What do you do for a living?

I am an associate professor of educational leadership at a public university.

How would you describe what you do?

I teach educators who would like to become school principals and school superintendents.

What does your work entail?

It involves everything from recruiting, screening, admitting, and teaching aspiring school administrators.  It’s a two-year graduate program where the students will complete a Master’s Degree by the time they complete the program.  I am the program director of the department, so I have a few more administrative tasks than some of the other professors, but essentially, we recruit, we screen, and then we work with graduate students for a two year period prior to them graduating with a Master’s.

What does a typical workweek look like for you?

My typical workweek is not unlike anyone else’s.  I go into work about 9:00 and I stay until 5:00 on most days.  All the classes I teach, I teach at night.  I typically teach three courses per semester, and each of them is three credit hours, I actually end up teaching two nights a week from 5:00 until 9:00 at night.  It’s a little different teaching schedule than teaching undergrads because all of my students have day jobs.

How did you get started in this career?

Well, I started out in education 38 years ago. During the time that I was teaching high school band.  I got my Master’s Degree and my Specialist Degree, and then moved into being a high school principal.  I was a high school principal for two years and then I became school superintendent.  I was a school superintendent for 19 years, and that gave me a total of 31 years before I retired in Missouri.

Your success[as a teacher] is determined by the success of the people that you teach.

I was only 52 years old after I retired and I had taught 31 years, so I didn’t want to quit working. So I moved out here and got a job teaching at this university.

What do you like about what you do?

It’s the best job ever.  I truly enjoyed being a school leader, I really did.  I enjoyed being a principal and enjoyed my 19 years as a school superintendent.  But I think that my true love has always been teaching.

What do you dislike about your job?

Like any job, universities have a good deal of bureaucracy. And I would say really, the only downside to the job I have right now is just the bureaucracy involved.  That’s a necessary evil.  It’s just required because of the way that the system works.

There’s very little to dislike about teaching at the university level.

There are probably different pressures that you have to deal with on a university level, of course.  If you plan to stay there, then you have to go through the process of promotion and tenure.  That can be challenging because you are required to publish in not only state but national journals.  You’re required to present on a regional, national, and international level.

You have to do a good deal of service in the university in order for you to achieve tenure.  Once you achieve tenure, all that really means is that the university will continue to employ you beyond your six years.  I just got promoted and tenured in May of this last year, which is pretty typical.  Generally, most professors have to work six years before they are considered an associate professor and get tenure status.

So, while the track to get tenured may be difficult it’s definitely not something that I dislike it’s just something people may find challenging.

How do you make money or how are you compensated in this job?

It’s a salaried position, much like any other job.  We’re paid off a single salary schedule.  There are merit increases that you can get.  We haven’t had any in several years because of the economic situations that have been going on.  Higher education does not pay well in comparison to most places.  A beginning salary at a university, even a Division 1 university, for my particular job would be somewhere in the mid-50s for a nine-month contract.  So it’s not a tremendous pay.

The advantage of it is the flexibility you have as far as your schedule and the flexibility as far as your teaching.  It’s a good gig, even though it doesn’t pay very much.

How much money do you make as an associate professor?

$80,000.

How much money do you make starting out?

If you want to back 38 years, my first teaching job paid $9,411 for a 12-month contract, and that was in 1974.  As superintendent, my salary was over $100,000 a year, but when I started at the university, my salary was $53,000, and then by the beginning of my seventh year I’m now making $80,000.

Are there any perks associated with this job?

We function off the university calendar, so we get all our major holidays and fall and spring breaks. Of course we have benefits, but the flexibility of what we do and how we work is one of the biggest perks.

To me, the biggest perk, and I’m not trying to be hammy or anything, but the biggest perk is being able to teach the students I’m teaching. I’m doing this job for fun, I’m not doing this job actually to try and make a living.

So the biggest perk I have are the graduate students that I get to work with.  These people are top notch and we’re teaching leadership, and those things to me are very important.

It’s like anything else. It doesn’t seem like work if you have passion about what you’re doing. I really love teaching and that’s really what I do best.

It’s like anything else. It doesn’t seem like work if you have passion about what you’re doing.  I really love teaching and that’s really what I do best.

What education or skills are needed to be an associate professor?

A lot of education. Your nationally accredited universities will not have professors in education that do not have doctorate degrees.  I have a Bachelor’s, a Master’s Degree, I have a Specialist Degree, and I have a Doctoral Degree.  So there is a lot of schooling involved.

As far as skills you really need to be an expert in the area you teach.  I would hesitate saying I’m an expert because that sounds arrogant, but to me, my proficiencies are in school law, school personnel, and school finance.

There is a lot of post graduate work that you have to continually participate in.  One of the perks about working at the university is that they are very good about providing you with opportunities for professional development.  They have been very good to me in allowing me to continue to upgrade my knowledge base while I’ve been here at the university.  I get to do a lot of law conferences, I present all over the United States, in the area of school bullying and prevention of school sexual abuse, and a variety of other things.  The university is supportive of those things because it does add to your knowledge base, which you in turn can then pass on to your students.

What would you say is the most challenging about what you do?

Making sure that your current with what is happening in education today.  I am a practitioner, so when I teach a graduate class, I teach it from a practitioner’s viewpoint.  The most important thing to me is that when my students graduate from the program they understand exactly what they’re supposed to do when they get out into the field.

So the most challenging part is keeping the relationship between the university and the public schools open so that we know that we’re teaching the latest and greatest so that when our students get out there, they have shortened their learning curve.  When they hit the ground as new principal or new school superintendent, we want them to know more and be better than anyone else.  So, our challenge is to make sure that we stay current and that we provide state of the art information to our students.

What would you say is most rewarding about what you do?

Watching our students become successful school leaders. And this is really our department’s slogan, and that’s the fact that your success is determined by the success of the people that you teach.  If our students graduate from the department and become successful school administrators then that’s very rewarding for me.  If they get out and fall on their nose, then that means I failed too.

What advice would offer someone considering this career?

School leadership and teaching is something you have to have a passion for.  You are never going to be wealthy.  Your rewards are going to be largely intrinsic.  Successful leadership is entirely based on your ability to build relationships with other people and your ability to recognize the talents of other people.

In the 21st century, there is no room for an arrogant leader.  You have to be humble and have humility, and if you don’t possess those things or you’re not willing to take on those behaviors then school leadership or leadership in general is not the place for you to be.

You have to recognize that you’re never going to be the end-all to what you’re doing. You have to continually learn and have to continually admit your mistakes.

It really becomes something that if you don’t have a passion for doing this, or you’re doing it for the money, or you’re doing this because of the schedule, or if you’re doing it for any other reason than you have a passion for seeing schools and children getting a better education, it’s going to be hard to succeed.

How much time off do you get or take with this job?

As a college professor, you have such a flexible schedule, that that’s a difficult question to answer.  If you don’t want to teach during the summer, then of course, you get all summer off.  If I don’t teach in the summer then I get three months off there, I get Thanksgiving, a fall break of five days, I get a winter vacation of about a month, and I get a spring break.

So if you stop to think about it, the schedule that we have and the time off that we have makes for a very nice job.

What is a common misconception people have about what you do?

That it’s not work.  They believe that if you’re a college professor, you’re somewhere up in the ivory tower, smoking a pipe and being philosophical.  When in reality, I believe good college professors are highly motivated individuals with a passion to make the world a better place.  It is a great job, but I think the misconception is how easy it is.

It takes a lot of training, it takes a lot of experience, it requires a lot of education, and it also requires a lot study.

What are your goals and dreams for the future in this job or career?

I just want to keep doing what I’m doing.  I’m 59 years old.  I will probably teach another three to ten years.  My guess is that I will retire sometime in the next few years and then I plan on traveling and enjoying myself.

What else would you like people to know about what you do?

That it can either be the best job on earth, or it can be the worst job on earth.  If you want it to be the best job on earth you have to have a passion to want to do it.

