Reflections on the First Year of the Tenure Track

It’s been one hell of a year at East Tennessee State University. Lots of highs. Some interesting lows. Overall, though I have to say, I’m pretty pleased with myself. Not pleased – in that cocky “I can do no wrong, don’t I kick ass” sort of way. Pleased with the fact that I made it through the first year. Why would I say that? I’ll tell you.

I say that because in my years in academe, I’ve seen any number of people fall off the tenure track. Some brilliant, hard-working people in fact. That’s one of the dilemmas I have regarding my dissertation. I was thinking about doing a longitudinal piece and re-interviewing those people who would be now getting tenure. Trouble is – out of my small sample – half of them didn’t make tenure. A couple of them are not in academe anymore at all. So surviving the tenure-track isn’t as easy as, say, baking a cake. Not sure why I used that analogy, because I can’t bake for crap…but whatever.

I have to say straight out that there’s no way I would have survived this first year without my comrades in Communication Studies at East Tennessee State. So a shout out to Drs. B., D, O, & K.  First off, they took a chance by hiring someone who at the time was not in academe at all, but only tangentially – going to conferences, applying for jobs – trying to get back into academe while not employed. Hiring in academe is a risky business anyway, and they certainly took a risk. Second, as collegues, they made me feel welcome. 

They let me ask my “stupid” questions and answered them, without rolling their eyes at the silliness of "The Noob." While I know at times I got on their nerves with all the questions, interruptions the - “Hey what’s with the….?” –questions, they were all gracious. I cannot emphasize how important they were to my making the most out of this first year. 

On the home front, I arrived here in Johnson City, TN with nothing, and it took me a while to get set up. For the first month, I didn’t even have a bed. When that first paycheck rolled in, I spent all of it on furniture. The following month all my money went to pay off past due bills. Nice to be getting on track that way after a year of living on unemployment. Acclimating to JC wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be, given that I’d lived in Tennessee once before, down in “The Noog.” I’ve made some friends. Found some like-minded compatriots to shoot the breeze with. I haven’t done much exploring. That will come this summer.

Not everything went as smoothly as I would have liked though. In my own opinion – and later confirmed by the student evals – my Organizational Communication class in the fall was a mess. Some of that had to do with learning the students: their expectations, their readiness, their culture. Some of that had to do with teaching a class that I hadn’t taught since 2007. So I learned some things as I went along: give four tests instead of three, drop a project that didn’t work as planned, rearrange the classroom to make it more interactive, don’t assume that everyone has (or even wants) a Twitter account, kill the two extra texts. 

What I learned from the disaster of my Org class, I incorporated into my Group Communication class. That class, I feel – though I don’t yet have the student evals to check my thoughts – went a whole lot smoother. I’m looing forward to teaching Org Com again this fall, incorporating everything I learned from the first go-round. It should be much improved. Adjust, readjust, and readjust more. 

As Dr. D explained way back last year when I was on my interview, while the university will talk a great deal about service and will talk a great deal about teaching, they will not stress publishing. “But don’t let that fool you.”  So I took that to heart immediately. So in my first year I’ve published three pieces, which I think is good, but not great. I also have two things that are in press that will come out sometime next fall. Although I post a lot of my successes on Facebook, I have an overwhelming number of rejection letters as well!!! That’s the game though, right? Just keep plugging away on the writing and the submitting. My goal is to have three per year. So far I’m on track and happy about it. If you are interested, you can find my pieces here, here, and here.

One of the things I’ve learned is not to ask “Why?” so much. Why? (Yes, irony.) Because – and I should have realized this – it’s beause when you ask, you also assume responsibility. So when I asked “Why don’t we have an Honors-in-Discipline Program in Communication Studies?” the resounding answer was “Because you haven’t started it yet.” So I did! It took a year to get the program proposed, set-up, and initiated. So in autumn, we’ll have our first honors students. I’m pretty stoked about that. Shout outs to both Dr. Harker and Professor C - both from our Theatre and Dance Division - for helping me with all the intricacies of getting the program situated and walking me though all the necessary steps. (See what I mean about good colleagues!?) Adjust, readjust, and readjust more.

There are some frustrating things as well. I’ll spare you all the details, but just list some. A committee that didn’t get its job done. Students that "checked out" mid-semester. The strange way the hiring process went for our lecturer positions. The meetings as we attempt to reinvigorate our M.A. program. Oh. And the never-ending stack of paperwork. Nothing major, just frustrating. A LOT less frustrating than working in information technology, that’s for sure!!!

