used to in that same amount of time, but not quite as much as I did in the 60-70 hrs I used to put in.

And my 7 minutes are up :) ...

Thanks murmur, I sadly think you are right. I am not as competitive (in terms of being promotion material) as I was as i can't do the hours I used to do. I guess it is the case of doing the best we can.

I was up at 5am working as I was awake although I am struggling now. I do have some more bits to do when the children are in bed but I doubt I will get too much sensible done. It's the extra stuff too though, not just teaching/research. The admin (e.g. Athena Swan stuff). I need to be better at saying no but it's a fine line between being collegial (I want this) but also prioritising what is good for you.

I don't want to think about this! I have my own fellowship, which started last week (lab sciences). I am recruiting a team. I don't teach. I only work 9-2 except 9-5 on a Monday and can't do evenings, I'm too tired after child wrangling.

I don't think I'm doing enough - writing a paper now and that's ALL I'm doing, whereas previously I'd be in the lab in he afternoons too. It makes me anxious and I'm reconsidering childcare, but I desperately want to carry on picking up from school. The children are much happier since I started.

I veer between 'I got a fellowship so it must be OK' and 'I need to get papers and get my name it there and oh fuck' on a daily basis.

Iveburnt yes - own books (although we kept the core collections, gave away a lot to charities, took some home) - however, I am in biomed sciences, so books not core to my activities.

bigkids you are doing well if you have a fellowship! one of my colleague has a DH one - she sticks to her PT routine and does all the pick-ups - this has not stopped her, but she is very efficient in what she takes on / does not take on (and is resistant to being guilt-tripped into non-brownie point activities)

Go bigkids, that is impressive! I have never felt that I would be competitive enough for a fellowship. I had a no of years out of research for personal reasons so feel like I am still playing catch up with pubs.

Thank you both. TBH I would think I'm doing ok, but everyone else in my new office works HOURS and HOURS. They don't have teaching either. I guess they will just get many more papers than me over the next 5 years.

murmuration I am in a similar position. I am limited in the amount of extra hours I can work due to poor health. (I had PND after DD2, which morphed into bipolar disorder 7 years ago. It's getting worse every year.) I had a terrible time with a former Dean trying to force me out of my job. The current Dean is remarkably understanding about everything (especially as academia is far from good when it comes to mental illness.) However, I still feel like I'm only just hanging on.

bigkids - yeah, a fellowship is good! It is tough, though. Without all those extra hours, how is one meant to do things? I've chatted with Profs who talk about doing their RC Committee work on the weekend - yeah, no, can't do that. Or, I could, but then I'd be too ill to work Wed-Fri. So better to do it properly during the working week.

Sympathies iveburnt. Glad to hear you've got someone supportive now. I am extremely grateful that the higher-ups in my school have all been great. It's all so volatile though - there's another related School that has gone downhill rapidly due to poor management and just truly terrible people-things. I just hope our new Head (as-yet unpicked) is as good as our current one.

Although just got a worrying email - I suspect I'm going to be bumped from my one 'low effort/high prestige' committee. I'm irrevocably on three 'low prestige' committees (unless I were to give up teaching roles that I actually find very rewarding), two of which are 'high effort'. I just got off another 'high effort/low prestige' committee, which was a relief. But leaving only 'low prestige' committees does not help my promotion prospects...

Oh, regarding open plan... Urgh! I am very glad that I have an office with a closable door. I also have a desk in an open-plan area, mainly for teaching duties, and it is very difficult - I find I've been meeting students in the cafe, as I can't really have sensitive conversations in the quiet environment of everyone working away and listening. Although that's not ideal, as it's still visible particularly to other students - sometimes I have a student come to my office, but it is 30min away from the teaching areas, and it is hard to find a time for me and the student to manage an hour round-trip plus meeting between classes.

Well, I'm now a few months into my temporary lectureship.

Research time has vanished: I assume this is normal? I am teaching two modules this term, and if I'm not preparing lectures, I'm either answering e-mails, doing some other admin thing, or you know, just trying to breathe.

It's not a complaint - I'm hoping I'll have time to get a draft of something during the break!

Also, this is the first time I have lectured (only received PhD in 2016), so I want to get it right. So far, I seem to have over-prepared, and have quickly realized the challenge to have less content in lectures rather than more.

I also have a one year fellowship running concurrently with lecturing, but er, I have barely looked at what I had planned - there simply hasn't been time. That's o.k. It's not a paid post (I just have a small research allowance), and I can think about stuff when we get breaks.

Something may be in the pipeline for next year too (100% research), but I dare not jinx it by thinking/saying anything about it - if it does come off, it would put me in a very favourable position since temporary lecturing isn't the way to go if you want to get pubs (though a necessity for me at the moment - you just take what you can get in the current climate!).

I'm also thinking more carefully about what jobs I might apply for this year. Last year, I applied for anything I was vaguely eligible for, and now realize that I wasted rather a lot of time. Even many post-docs want publications, nevermind beyond that.

I have a few papers under review, and so far the process has gone:

• Paper 1: 1 reject (comment: good paper, but we're not publishing on it right now), 1 reject (no comments, rejection rate at that journal is 95%), and it's now been at another journal for 2 months.

• Paper 2: 1 reject without comments (from a journal that also rejects about 95% of submissions), and it has also been at another journal for 2 months.