We’re all on the earth for a very long period of time, so while we’re here, we need to see if we can make it a better place for folks.  If we’re not, we need to re-evaluate what we’re doing.

What do you do for a living?

I am the middle school Band Director at a middle school in the Southeast U.S. Basically I teach sixth through eighth grade band.  And I also teach eighth grade general music. This is my first year of teaching.

How would you describe what you do?

I teach students on various levels how to play band instruments. I have about 52 sixth graders and about 25 of them are woodwind players; I start teaching band so that all the woodwind players are going to either play flute or clarinet and then later I switch them to the other woodwind instruments during an audition process, as an education sound-play, to make sure that they stay with band. I teach the fundamental techniques and concepts necessary to play a school instrument.

A big part of the job is helping students to be successful, because it is very difficult to learn to play a band instrument. A sixth-grader who learns he or she can make progress quickly when they practice and are taught appropriately, is likely to stay with the band for a long time.

In the general music class I begin with the music they are familiar with today, and work backward to the classics. The first week of class we do exercises on some certain type of music. For example, the first week I try to find what’s most popular for them, so I cover pop music and we listen to everything from Lady Gaga to Michael Jackson to The Rolling Stones. Just last week we covered Rock and Roll, and this week is country, so the kids learn a new song every week, and along with that they learn how to notate rhythms and how to identify pitches on a musical staff. They learn not just how to listen to it, but also how to write it and how to play it.

What does your work entail as a band director?

Probably the most time consuming aspect of my job is the lesson planning. I spend a lot of time planning 45-minute lessons for each class.  But they’re just now learning on how to put their instruments together, they just got their instruments so I’m literally teaching them proper maintenance, how to piece the instruments together. The clarinet, for instance, has seven different pieces that have to be assembled before it can be playable.

When you’re handing it to a sixth grader you have to be careful, because if they start going to town on it goodness knows what you’re going to have at the end of the class period. So, we are very slow and systematic about that process, so that they take care of their instruments. On the average. beginning band instruments cost between $400-$500, so we really try to prepare them not to only be good musicians but to take care of their instruments.

I just knew that I was going to be a band director. I love music, it’s my passion and it was hard for me to imagine a single day that I didn’t play my trumpet or give somebody a lesson or show somebody how to play his or her instrument.

Another aspect of my job is fund raising. Nowadays we get so little support financially from the state and our county that a lot of my job is spent raising money.  We’ve raised almost $2,000 so far, and that is just in the first four or five weeks of school. For a band program, that is pretty good. The band program needs that kind of monetary support because we need to buy instruments, have money to take the kids on trips, and other items to keep the band in working order.

What’s a typical workweek like?

I teach the same 45-minute periods every day. I usually come to work in the morning around 7:00 or 7:30 and at that point I start planning some lessons and doing some other things to keep the program running. At 7:45 I let my band students come in to practice in the mornings and they’re in there until 8:10. At 8:10 I dismiss them to head back out so I can take care of some things, get my room back in order and then at 8:20 I let them come back into the room and begin the first class.

My band classes are broken down by grade, and also according to type of instrument. I teach woodwinds together, and then I have classes in brass instruments. In between, I have a 15-minute break where I reset my classroom for the next section. Every day we do 45-minute lessons on the various instruments, where we do a warm-up routine and cover fundamentals, and then we get into our method book, which has four and eight-bar exercises.  Then we actually pull out full pieces of band music and the sixth, seventh, and eighth graders all love that.

The exercises help them to build technical ability, and are a necessary part of learning, so that they can perform the actual music. For example, we have a piece called “The Volcano.”  Much of the band music for middle school students have names like that, interesting pieces that bring the music alive for them, and teach them a concept, and then they understand how the music is supposed to sound. My band classes are by far my favorite classes, hands down.  I have a break for lunch, 20 to 30 minutes to eat and then an hour of planning. I usually eat while I plan, so I have extra time for planning, because there is so much that has to be done.  These are the instructional things that I do every day that are part of my job description. After school, I spend time planning for the next day, and do a lot of other things in the band room. Sometimes I work until 7 p.m. Then, I also work on Saturdays, at least an hour or so, and some Sundays, here by myself.

How did you get started?

I was always an active band student. I’m a trumpet player. My dad was a band director for ten years and then became a school principal and a school superintendent for the better part of his career for more than 20 years, and he had a lot to do with it because he was also a trumpet player. My brother is also a musician, working on a degree in music education.  We’re both music lovers and we wanted to progress on our instruments.

But when we lived in another state, the school we were in was not really helping us develop into the musicians we wanted to be. When we came to the East Coast, my dad set us up with lessons, and I started taking trumpet lessons with the principal trumpet player of the local symphony – a really phenomenal trumpet player. He really did a lot of things for my playing and I kept taking lessons when I was a junior in high school. And as a senior in high school I just knew that I was going to be a band director.

That’s the most rewarding part of the career. To help students be successful, because when they are you’ll feel like you’re successful.

I love music, it’s my passion and it was hard for me to imagine a single day that I didn’t play my trumpet or give somebody a lesson or show somebody how to play his or her instrument. I started giving private lessons to kids over at the middle school  – 30 minute trumpet lessons for five bucks apiece, when I was still in high school, and while I wasn’t a professional, I felt like I was good enough to help beginners to play the trumpet. And it’s funny now to look back and see where those students are because most of them are very good. I think probably one of my biggest strengths, as a teacher is that I’m really enthusiastic about what I do and I love seeing kids get excited about music and about playing their instrument. I think that’s what it really takes to propel a student through.  I know what it is like to come from a school where the band directors are not very good, either because they are burned out or having other problems.  When I really started to improve was when my dad and I would sit down in the living room and start playing trumpet duets. He taught me about things that I was not getting at school. When we moved to this part of the U.S.,  it was surprising to me on how much I had been missing out on because I came from a program that wasn’t very good into a program that was renowned – a really great band and music program. I spent a lot of time in the band room and getting better with my instrument and I had friends that were in band. I practiced a lot, did a lot of concerts and just knew it was what I wanted to do.

What do you like about your job?

I really enjoy students being successful on their instruments. For example I’ve got the sixth grade trumpet players, and there are sixth grade trombone players. They’ve gotten to the point where they can put their instruments together and they’re starting to play their very first note. And at first, none of them have any idea what they’re doing, so when you tell them to buzz at the end of the instrument, they wonder, “what is he talking about?”  If you tell them the right thing, then it isn’t long before they are making that first note on their instrument, and it is thrilling to experience their excitement. For example, we go around the room, and one student will play a note, and I’ll say, “it’s not quite right,” and then I play it back to them, and they hear it. I remind them that this is a process, and before you know it, they are playing a note and they just can’t believe it. To watch a sixth grader freak out about that is really fun. It’s like giving them a coat of armor and saying they are some sort or king or something. It’s just really cool.  I think the kids feel very empowered when they start to take control of their instruments and realize “Hey, I can be good at this, this might be my thing.”

What do you dislike about your job?

The thing I dislike the most is the complaints I hear from teachers who have been doing this for a while. I’m not sure if it’s just that they don’t make very much money or they think they have to work way too hard for what they make. I mean there’s no doubt about it this is not a job where you are gratified with the salary that is appropriate for what you do. But it could be that not all teaching jobs are as much fun as mine. Of course, we are working with middle schoolers everyday and they can be annoying as hell, no doubt about it. But if you train them up the right way and explain your expectations there is really no reason your class can’t go very smoothly.

Yes, every day you have problems.  I’ve heard teachers complain about the fact they have to deal with parents,  and that’s not always a fun thing because parents are kind of irritable, and they think they know the best for their child.  You can’t argue with that because it’s their kid. But by the same token,  in my field I’m the music professional and I don’t believe that there can be many parents out there that can call me and claim they know more about the music curriculum than I do. And that’s not to sound pompus or arrogant, it’s just to say “Gee, I’ve got that professonal degree in this, and I know.” But you have to be very careful about what you say, because you need parent involvement.  I really haven’t had that many issues with parents so far,  but I know it’s something that’s going to happen.  I have found that if you tell a parent that you just want their child to be successful,  most of the time you get a pretty big attitude change because no parent is going to argue with that.  I work to develop a rapport with parents, so that the lines of communication are open but they let me do my job.