Despite those frustrations, there were many things that gratified my soul. Our undergrads presenting at the Boland Research Symposium. Presenting at the Spring Mixer with Andrew, aka Classic Andrew, aka Dr. Dunn. Representing ETSU and the Communication Department at NCA and CSCA, while seeing great mentors, peers, friends, bar buddies, former academic outcasts, more friends (that's you Herbig), and #commnerds (all wrapped in one, usually).

Finding out that certain colleagues - the previously mentioned Dr. Dunn and the yet as unmentioned Dr. M. - and I can collaborate on a very cool internet–based research project. Having interesting, intelligent conversations with graduate students. Watching my undergraduates present at local non-profits. The ability to proffer up two new classes: “Technology, Communication, and Culture” and “Communication and Leadership.”

And so, rather than some “dark night of the soul” as some of the participants from my dissertation research experienced, I find myself thriving, I find myself engaged, I find myself mostly in awe that a kid – who almost never made it out of RCNJ in the first place – is in the position of having finished up his first year on the tenure track. And I couldn’t have done it without the great colleagues that I do. So with all that is in my soul, I thank you my colleagues. Here's to a great year two!

Go Bucs!

Counter-Narrative: An Important, Much Needed Book

Bud Goodall starts out with this truth: 

We on the left suck at narratives. 

We do – at least compared to the right - be that right the economic libertarians, the religious conservatives, the neo-cons, or the conspiracy theorists like the Birthers.  Slowly but surely those on the right have spun their tales so well, that what they say is too often taken for granted, as given, as the way things are and the way things ought to be. All these ‘givens’ aren’t givens at all. They are stories told over and over and over until we believe them to be true. For instance:

“Free markets should be unfettered!” (Hello financial crisis.)

“Democrats are weak on defense!” (Goodbye Osama Bin Laden!)

“Jesus was not interested in justice!” (Hello? Have you read the New Testament?)

“Obama is a Kenyan born Muslim!” (Hello long-form birth certificate!)

“Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot!” (Yes, ridicule is helpful but not constructive in the long term.)

Sure, we have facts on our side.

Yes, the deficit was caused by the Bush tax cuts and the wars.

Yes, Jesus was interested in justice.

Yes, the founding fathers were human with human foibles.

Yes, Teabaggers gave themselves that name without knowing what “Teabagging” is.

Here’s the thing: facts only matter if they are embedded in a good story. To quote Reagan’s 1988 slip up: “Facts are stupid things.” Narratives drive information, not the other way around.

Have you ever wondered how Al Queda can recruit people into killing themselves? Have you ever wondered why Glenn Beck’s conspiracies were accepted by so many? Have you ever wondered why the Birther issue will not die? Have you ever wondered why people who say they follow Jesus only follow the free-market Jesus? Have you ever wondered why academics are losing the battle over who academics are and what we do? Have you ever wondered what ever happened to the concept of the common good (clean air and water, state and national forests, public education, etc.)? Here you will find the stories conservatives tell dismantled, examined, and critiqued.

Finally Goodall doesn’t let us off the hook. He delivers to us an ultimatum.  If we don’t start actively writing our narratives to counter the conservative narratives, we will no longer have the words by which to tell our narrative.

Read it. Practice it.

"Hey Andrew, How Do You Get So Much Writing Done?"

People ask me this and I tell them I write a lot. People sometimes say, "You're really smart. That's how you get so much accomplished." "Well hold your horses," I tell them. "I'm not really THAT smart. I just work hard and I write everyday." And that's the first key. So if you really want to know how I get so much published in journals - though it's probably similar if you are writing books, magazine articles, or for a newspaper - here is what I do. None of this is original. They are ideas I've snagged from other authors, colleagues, peers, friends, mentors. 


1. Always, always write. Whether you are sitting down with a vague idea (Chaos theory and academic conferencing). Write. Or have just a bare sketch (Buffy, Spike, and Foucault). Write. Or are entertaining two opposing thoughts (Abbot and Costello Meet Punk Rock). Write. Or have come up with simply a weird title (like “Kierkegaard and Human Resources in the Modern Corporation,” for example) write. Write a little each day, write a lot each day. Write. Take Anne Lamott’s advice and write that “shitty rough draft.” No one will see it but you, so don’t worry about grammar, punctuation, references, footnotes, or any of that mundane stuff. That’s not writing. That’s editing. That comes later. Just write. Get words on the page. Sometimes they come slowly – word by word. Sometimes they come in a flourish. No matter. Write.