This sounds grim, but it's the norm. General advice in my discipline is to simply send it out about 7-8 times before worrying if it's a bad paper, or unless comments come back with the rejection. However, what this means it that it's also normal to wait a year or more between sending a paper out and seeing it published, which makes things tricky job-application wise.

At the moment, my self-esteem is just about remaining intact!

Hello everyone, can I join?
I'm a teaching fellow in a vocational field and don't have a PhD so feel like I became an academic by accident. As of last summer I went full time after 12 years part time and was appointed to a management role. I love the job but often feel quite overwhelmed by it all. Luckily my DC are teenagers so lower maintenance than little ones but still need lifts, emotional support, food and clean clothes!
I should be working now but am sitting in bed with a migraine. Have piles of essays to mark, module to plan and urgent admin. To top it off a lecturer has just had to drop out of a module starting next week due to serious personal issue. I need to sort this tomorrow.
I'm finding it a bit lonely as a manager and have no RL friends in academia so think I need some virtual shoulders to cry on! I'm not sure it's possible to do this well in normal hours.

Oh, that sounds rotten, ivy. Especially the migraine on top of things. My job that's just ended was teaching, so I can relate a little bit to what you say and what godstopper says. The preparation feels relentless.

gods, the only tip I have for making research work in a teaching-heavy post is to make your lectures and teaching as geared as possible to your research. Is that a possibility? It can help.

(I am on here procrastinating instead of finalising my proposal. )

Thanks LRD. Going to attempt some sleep now.

My colleague has just texted me to state joyfully that she has finished her marking and also got a research bid in this week.

I am trying to be happy for her!

I'm marking. Trying to kill myself discreetly with a ballpoint pen so it's over. Have I mentioned I hate marking on TurnitIn? I used to like marking paper with a nice red pen.

Welcome ivy. I've known a few in academia without PhDs, and it does seem to be quite hard - some people don't seem to give the respect they should to what you're doing. Hope your migraine has gotten better!

god - are you doing two modules on your own, or do other people teach on them? Even if the latter, wow, 2 modules would take a lot! And your field sounds really tough on the publication front.

I was realising last night that I've got teaching and meetings scheduled from noon-4pm today. Not sure when I'm going to eat lunch. I suppose I could do it around 11:30am? Just seems too early. Then I woke up this morning with a fever, a sore throat, and a UTI. Argh! Currently planning to drink lots of water in the hopes of flushing out the UTI before I'm trapped for 4 hours. But this is only the second illness I've had this winter, so I'm going to count my blessings. Last year, when DD went to nursery for the first time, I had something like 40 - yes, I'm not exagerating there either, it was 2-3/week from Nov through Mar (some people may remember me moaning about it last year!) - so getting to Feb before #2 is great.

Oh, sorry to post again so soon, but how do people deal with being sick and commitments? I'm still at home, have been doing marking on the toilet (TMI ). I can't see how I can cancel my activities today - meetings are about things that have deadlines today(!) and two lectures, which just can't be rescheduled. So unless I was actually in hospital or something, I just can't see creating the chaos of cancelling. But today is going to be so uncomfortable. I guess I can stay home as long as possible to work from the toilet and just hope things get better...

Drugs and suffering is how I deal with it, murmuration. It's more painful to try and get the four people into the same room at the same time and before the next academic board than to just go in and sit through it.

We use Skype and conference calls a lot so if a colleague was sick, they could stay home and join in by telephone. Although, it's rarely so important that they would need to be there, one advantage of team/collaborations on grants is that we only aim for a few people to be there at any one time, then just send stuff to the rest.

That's my approach, today pax - in the office now. Was able to grab a ride off DH straight to the door, so decided to trade less time actually on a toilet for less time completely away from the vicinity of one (otherwise commute would be 45 min on the bus/walking).

Ah, I've done that sometimes, four, but doesn't work when the commitments are teaching or the meetings are with students like today...

Well, fingers crossed I make it through without too much embarrassment today.

I agree you can't do a lot about teaching, the obligation is to be there! However one year I recorded all my lectures in a huge effort, it was a real pain, but now I have copies of every lecture I give (unless it's for a new course or significantly altered) so I know I have back-up if I can't make a class. That rarely happens, it's more likely the students don't come and then approach me for the recording, but I like the security that there are options if it comes to it.

Students, I work from home a lot and have started doing a lot of telephone conversations with students, then following up with an email summarizing what we said. I think this is a more productive way of doing it if you aren't in for teaching already, and the students seem to like the prompt response/follow-up. This works for academic advice/UG/PhD dissertations, stuff like that, if they seem in emotional distress, I usually go in.

Feeling much better today, got through quite a lot this morning and now on train to a meeting with colleagues in my field in other unis which will cheer me up as we can compare war stories.
Although a PhD isn't necessary for what I do I think doing one shows you how to be an academic IYSWIM, I've just had to pick it up along the way.
I've done a pg cert in teaching in HE and am now doing an Masters & research in that area which obviously helps a lot. My personal tutor keeps saying 'so when you do your PhD....' but I'm not sold!
I'd have to virtually dead not to go in as a lot of visibility to students is the norm plus I have a lot of meetings. It's the difficulty of rearranging everything that motivates me!

Hope you're coping ok Murmuratiom