What is most challenging?

The most challenging thing is meeting the financial hardships of my students. Band can be expensive, so the trickiest part is finding ways for students to participate in band if they can’t afford the instruments. That’s a really important thing to me. When kids get turned away from band because their parents can’t finance or pay for an instrument, that is doing the student a disservice. So this weekend I spent a lot of time at pawnshops trying out different instruments.

I actually purchased a couple and had a couple of instruments donated this week, but we are barely squeaking by. I have several sixth graders who came in today and they simply don’t have the money right now for an instrument; you can’t turn that kid away. That kid wants to be in your class because they love music and they want to learn how to play a musical instrument and so you have to find a way to make that happen. A lot of times, unfortunately, mom and dad don’t care so much about that. They’ll just say, “well you need to drop that class. “ But it’s cheap to rent an instrument. You can rent a brand new instrument from the music store here in our town for $25 a month. For some people that is a lot of money, but you think that’s less than a dollar a day – so don’t go to the pop machine and you can rent a clarinet for a month. Because many people don’t see the logic in that, instead of arguing with them I go to pawnshops and try to find an instrument for their kid. So the tricky part is making sure every kid has their necessary materials, and is prepared for class. And another really difficult part is to simply managing all the details. One needs excellent organizational skills and planning skills to be a teacher, especially a band director.

What is most rewarding?

The most rewarding part of job by far is the part where I get to get on the podium and conduct my ensemble and know everything is happening because of how I taught it. And hopefully the skills I taught them, whether or not they go on to play an instrument in college, gives students a lifelong love of music. And really that’s the true measure to me of a good band director is how many of those kids you taught however many years ago, how many of them are still doing music or at least still go to concerts and enjoy the arts. We want them to be good and we want them to achieve but at the same time the ultimate goal is to give them the love of music and fond memories of their high school and middle school days.  So the most rewarding part is definitely seeing kids perform and participate in music and knowing that you helped them to be successful. That’s the most rewarding part of the career. To help students be successful, because when they are you’ll feel like you’re successful.

How much money do you make as a Band Director?

The first year salary for a teacher in my school district is $32,595.00. If I worked an seven-hour day, five days a week, that would be something like $23.50 an hour, but teaching isn’t like that. I’m paid by the hours I’m in the classroom, but there is more to my work than being in the classroom.  I’m at work every day and most nights I don’t leave until 7:00 PM because I have a lot to do, and I have to get my work done. And so you can say they pay by the hour in the classroom,  which is 8 to 3:30, but Realistically no teacher is getting out of there before four, and then there is the preparation work to do and the extra-curricular work that all teachers do.

How much money do you make starting out?

It depends on the school district and the state, because as a public school teacher, salaries are set on a scale that includes years of experience and education level. Someone with a bachelor’s degree and no experience, straight out of college, is paid on a different scale than someone with a master’s degree and five years of teaching experience. The downside to the scale is, that most of them top out at a certain point, so that no matter how much education a person has, it will not increase your salary above the top level, unless the district imposes a new scale. Some districts pay band teachers an additional stipend on top of the salary, but this is mostly at the high school level, and is similar to the extra pay that athletic coaches receive.

What education or skills are needed to do this?

The most important skills for teachers of instrumental music and those who want to be band directors is experience with a musical instrument, starting in sixth or seventh grade, in middle school. There aren’t a whole lot of instrumental music teachers out there that don’t play an instrument. Every band director that I’ve ever met in this state has a primary instrument; they’ll play one of the band instruments or one of the string instruments. The education requirement in most states is a Bachelors of Music Education, with either an instrumental or vocal emphasis. Elementary music is a very popular field. But, getting a degree a professional Bachelors of Music in education degree is a requirement in most states.  To prepare for the degree, most students begin in high school with taking the college entrance exams, which are usually either the SAT or the ACT, depending on which test is required for the college you want to go to. There are also requirements for entering teacher education that must be met. Today most states require students to submit to background and criminal history checks, and prospective teachers must be fingerprinted in most states. This is a cost to the student.  If you have a criminal history, you will not be admitted to the program. Another requirement is a minimum GPA of, usually, about 2.5 on a 4-point scale.  After the teacher education block, you must pass state exams to obtain a teaching license in your field, both overall and in your practice area. In my case, I had to take a test for my knowledge of music and music theory, music history. And then I also as an education major I had to take another practice exam – Principals of Learning and Teaching – to see if you know how to manage a classroom, if you have different strategies for how to present curriculum, both in terms of engaging students and getting their interest. While you are in school, it is important to foster good relationships with your professors, so you are able to obtain recommendations for teaching jobs. You will need a solid resume and good references.

How much time off do you get or take?

One of the main reasons people join the teaching profession is because they like the vacation time. We get two weeks at Christmas, we get off any holiday that the kids have off, and then we get a spring break week and then in the summer time they tell us we get two months off with no pay. And everybody is on a 12-month contract which means instead of just being paid for the weeks that you’re in school those nine months you’re actually get paid year around and two of those months you’re not in school. So, that’s pretty good to get a check when you’re not teaching.

What advice would you offer someone considering this career?

If you want to be a band director you need to be a great musician because if you’re not a great musician you’re not going to create other great musicians. And that may sound like a hard piece of advice for some people but the fact of the matter is the best teachers out there and the best band directors are also compassionate musicians, and if not, then they’re not giving their kids everything that they’re due. So that would be my biggest piece of advice. Master in instruments and develop enough skill on that instrument so you feel you can play it professionally. I had several opportunities in college to do that.

I played with the city orchestra and I played with lots of different groups with professionals. Most of them were not teachers; they were professional musicians. You also need to be dedicated to your studies in college, because teaching is the only profession where you can drastically affect population. In other professions that deal with money and that kinds of thing, and yes,  you can affect population severely. But with teaching you are directly affecting people. If you are not good at your job, you are preparing others to not be good at their job. There was a philosophy in my education department that was written on top of the wall that said, “Teaching is the profession that makes all other professions possible.”  That is a very important thing to keep in mind.

What is a common misconception people have about what you do?

I think the biggest misconception is that a teacher comes in and it’s a 9 to 5 job, and that’s just not the case. Also, you are not going to have a whole lot of social life the first year of teaching; you’re going to have a whole lot of personal life. You’re going to have to try and learn to balance things. Even if you try hard and you’re good at organizing, you will find it a very time-consuming job. The other thing is being realistic about salary. Some people have been doing this for very long time and make a pretty decent salary, but I think some people come in thinking the salary is going to be huge that first year and it’s not, it’s simply not. It’s enough to live on and get by and I’m not going to lie, I live comfortably,  but I’m a single guy. I rent a duplex and it’s very comfortable to me and I like it but it’s not luxurious and it’s not going to be a job where you start at $50,000 – $60,000 a year; it’s just not going to happen.

What are your goals/dreams for the future?

First, I want to have a really phenomenal program. I want to have musicians in my band who are proud to be musicians and continue to do music for the rest of their lives because it’s something they are passionate about and that they love.  I feel that if you have a good experience in learning how to play an instrument you’re going to always think back on those good experiences and they’re going to recreate those experiences in the future. My plan basically is to create a great band program that gives superior concerts and is able to travel. I want to be able to take my group to different cities. There’s a worldwide band clinic in Chicago every December at the McCormick center in Chicago, and professionals come to give sessions to students at that clinic. I would love someday to have a middle school band that was good enough to send an audition tape and be accepted to play at that clinic because for me, that would be the epitome of success.

What do you do for a living?

