Academic common room
Cannot face going back to academic role
Marasme · 01/01/2022 13:11
I am a prof at a RG uni, STEM subject. I worked through to the 23rd to "catch up" before finally switching everything off. This was a long awaited break following the semester of hell, and no holidays last summer.
I opened the email yesterday and got totally overwhelmed by the amount of work hiding in my inbox. Ten years ago, I would have happily worked on pet projects during the break, but this has massively changed over the last 3 or 4 years. I cannot complain - my group publishes well, I have more than enough funding.
I just can't face going back. It could be burn out, or just falling out of love with the job and the workload, especially now that the nice parts have vanished (conferences, workshops). My uni has also done some dodgy financial moves that restricts us from spending any discretionary money toward CPD or conferences (unless from grants).
DH suggests that I just pack it in a retrain in sthg else. I don't like the idea of retraining. I am sitting on an academic job offer elsewhere (not UK) which i haven't actioned just because it would mean disrupting DH s career and DC10 and DC13 too much.
. Can't say I blame you, wokloads, expectations and grievances are indeed just increasing. Good luck!howtoplaythegame · 20/03/2022 15:29
This is such an interesting thread. How I envy you lot - I just migrated to London, from overseas (gave up a postdoc to do so) and now I am struggling to find a job in HE. Doesn't help that I haven't published enough, but even just teaching with no/minimum research expectations are difficult to get. Any advice on how I can get a foot thru the door?
howtoplaythegame · 21/03/2022 10:18
[quote hernamewasrio]@howtoplaythegame write to departments about Associate teaching. Most Universities are massively understaffed for teaching and we rely on Associates. Great way to make connections and get a foot in the door.[/quote]
Thanks so much for the suggestion @hernamewasrio. I'll do that.
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