Assistant Professors

FamilyCareers

  • Author Marcus Lim
  • Published April 28, 2010
  • Word count 701

Assistant professors are very similar to what you would expect a traditional professor to be, except for they are not tenured. This means that nearly every professor in an American university will have started off as an assistant professor. After a period of 4-8 years in this position, the assistant professor is either tenured or let go to apply at a different university. Basically, this term can be applied to any post-secondary instructor who is tenured, although this is not necessarily the correct definition. If you are looking for one of these jobs, your best bet is to get your first university degree and go from there.

These careers are definitely not for everyone, as it takes a great deal of education to become a professor. You will need a PhD in order to get one of the jobs, although it can be in nearly any subject that is taught at a university. One thing to keep in mind is that an assistant professor is not forced to assist more senior professors, but will rather have classes of his or her own to deal with. This is much different from a traditional teacher's assistant job, as these assistant professor jobs call for the professor to be just as prepared as a senior professor would be.

Another thing to keep in mind when applying for one of these jobs is that many different things will go into the hiring process. For starters, you must have experience in research, teaching, and administration in order to be considered. The amount of experience that you must have will be entirely dependent on the school, but generally liberal arts schools place a higher emphasis on the actual teaching performance. If you are attempting to get one of these jobs with a school that offers PhDs, your research contributions will be more important than anything else. In the end, you must be able to sell your contributions to the school in order to have a chance at being hired by anything of them.

There are a few different things that you must deal wit before being hired, starting with external reviews. These reviewers will take a look at your application and all of the contributions that you have made over the years. They will then submit a report to the school about your qualifications that will carry a great deal of weight in whether or not you get one of these jobs.

Next, the university's subcommittee will take a look at this repot and make an official recommendation to the school based on its findings. Once this has been completed, a vote will take place and a final decision will be reached based on this vote. If you do manage to receive one of these jobs, you can expect a great deal of work, but it will be well worth it in the end because you will have your foot in the door with the university.

Assistant professors generally do not have to deal with too much administrative duty until they reach the senior level. This allows them to focus solely on their research and the teaching aspect of the job, which is great for their professional development. After a certain amount of time has been spent as an assistant, the individual is able to apply to become a more senior level of the staff, which brings about more responsibly. This added responsibility also brings about more pay, which is why these careers are so desirable for anyone who has achieved a PhD in any subject.

The good news about these careers is that there is countless room for advancement and there are always schools hiring. The bad news is that it takes a great deal of schooling to get to this point, as you must have a PhD in a particular subject to even be considered for a role. The reason why this schooling is necessary is that these individuals are responsible for teaching the next generation the skills that are needed for success. Every assistant professor was taught by someone who had to go through a similar level of schooling, so is makes sense that this level of education is needed for these prestigious jobs.

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