I’m a teacher at a Carnegie-level university, a Ph.D. granting institution in the mid-South. I’ve been at this school for six years now, but I was hired on the non-tenure track, and I’m considered an adjunct professor, even though I teach full time. In the area I teach, I teach about literature and composition. Some of the classes I teach are courses that many students take, regardless of their degree path, because they are considered “core” classes. Others are for those students who are majoring in English.

Not all of these are exclusive to majors, but most of them are majors or graduate students in English. For example, this semester I’m teaching a course in British Romantic Poetry, and I have a couple of people who are not English majors.  My area of expertise is 19^th Century British literature, mostly the novel – but I also have an interest in poetry and prose of the period, and the politics and history of the time. The main genre of the 19^th Century is the novel – that was the big focus.

How would you describe what you do?

This semester I have 75-80 students, and I am teaching three courses. The required load for my job classification is four courses a semester, for two semesters a year. But in my case, instead of teaching four classes, I teach three and advise college students, which means I work with students on their degree plans and coach undergraduate English majors and Master’s level students on their theses and course selections.

The normal load for college professors at the type of institution where I teach is actually two courses a semester, because they are expected to also do research and publish articles in their particular area of interest and expertise. This helps them to keep fresh in the area they teach in. Of course, that is not my case. At my school, we have gone from having a few adjuncts to quite a few adjuncts, because fewer tenure track professors are being hired. Many of our courses are taught by graduate assistants.

In our major, we have more than 100 graduate students who teach two courses and take two courses each semester, and are paid a stipend, plus they are given a tuition waiver and some health benefits.

What does your work entail?

Well, I already told you about the teaching. I teach on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and advise on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Right now I’m rather bogged down with several committees and advising a student group, but when I have time I work on several projects of my own, for publishing.

For example, I am working on an article about Darwin and Melville, who was a 19^th Century American novelist -  doing some transantlantic work there – my husband is a19th Century Americanist, and we enjoy working on projects together when we can. I’m also working on a class on Thackeray for next semester, and will be going to a symposium in Boston on Thackeray, and have been doing some reading and research to prepare. Mainly, though, I’m just working to keep up on what I’m doing in class.

I’m doing a lot of preparation for the British Romantic Poetry Class. We are doing the famous six, plus Burns and  Scott – who are not in the canon anymore.

What’s a typical work week like?

I usually go in very early, because I typically have an early class around 8 or 8:30 or even 7:30, so I get to campus between 7 and 7:30, and my classes are typically over by noon – but this semester I’m teaching an afternoon class, and get out at 3:30. And then I have students come by. I’m working with a graduate student this semester on her thesis, so she comes by once a week for an hour.

And I have other students who come by and work with me on their projects. I help students decide what courses to take, and guide them on their progress. I leave campus by 4:30 or 5, and then I work in the evening. If I teach a Tuesday/Thursday schedule, I will go in on Tuesday and won’t always do prep that night, but I will be answering emails  and doing some research, or working on committees. I’m an officer in an international organization for English, and I work on that – spend a lot of time on a variety of things.

I’m also on a committee for the Modern Language Association. These are things that are related to teaching. I’m also an advisor to a student organization, so I do a lot of communications that keep me on the computer for hours when I come home. I try to go to bed by 9, but often it is 10 or 11. I never even think about how many hours a week I work. I can’t. But if I had to guess, I’d say 50, but I’m sure that is not enough. For example, this is a Sunday, and I’ve spent several hours creating an online test for one of my classes and working with technical support at the University to make it happen.   Is this typical? Yes. There are a minority of teachers who – maybe one or two percent of teachers, people who are “stars,” and are revered in your area, who don’t do all that. But somewhere they have been in the trenches to get there. And now there are even fewer of those, hired on the tenure track, now that tenure is under attack

What is the main difference between what you do and what a tenure track professor does?

I do the same work. I sit on committees, teach the same course and the same students, but I don’t have the release time to do the research. They typically teach two courses, and I teach four. I also sit on master’s and Ph.D. committees, and a variety of committees.

The other difference is benefits and pay. Some are tenured, but the trend today is to hire people on a contingent basis, non-tenured. Some are hired on a more permanent basis, but they still have little job security. For example, if a budget becomes strained, or they decide they want to hire someone’s friend or family member (and it not supposed to happen, but it does) it is possible that you could lose your job even after working there for years.

How did you get started?

I started teaching in 1989, when I was working on my master’s degree in English. I continued to teach while working on my Ph.D., both at the university I attended and a community college nearby, to supplement my income.  After graduation, I taught at a public college and a private college on the East coast. I always liked teaching, but when I started out, I wanted to be a labor lawyer. But when I was getting my bachelor’s degree, I took a class in Law and Literature.

And I thought, I could do what I want to do in the classroom. I could teach mainly middle and lower class students and teach them literature that would teach them to be more informed. So I turned from law and literature, and to the classroom because that is where I wanted to be. Sometimes I have regretted that decision, because of the situation, the labor situation, in academia today, because public education is under attack. In the part of the country where I teach, it is a right-to-fire state.

With tenure being eroded because of fewer teachers being hired on the tenure track, and more and more students coming in, the ratio for students in the classroom with an adjunct is going up. I’m thinking I could have had some impact. But two roads diverged, and I chose my path. But some of my students are going on to study and practice law, and I feel good to have an influence on them indirectly.

What do you like about what you do?

Being in the classroom with students. That is a real high.

What do you dislike?

It’s a mix. I don’t like stacks of papers, but once you start reading them, sometimes it is good and sometimes it is a nightmare. It can be a real joy when they are getting it.  I hate the politics involved in working at a university. And nepotism is a problem, when family is hired, or cronyism.

Sometimes I don’t like the attitude of the many tenure track professors who don’t see what is going on, and don’t support adjuncts and recognize what they do. They are deliberately not facing what is going on. Sometimes I feel it when I’m walking down the hall. But the good thing is, the students don’t realize it. We can’t allow them to know that there is a difference between us, because they are all paying the same amount of money for the courses they take. All the teachers are professional, and the students don’t know that some are grading 150 papers and others can spend more time because they are grading 50 papers.

How do you make money/or how are you compensated as a college professor?

Salary.

How much money do you make as a college professor?

I make $30,000 a year. That embarrasses me. If I were working in a factory, I would be making more by now. But I love what I do, so it is not all about money. That is the adjunct’s plight. We have student loans to pay off, and it is not that the jobs aren’t there; it is just that administrators aren’t opening them up.

Tenure-track professors make more money, typically $50,000 on up to $150,000 a year, if they occupy a position chair (which is a special category for specialists hired to be over a certain area, often with the pay supplemented by a donation to the school). I don’t have the same benefits. . I do have some benefits, though. I have a retirement plan, and health insurance, but no vacation. I’m on a nine-month contract but I’m pro-rated over a 12-month period because I chose that option. I have the typical holidays – when the students aren’t here, I’m not here.

How much money do you make starting out?

I started out making about $42,000, and when I moved to the East Coast, I made about $75,000 a  year. As I said, it was personal choice for me to come back to this part of the country and take the pay cut.  A typical salary, across the U.S., is $80,00 for a tenured professor in English. But getting a tenure track job is challenging.  Departments are using the hires they have to fulfill diversity tracks; those who fit one of those categories are usually persons of color, which I am not, and I understand that. They are looking for those that fill those categories.

What education or skills are needed to do this?

First, it is important to be a really good student. Excellent grades, mostly A’s and maybe a few (but not too many B’s) should dominate your undergraduate transcript. The education is challenging, and requires dedication, and you have to like reading and have a strong aptitude for writing. To teach where I teach, a Ph.D. is required. It takes about eight to nine years, typically, to get that degree. Sometimes, it takes as long as 12 years, depending on how much you have to work while you are going to school. First, you have to get a four-year degree, and then the master’s degree, another two to four years.

The Ph.D. takes from three to six years, and sometimes seven. It takes almost as long as to become a surgeon.  At a smaller college, a four-year college or community college, a master’s degree is required. the important thing is, if you are going to teach and advise graduate students, you have to know enough to be able to guide them. And you have to know where to get the information, if you don’t have it.

