aelfgyfu_mead | Way overdue update

So it has been FAR TOO LONG since I did any kind of personal update or even what I'm reading and watching. I'm not sure why, but it feels like the longer I wait to give an update, the more impossible it becomes: I want to say G, but I haven't posted about F and I must do that, and wait, I've also got to post about E; E should really come first. But before that. . . . And pretty soon, I don't post.

So I'm about a year late, but some good news: last summer, I was promoted to professor.

For those who aren't from the US or don't know how tenure works: In the US system, the tenure line generally works like this: after one is fortunate enough to get a tenure-track job (which involves several stages and usually at least two interviews, one taking one to two days and happening on the campus one would join), one starts at assistant professor. After six years (sometimes a little less if one has done extraordinary work or, like me, started a tenure-line position elsewhere), one can apply for tenure and promotion to associate professor. I succeeded so many years ago that it would be embarrassing to tell. Tenure means I can't just be fired at will; the university would have to show cause and follow procedures. Before tenure, they can and do simply not renew people, so one could find that one simply doesn't have a job the next fall, and yes, this really happens. After six more years, if one has been successful enough, one can apply for full professor (the title used with a name is just Professor: I'm now Professor Ælfgyfu). But I hadn't accomplished enough after six years, or seven. So after [mumble] years, I finally made it to the point where I could apply. I went through a year-long application process that involved filling out a thick binder's worth of forms, creating another binder about my teaching, and creating a third binder about my research. Several esteemed external reviewers from my field read my research and wrote letters. My materials were judged by a committee of tenured colleagues in my department, my chair, a committee of tenured colleagues in the college, the dean, another committee, and the provost. All approved me, and thus I was promoted.

I believe in the UK the equivalent title is senior lecturer or possibly reader (I'm not entirely clear on this title). I'm in the highest position I can simply earn by applying. Professor in the UK is a title of even higher distinction; in the US, that would be a named professorship (the Smith Professor of X) or Distinguished Professor/Distinguished University Professor. At many universities, one can't just apply for these; one is selected. Or one can apply, but only one or three or five out of a whole college or university will get it every X year(s), so highly competitive.

In Australia, I think the equivalent is Associate Professor; Wikipedia says y'all have a five-step hierarchy as opposed to our three.

It's an honor and a huge relief. At a time when so few academic positions have tenure, it was wonderful just to have tenure. Now I don't even have to worry about moving further up the ladder. I also got an excellent raise which has already allowed us to do things we probably wouldn't otherwise have done. I have a stronger voice in my department and my university because I don't have to worry I'll be rejected for promotion if I raise objections (which I had already been doing but with more anxiety). And my title carries a little more weight on recommendations for my students.