So the Ph.D. level is necessary at a school that teaches graduate students. It’s similar to medicine or law in that regard – you have to have the expertise to be able to guide students, and have gone through this yourself, so you can help them to become scholars.

What is most challenging about what you do?

Time management. For one, I teach a heavier load and don’t have the luxury of time to work on articles or research. I also don’t qualify for sabbatical, which is typically having a year or half a year off, with pay, to do special projects. That is a huge benefit only granted to tenure-track professors.

What is most rewarding?

The most rewarding things that I do is to teach, and then there is the camaraderie that I have with my peers across the U.S., in working on the various national committees. But the most rewarding thing is working with students. There is a joy in seeing students bloom and develop into scholars that cannot be compared with anything else, at least not for me.

What advice would you offer someone considering this career?

You need to think carefully about this before you do it. If you can move, go for it. But, if you are married to a particular place, and cannot move, you should not get a Ph.D. in English, because your job choices will be very limited. I would not advise anyone to do what I have done.

If not careful, you will be undercutting yourself. That is what happened to me, in a sense; I decided that living away from my children was not an option for me, and that I wanted to live near them – plus I love the place where I live. I’m fortunate that my husband, whom I met after I left the area and taught back East, was willing to move here with me and take a lesser position than he had there.

But this is not going to be the case for everyone, and the jobs you want to have may not be in the part of the country where you want to live. You also need to understand the difference in the culture between a four-year college, a public school and private school, and a Ph.D. granting institution, because those differences can be vast. The benefits, opportunities and job satisfaction levels can be very different between them.

How much time off do you get/take?

Except for the summers, when I am really unemployed, I am here when the students are here. The only time I am not here is when I am at a conference, which is maybe once or twice a year. I am compensated somewhat for the cost of these, but I end up paying much of the cost of travel and accommodations out of my pay.

What is a common misconception people have about what you do?

Several. First, people often think this is an easy job, with lots of perks. They think we don’t work hard, and take all summer off to play. There are also those who have a negative idea about what we do, that someone like me walks into a classroom unprepared, and pushes our ideas on our students.

They think we don’t teach anything. There’s a movement out there who spread this idea that we don’t teach, this idea that college teachers walk into a classroom, talk about politics, and try to teach a liberal agenda. That’s an unfair view. This is coming from people who are anti-intellectual. It is an easy cop-out, a very conservative viewpoint. My advice to teachers is to just be who they are, and not to talk politics.

My students, the average student in a core-level course, have no idea what my politics are. Yes, most of my peers are more liberal than conservative, which is really a consequence of our type of study than our political propensity. Conservatives are far more likely to go into other fields, such as business or law.

What are your goals/dreams for the future?

To continue teaching and see my students succeed in what they want to do, and my family, to see each of my kids, who are in school still, do what they want to do and what they like and believe in. They don’t have to be like Mom. But even though the job situation, and the job conditions with what I do is not ideal, the teaching part of it is ideal. I have had wonderful mentors in the past, and some are people I’m working with now. I’m continuing to grow as a scholar.

What else would you like people to know about what you do?

People think I’m in an ivory tower, and don’t relate to the real world, and that I’m elitist. But I don’t know anyone who teaches who doesn’t have their feet on the ground, and who aren’t in the trenches with the students.

Eleanor Feldman Barbera, PhD of www.mybetternursinghome.com was nice enough to visit with us about her profession as a professional psychologist.

What do you do for a living?

I am a psychologist and I specialize in geriatric psychology which is working with older adults. I work mainly in nursing homes.

How would you describe what you do?

I talk with the residents to try to help them cope with the challenges that they’re facing and adjust to the nursing home environment. I work with the staff to provide the best care for the residents. I also help the families help their loved ones adjust to the nursing home as well and cope with any challenges working with the staff members and the nursing home administration.

What does you work entail?

I go to a nursing home, I’m only in one nursing home right now, though at times I have been in more than one. I work as part of the team, so I might attend a morning report, and then I have a roster of residents that I see and I generally meet with them in their rooms. Then I talk with the staff about them.

Being a psychologist is a very rewarding profession. I can always say I am doing good in the world and that’s important to me.

I may look at the medication in their chart or talk to the doctors or another staff member to try to work out any kind of problems that the resident may be having.  I consult with the psychiatrist and talk with family members to try to create a more pleasant environment for them and help them with any kinds of problems, whether they’re feeling depressed, or they’re having an issue with a roommate, they’re not getting along with the staff member, any kind of problem.

What’s a typical workweek for you?

Typically I see about thirty to forty residents of the nursing home a week. I talk with the staff every day and I have a lot of paperwork to take care of.  It’s always interesting and often challenging. When I go into work, I have a certain number of people that I need to see so it’s pretty flexible in that I start at a certain time, I see who I need to see, and when I’m finished, I can leave.

How did you get started?

I got started in the mental health field when I was in college. I started by working at a counseling center at the university I attended. It was really interesting and I felt I had an aptitude for it and I continued on to graduate school. I started specializing in geriatrics because I thought it was going to be a boom industry because there were going to be many people that needed care as they got older. I was young in my career at the time so I wanted something that would sustain me throughout my career and found that I really enjoyed it. I feel like I can be of tremendous help to the residents in the nursing homes.

What do you like about what you do?

I do feel that I am very helpful. I make a tremendous impact on the residents’ lives and I know because they tell me. I like the flexibility of the job. I like the challenges of it. I have an opportunity to be very creative in my approach to handling problems in a community setting.

Is there anything you dislike at all about your job?

Usually, being a psychologist, you see people when they’re having trouble and when they’re better they say thank you and then they leave. So one of the challenges is that when people want you and need you they’re having a hard time, so you have to get used to being with people that are having a hard time. I also find it challenging when I see people at the nursing home that are not getting the type of attention or care that they should.  That’s why I’ve been developing my work where I have the opportunity to give people on the staff ideas of how to handle problems in a different way that’s more effective and helpful for the residents.

How do you make money or how are you compensated?

My work is fee for service which means I get paid for the number of people that I see. So some psychologists that see many residents in a nursing home or see many patients in an outpatient practice would make more money.

I really don’t think you have to be crazy to see a shrink. I think that life is very challenging and that it can be incredibly helpful to have the outside perspective of somebody that doesn’t have a vested interested in your choices that you make.

And people that don’t see quite as many people would make less money.  It really depends on how ambitious you are and how much time you have to put into your work and what kind of resident population you’re working with.

How much money do you make as a psychologist?

The salary range for a psychologist is between $70,000 and $200,000. I am sure there are people who are making more and people who are making less.

How much money do you make starting out?

It depends if you’re working as a salaried employee because there may be jobs where you can get $50,000-70,000. And then if you’re starting a practice, you probably don’t make very much until you get more people coming through your door.

What education or skills are needed to be a psychologist?

First you need to get a high school degree, then a college degree, and then you need to get a graduate degree.  And you need to have a PhD level. So that could be a PhD, a PsyD(Doctor of Psychology), sometimes people work with an EDD(Doctorate of Education), but it’s a doctoral level program. And then you would have to be in a clinical study so that you can be licensed. You have to take a licensing exam in order to work as a licensed psychologist.

What is the most challenging part about your job?

I think as part of my job I tend to fall in love with everybody that I work with, at least to a certain extent, and since I’m working in a nursing home, some of them do pass away. I miss them and have to deal with losing them, so that is the most challenging part for me.

What is the most rewarding?

My residents give me such compliments, it’s quite lovely, and it’s very rewarding walking into a room where somebody is anxious or depressed and seeing them within the span of my meeting feeling so much better.

What advice would you offer someone considering this career?

I would caution them to think carefully about whether they are able to spend most of their time talking to people that feel bad, and are having troubles.

How much time off do you get/take?

Because I’m not working for any particular company, I can take as much time off as I want as long as I have coverage for the patients I am seeing. So it can vary. But of course when I take the time off, I don’t get paid. So you have to factor that in.  I typically take three or four weeks off a year.

What is a common misconception people have about what you do?

I think that many people have seen a lot of Woody Allen movies and so they think that they would be lying on a couch, talking to somebody that isn’t saying much. And often you have people saying “Oh you’re a shrink? I’m not crazy.” I really don’t think you have to be crazy to see a shrink. I think that life is very challenging and that it can be incredibly helpful to have the outside perspective of somebody that doesn’t have a vested interested in your choices that you make.

What are your goals and dreams of the future?

Well I find that I’ve been very helpful for individual residents in their rooms and individual nursing homes.  But my goals for the future are to bring the kind of help that I offer to them to a much larger group because I think I have a perspective that many people don’t have. And that is currently what I am working on; training staff members how to help in the nursing home and creating opportunities for families that are looking to place their loved ones in a nursing home learn from me about and how to transition their family member to a nursing home.

Is there anything that you would like people to know about what you do?

Being a psychologist is a very rewarding profession. I can always say I am doing good in the world and that’s important to me.

What do you do for a living?

I am a football coach and Co-Defensive Coordinator and linebackers coach at Mississippi State.

How would you describe what you do?

I’m a coach and a mentor to my players. I try to instill values, work ethic, motivation and those kinds of things to eighteen to twenty year old kids.  I game plan and do schemes for upcoming opponents during the week.  I try to put out the best product that we can on Saturdays and hopefully win championships.

What does your work entail?

The biggest part of it is recruiting. And the recruiting aspect is a 365 day a year process. There’s also the coaching and practice preparation, and those kinds of things change throughout the year. Starting in August we have a preseason camp that will last about a month and then the season starts. We’ll be constantly game planning during the season. Game days are on Saturdays or Thursdays, whatever the case may be. And then come December and January, we’re out on the road recruiting and visiting schools and homes every day for two months.

If you can live without football or can live without coaching, don’t do it. But if that’s what your passion is, and you wake up in the morning and that’s what you’re thinking about, dreaming about, and wanting to do, then just go all out for it.

Then February and March is off-season conditioning, getting the players ready to start spring ball and getting them in shape. Then the end of March, beginning of April is spring training where we practice amongst ourselves for about a month. Then during May, we’re out on the road recruiting again evaluating juniors and seeing high school coaches. And then the early part of June will be high school camps where we’ll have kids on our campus working out.  Then halfway through June and most of July is vacation.  Come August we crank it back up again and do the same schedule.

What does a typical work week look like?

Sunday we’ll come in if we played a game the night before and watch the previous nights or afternoon game. We’ll grade it, evaluate it, take notes on it and that same day we will start game planning on our next week’s opponent and actually have a short practice with the team. We go over corrections and start implementing the game plan for the next week’s opponent.

Then Monday we’ll get in at six in the morning and go till about eleven or twelve at night game planning for the next Saturday. Then Tuesday we’ll game plan all day, practice in the afternoon and come back in that evening and have more meetings, and watch practice on video tape. Wednesday is a little more of the same thing as Tuesday except on Wednesday nights we make recruiting calls. So when the second practice is over, we’re on the phone with recruits and coaches.

Thursday we do meetings, game planning, and finish up the weeks schedule and have practice again. And Thursday nights is usually date night with our wives, so it’ll be the first night of the week we’ll get to see our wives. Fridays are a little bit more low key but we’ll do our picture and reminders for the week for the players and we’ll have tests that we’ll have ready to give to our players that Friday night. Then we’ll have a short practice, and meetings at the hotel. And if we’re traveling, we’ll travel to wherever the game site is of whoever we’re playing. And Saturday’s is just getting ready for the game with the walk through and the pregame and then hopefully have a victory that night.  We have twelve weeks of that.

How did you get started in this career?

I played college football, and when I was done playing my college coach told me that he thought I would make a great coach. I hadn’t really thought about it that much before but I said I’d look into it. So I did student teaching at a high school and while I did that, I actually coached the high school team and just fell in love with the environment and coaching.

After that first year of coaching high school ball I got a graduate assistant job at a wonderful school up in New York City. I did that for a year, and went to graduate school. I got to coach, got my feet wet, and did a lot of grunt work. And then the next two years I was a defensive coordinator for a small Division III school up in Pennsylvania called Albright College. I then went back and did another graduate assistant job at Georgia Tech, just to get a taste of Division I, and see what division one coaching was all about. I did that for two years. After two years doing the graduate assistant job I got promoted to full time, so I was a full time division one coach. I think I was at the time twenty nine years old. I started moving up and going different places from there.

What do you like about what you do?

I just love being around the players, it helps you stay young. I also love college football and football in general. I get paid to watch tape, coach, and be involved in a college football environment every day. The impact you can have on young people’s lives and seeing them develop from an eighteen year old to a twenty two year old young man and have a big impact in their lives is extremely gratifying as well.

What do you dislike about this job?

Maybe at times the hours and the stress that the job comes with would be the only negative. But, you know, it comes with the territory. Actually, with all that being said, there is some excitement along with the stress too, it gets your adrenaline pumping so even though it could be viewed as a negative, it’s still part of what makes the job so fun.

How do you make money, or how are you compensated in this career?

Salary. I’m a salaried employee and then we’ll get bonuses for going to bowl games or good GPA’s etc. We also get paid for working camps during the summer. And then most places have either a car deal where you get a dealers car or they’ll give you a stipend to rent or lease a car.

How much money do you make as a Co-Defensive Coordinator?

Currently $280,000-300,000, in that range.

How much did you start out making in this career?

We start off as a graduate assistant, we basically get tuition and books, some meals, and maybe eight hundred dollars a month to live off of. And then my first defensive coordinator job I made twenty four thousand dollars a year. I did that for two years. I was making about $60,000 at a Division II job and then I started getting more and more compensated as I started moving on up the ranks.

What education or skills are needed to do this?

I got an undergraduate degree in sports management with a minor in coaching. A lot of people get their education degree. I went back and got my education certificate as well, just in case I wanted to coach high school football. But to be honest with you some of the classes that helped me the most were when I did some graduate work in psychology. I did graduate work in educational psychology at Fordham University and undergraduate work in educational psychology or organizational psychology at Georgia Tech.

What would you say is most challenging about what you do?

The recruiting part is probably the most challenging, because you’re going against the same scholarship that every school is able to give. And you’re competing to get to know the recruits and learn what makes them tick and what they’re looking for in a school or in an athletic program.

What would you say is most rewarding about this?

Probably when a young man calls you five, ten, or fifteen years after you’ve coached them and tells you how things that you’ve taught them or lessons that they’ve learned from being around you are actually helping them in their current profession or even with their kids. Those kind of things are probably the most rewarding, knowing that you’ve had an impact on somebody’s life.

What advice would you offer someone considering this career?

Only do it if you love it. If you can live without football or can live without coaching, don’t do it. But if that’s what your passion is, and you wake up in the morning and that’s what you’re thinking about, dreaming about, and wanting to do, then just go all out for it.

How much time to you get off?

After signing day, which is the first Wednesday in February, most coaching staffs get somewhere between three and five days off. Most coaching staffs get spring break off when the university takes spring break. Then during the summer it varies but the vacations range anywhere from three weeks to five weeks vacation during the summer. But the number of Saturdays and the number of Sundays that are spent invested in this profession far compensate any time off.

What would you say is a common misconception people have about what you do?

Probably the biggest thing that most people think is that we only work from August until November. Many people can’t understand that there are actually things to do outside of football season, and truth be told, that’s probably some of the busiest times.

What are your goals or dreams for the future for this career?

To try and put myself in a position to be a head coach of a division one school, positively impact a lot of people, try and do things the right way, help kids get their degrees and an education, and win a lot of football games.

What else would you like people to know about what you do?

I guess just that everybody sees the glory that comes from when you win games and now a days it’s almost like a TMZ society with college football on blogs, message boards, and ESPN.com. There’s a lot of negative that’s always being written about college football coaches or college football players. But the truth of the matter is 98% of the time people that are in this profession are in it for the right reasons and 98% of the kids that are involved in college football are some of the best and brightest in the country. And I think sometimes the small percentages of people that are doing negative things get overblown where the majority of people are doing great things and are really trying to make a difference. That kind of gets underplayed a little bit. There are just some great people in this profession and there are some great great kids that play this game.

This in-depth interview was conducted by one of our contest contestants Jordan Grummer.

What do you do for a living?

I’m a history professor and writer.  I teach U.S. foreign policy and political history at a major university.

Can you describe what you do on a day to day basis?

I teach 3000 and 4000 level courses on American foreign relations and one specifically on Vietnam.  I also teach a course on America since 1945. I teach two courses a semester.  When I first started I wrote notes.  I had to read and make up lectures for those, you update and change them.  I have to get ready for class before every class.  Because I try to lecture without notes as much as I can, I try to be prepared, it’s the least I can do is be organized and be prepared.  What I’m trying to do is to get most of my regular students to just be literate about history.  To know what WWII was and the basics.  I also train masters students who usually teach public school and then Ph. D.’s who teach at the college level.

So would you say your work also entails research and writing, and you do that on a day-to-day basis?

Absolutely.

What do you do with Master’s and Ph. D. students?

You teach them the literature more than just the narrative.  You teach them about the various ways that WWII has been written about—the various interpretations. And then you also teach them how to do historical research and how to write.  But then I spend probably half my time writing books and articles.  The idea at the university level is that you come here rather than going to junior college because you’re taught by people who are creating new knowledge.  You’re not just taught by people who are reading the literature and telling you about it.  You’re actually being taught by somebody who is making new knowledge in the field.  So research and teaching for me and writing are all bound up together because I initially wrote for more specialized audiences, but lately I try to write for a more general audience.  The stuff I write is researched and footnoted.  It’s reviewed in academic journals, but also its sold in Barnes and Noble—any educated lay person ought to be able to read it.  I think that’s the way you ought to be able to communicate to your students.  They don’t come in with any specialized knowledge.  But I have a routine.  I’ve been going to school since I was six. The fall semester.  The spring semester.  I used to teach in the summer time but I don’t do that anymore.

How did you get started in history?

Well, it was by accident.  My wife’s always threatening to sue me for marrying under false pretenses because I was pre-med until I was senior, and we got married before our senior year in college.  I had been admitted to medical school.  But I remember going to the University of Michigan. My brother-in-law was doing his residency there.  He was a neurologist and all of his patients were dying of brain cancer, and he was just under tremendous stress.  So I thought, “I don’t know if I want to do this.  I don’t know if I really want to be a doctor or not.”  I always liked history and literature and that sort of thing, and so I began to talk to a guy named Robert Divine who’s a historian at Texas, a big name.  So he encouraged me and that sounded like a neat thing to do.  I knew I wasn’t going to make near as much money as in medicine, but also I thought I’d have a more fun life.

What do you like about what you do?

Well, I’m my own boss.  I have to do my job and everything, but not like an office setting where you have to punch a clock.  It offers a lot of flexibility.  It was great for raising a family because my wife worked.  I could pick up the kids from school and work at the house, or I could work at night.  So it’s a great profession for a couple in with both of them are working, and I really liked that.  Now I teach the same classes over and over but my research is always different.  So I get to explore something different.  And I like writing. I like the creative process as a journalist.

What do you dislike about being a history professor/historian?

You don’t really start making any kind of money until later in your career.  Everything’s back end loaded in this profession.  It’s tough because it takes 8 years to get though college—minimum 8 years, usually ten years for your undergraduate and graduate degree and you’re not making any money then. Budgets are always tight.  It’s tough economically and financially.  It’s really really tough that way.  It tends to be somewhat isolating.  I’m a pretty gregarious person.  Writing I spend a lot of time by myself when you do research or write. I don’t like that.  But it’s a sacrifice you make.

How do you get compensated?

You’re evaluated on three categories.  Teaching and teaching evaluations by students and then by your peers.

How long did it take to get to distinguished professor?

25 years.  Most people don’t make it.  If there’s money for raises, the faculty get raises according to their merit.  When you’re promoted from rank you get a larger raise when you go from one rank to the other.  So there’s incentive to do that.

Is it pretty cut throat?

Yeah, although you either have a good record or you don’t.  Sometimes it’s based on reputation.  You’re reputation’s based on what’s on the paper.  So it’s pretty hard to fake it.

How much money do you make starting out as a historian?

I think starting salary for assistant professor in history is about $48,000 for nine months.  If there’s an opportunity to teach summer school then you get paid separate for that—not very much but probably ten percent of your salary.  The raises the last ten years have not kept up with the cost of living.  They’ve been two percent or less.

How much do you make as a historian?

$180,000/yr (This particular interviewee declined to answer this question. However they directed us where to find it because it is public knowledge since this is a university job.)

What kind of education and skills do you need to be successful as a historian?

Well, you need to go to a good graduate school.   You have to take seminars and take classes and eventually get your Phd.   I took it in US history and European history.  Then I had two thematic fields in African American history and diplomatic history.  But you take a wide variety of courses in American history, I did European history because I was going to do the Cold War.  And then you have to have two languages.  In some places you can replace statistics for one of the languages.  They teach you methodology, how to think about history, what are the various schools of thought, and then how to do research.   And if you want to write about a topic where do you get the information to write about that?  You look at presidential papers, memoirs, documents diaries, newspaper articles and other books.  You pick a topic and you research it.  It’s practice for writing your dissertation.  Then you pass your comprehensive exams which is testing over these broad fields, and then you write your dissertation which is a book length study of some particular topic.

How much reading is involved?

Thousands of books.  But you learn how to read them.  Academic books are not like a novel.  They have a thesis, and they’re trying to prove a point.  Now, they have a narrative which tells the story that you’re writing about.  Like if you’re writing about the….Battle of Gettysburg.  You’ll tell the story of Gettysburg in general terms, but if you’re thesis is the Union prevailed, you may argue, because the Confederate positioning was bad—the strategic planning was bad.  Or maybe it was logistics.  Maybe the armies weren’t being supplied properly.  So then you try to prove that point.  If you’re a Ph. D. student, you’ll know what the narrative of Gettysburg is. What you want out of that book is the point you’re trying make is.  And then did they prove that point.  You can usually read the introduction, the conclusion and maybe the first part of each chapter.  You can boil it down.  All books are reviewed by other scholars in journals, and so you can go and look at the reviews. To try to boil it down. It’s a skill.

What’s the most challenging part of the job?

Patience. You have to sit. It took me ten years to write my first biography. It took me ten years to write my second book. Patience.

When you’re writing the books do you do a lot of interviews?

I do some interviews, but a lot of people are dead.  Most of it’s archival research; Presidential libraries, the National Archives, the Library of Congress.  Most of it comes from letters, diaries, and reports.  If you’re doing foreign affairs cables between the state department and the embassy overseas then you’ll look at memorandom between the President and Secretary of State.  Those kinds of things.

How did you learn to be patient?

Fear.  If you’re not gonna get tenure what are you going to do?  You’re screwed.  You’ve wasted ten years of your life.  You got a family.  You better sit.  You better have some patience.  If you just hated it I couldn’t do it.  But you get lost in it.  It’s basically like detective work.  So you get to explore.  It’s interesting.  The more skilled you get at it, the more interesting it is.  The more efficient it is.  The less boring it is.  You set goals for yourself.  If I don’t get anything done I still can’t get up.  I’ve got to stay here until it’s don. Discipline.  That’s the key.

Whats the most rewarding aspect of it to you?

Two things.  Getting your books published and getting them well reviewed.  And then seeing students later on after they’ve graduated and gone out in the world and they come up and say I really liked this course.  They might say “I’m not necessarily using it in what I do, but I feel like it was a significant part of my education.”  And that’s rewarding.

What advice would you give to a student who’s an aspiring historian?

Make sure it’s the last thing you can do.  I mean make sure it’s the only thing you can do because it’s hard.

The job market’s flooded.  It’s been flooded since I entered the job market forty years ago.  We don’t regulate…unlike doctors or lawyers we don’t regulate the supply.  So there’s far more people looking for academic jobs than there are positions to fill.  So it’s very competitive.

It’s a major endurance test for the first 15 years.  Don’t do it because you can’t find something else to do.  You’ll get frustrated.  You can always try it.  You can get a masters and teach public school which is great.  You can get a master’s in two years, and make a decent living.  A high school history teacher now with a master’s degree probably makes close to $40,000.  That’s not great, but it’s not that different.  It used to not be that way.   So you can get a master’s program and stop there and teach public school or then you can decide to go on.

How much time off do you get/take?

I mean you can take as much as you need as long as you get your work done.  You set sort of goals for yourself.   I don’t know, it’s hard to say.  I’m older now so I don’t work as hard as I used to.   If I want to go play golf, I’ll go play golf.  If it’s a pretty day, I can go play golf on Wednesday afternoon and work on Saturday afternoon.  You see what I’m saying.   I probably take two vacations a year. There’s the school year where you teach and you come up here.  There’s 16 weeks in each semester.  But writing and teaching and research are all of one piece.  So I come up here pretty much 8 to 5.  You’ve got to, that’s the key.  And it’s hard because it takes so long to see the end product.  I had a colleague who said it’s like plowing a field.  It’s back and forth, back and forth and back and forth. It gets very tedious but then it begins to sort of come together for you.

What do you do for a living?

Business Dean and Professor of Business.

How would you describe what you do?

I basically manage the college.

What does your work entail?

It ranges considerably. I’m on the road a whole lot. I work a lot of nights, a lot of weekends. It’s definitely more than a full time job. It entails a blend of both internal and external activities. Internal to the college, internal to the university, and then external dealing with alums and friends of the college, donors to be specific.

How did you get started?

There was a lot of serendipity to it. When I was an undergraduate, I never had any clue that I would get a Ph.D., much less, go down this particular trail. Careers have life cycles, and it was just when I came to various forks in the road that I took those particular forks and I ended up at this node, if you will. I think I was a fairly typical of undergraduate students at the time, and this goes back to the Vietnam War. After I got my undergraduate degree, I was a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army for a while in the Medical Service Corp. When I got out, I pursued a Master’s degree and that’s when I really began to think that this might be for me. Prior to my military service, I really hadn’t thought about that much. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. I was pretty young but I enjoyed the Master’s program and I had some professors that encouraged me to continue my education and then one thing led to another.

What do you like about being a college dean?

I like the variety. Like tomorrow for instance, I’ll have a meeting with all the Department Chairs in the morning and then immediately after that I’ll hop a plane to St. Louis where I’ll attend a meeting. Then I come back early the next morning and I’ll hop another plane to San Francisco and meet with the University’s San Francisco Alumni Society. So, you just never know. It’s a lot of fun.

What do you dislike?

I think it’s being in a large bureaucratic organization. It’s not like being an entrepreneur where you can make rapid decisions. They’re more hurdles to jump, so that tends to slow things down. The good news about it though is that it highly encourages involvement. There’s a lot of participation in decision making. That’s probably a good thing, but on the other hand, it does slow things down.

How do you make money/or how are you compensated?

There’s a national market for Deans. When you come in from the outside the university as a new Dean, there’s a market and your salary depends on your record up to that point. It depends on the kind of school that you’re going to. Like is it a baccalaureate only university? Is it a Master’s, an undergraduate? Is it a Ph.D., a Master’s, and undergraduate? Where does it fit in the overall constellation of universities? Is it a public, is it a private? If it’s a public, is it a top 25 public? If it’s a private, is it an elite private? All of those things factor into the compensation package. So then, based upon where you personally fit and what type of university that is that you’re going to, and what discipline you’re in because Liberal Arts Deans tend not to make as much as Engineering Deans, Engineering Deans tend not to make as much as Medical School Deans. All of those things are thrown into the hopper and something spits out at the end.

How much money do you make as a dean?

In the range of $250,000 to $320,000. And then if you are at Harvard, Stanford, University of Chicago, Northwestern, those kind of elite private, if you are at a school like that and you are the Dean in this particular discipline, probably you’re compensation is at least $400,000 for 12 months. And there’s all kinds of different packages out there. Does this person get a car allowance? Do they get a housing allowance? Do they get an entertainment allowance? Do they get a country club membership? Do they get all these kinds of things? And the reason that those things are included is that Deans in this discipline are boundary spanners, and they spend a considerable amount of time interacting with others. This particular college raised $44 million last year, that’s a lot of money. And that’s necessary for us to be successful. So, somebody’s got to be out there raising those dollars, so naturally you have to do a lot of entertaining and traveling.

What education or skills are needed to do this?

There are two ways that it can be done. One is through a purely academic way where someone has an undergraduate degree, has a Master’s degree and has a Ph.D. in the appropriate discipline, and he or she also has a proven track record of performance over time. Typically, they have a record that merits full professor rank at the particular university, and that’s not easy to have a record that merits that at a university like this. I think the best candidates have a proven record of increased administrative responsibilities over time. So, you may have started out as an MBA Director, then you became a Department Chair, then you were Assistant Dean, then maybe you were Associate Dean and so forth to become Dean. On the other hand, sometimes you might have someone that becomes the Dean of a school that has a different track record of having nationally renowned business success. They may be a former CEO of a major company and it also just so happens that they have at least a Master’s degree, maybe even a Ph.D. But, they haven’t been in academia, they haven’t been teaching and researching and all of that. They have been following their career. Sometimes, those people become Deans.

What is most challenging about being a college dean?

I would say that the most difficult aspect is escalating and ever changing expectations of multiple stakeholders over time. You have students, faculty, staff, you have alums, you have senior administrators, you have competitors, you have donors, you have employers, and so they expect more and more. And what they expect may not be a particular segment of that stakeholder. Their set of expectations may not be consistent with what another group has. And so you can’t both jump and sit still at the same time. You can’t please everybody at the same time. That’s probably the most difficult part.

What is most rewarding?

When you feel that you’ve made a difference. Particularly if you’ve hired a good faculty member that you feel that would make a difference for the college, or you promote someone that’s outstanding, or you started a new program that seems to work. Things like that are fun.

What advice would you offer someone considering this career?

I would say that it would be unlikely that someone would consider being a Dean, at least as an undergraduate. I think it’s something that just has more of an evolutionary process. If someone becomes a professor first, and then he or she gets tenure second, then if someone wants to cross over to the dark side of administration, maybe they would consider it.

How much time off do you get/take?

Deans are, for the most part, considered 12-month employees. This is a regular person job, this isn’t like a university job, you don’t get semester breaks. You might get a couple of days off for Christmas or Thanksgiving, things of that nature. But except for those few circumstances and designated state holidays you just get vacation time. I have a lot of time built up that I haven’t taken and I’m sure I’ll never take it.

What is a common misconception people have about what you do?

I think a lot of people are not sure what a Dean does. They don’t know if the Dean is the same thing as the Chancellor, or the President, or the Provost. There is some confusion about that. Internally, there’s no problem, but externally, I think a lot of people that aren’t in the academy so to speak, are a little lost.

What are your goals/dreams for the future?

I hope that this particular college continues on its very positive trajectory. It’s made great strides. So, I hope that we can keep that momentum going, and I hope that we can do some new things as well. We’re starting a program in China in January and and we’re excited about that. And we started a new undergraduate program that provides undergraduates with a series of activities that we think will broaden their education beyond the classroom and it will help them in their retention. We hope that will lead them to stay here longer and to succeed.