2. Take a break. Seriously. The pressure to publish is insane in academe. So write. Write until your P.O.S. draft is done.  Then stop. Push yourself away from your desk. Close the laptop. Whatever. Just stop. Go outside. Take the Underwater Basket Weaving class that meets every Saturday. Just don’t write. Have a beer at a local water hole. Shoot a game of pool someplace. Smoke crack. Walk the dog. Buy ferrets. Paint your abode. Work on your syllabus. Read some fiction. Go see a kickin' flick. Work on a flier for your upcoming summer class. Don’t write. For three days. Don’t write. This will refresh your mind.


3. Edit. As Bud Goodall once said, “All good writing is re-writing.” This does not mean merely editing. This means giving your work a careful read. By doing so you find concepts that are unclear and need to be expanded. Hack away the passive voice. Keep to your thesis statement. This means re-examining thoughts and ideas that may be tangential to your main argument and dumping them – perhaps they are the germ of a different piece. Like Red Leader said in Star Wars, “Stay on target.” This writing can be the real muck, but don’t be deterred. Revise, refine, rewrite. Put it away again. Just leave it be. 


4. Edit again. Here’s where things get tough. We generally like all the words we write. As the Police song goes, “I'm a walking nightmare, an arsenal of doom” and be a Demolition Wo/Man. Here’s where you kill your children. Some of them are still-births and need to be eliminated. Some of them sound grand and promote a flourish you think is delightful. Kill them. Axe them. Erase them. Murder them. While you want to maintain your voice, anything that is unneeded needs to go. Be a brutal dictator.


5. Show it to peers. For academics this is the hardest part, because we don’t like anyone to think we are stupid. There’s a lot of work and pride that goes into writing. Let me give you a hint. Nothing you write is perfect. Ever. So let it “leave your hand” and go into a colleagues'. This is absolutely important. I wrote a piece for an ethnography class I had as an M.A. student at Saint Louis University. I wrote it and rewrote it and rewrote it. I sent it out for publication over and over. Well, finally I let some other people read the thing. Turns out I was trying to do too much in that one piece. Bob Krizek read it when it was a class draft. My friend Sam read it. Eric Eisenberg read it. They all gave me great advice. I still could not get it published. Finally, I took it to the Young Scholars class at CSCA. This group of scholars said, “Andrew, its almost like you have two pieces here. One on the process of organizing at a new nonprofit, and one on your own personal narrative as a punk rocker returning to the scene after a dozen years.” They were correct. I broke it into two pieces. One piece is out. The other is in press. If I had never shown it to anyone, I’d never recognized the problem.


6. Edit. Again. Word by word. Punctuation mark by punctuation mark. Line by line. Reference by reference. Work out those transitional sentences that connect paragraph to paragraph. (Confession: I hate those sentences. I stink at them. For me they are the most arduous task. Still they must be done.) Essential tedium.


7. Send it out. Pick a journal that matches what your subject is and what your method is. I’m a qualitative researcher, so as much as I’d like to get something published in Communication Monographs, that’s not going to happen. There’s no goodness of fit. Don’t mess with journals that don’t do what you do. I don’t want to waste my time and the editor’s time either. Search out journals. As a qualitative organizational communication scholar, I had to find my outlets. Like what? Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management: An International Journal. Journal of Loss & Trauma. Qualitative Inquiry. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication. Studies in Symbolic Interaction. Journal of Organizational Ethnography. International Review of Qualitative Research. Qualitative Communication Research. If it gets rejected outright – send it to the next journal on your list. Don’t waste time feeling sorry for yourself. When you get a revise and resubmit, revise and resubmit. Period.

8. Keep writing. I generally have two or three things always in progress. When something is accepted for publication, I begin a new piece, even if that possible piece is some hackneyed idea like “Adding bleach to the laundry as a speech act.” Brainstorm. Read good fiction ( I prefer Horror and Hard-Boiled Detectives) and nonfiction. Write. Keep writing. Always write. Every day. Every day. That’s the only way to progress.


Bonus step: Unplug. Kill your cable. There's nothing on there anyway. Hulu or Netflix what you really want to watch. Seriously. You'll never realize how much time you have to write until you realize how much time you have to write.

My New Course: Technology, Communication, and Culture

A new class that I've prepped for the summer. It is the first new class I've proposed and with the help of my chair, Dr. Amber Kinser (who I cannot thank enough for making sure this new faculty member knows what he's doing) this has been a pretty darn smooth process.

Now the only question will be if it 'makes.' If it makes, that would be the first step into getting into the Communication Department rotation. Here's hoping!

An Open Letter to President Obama from Someone "On Notice"

Dear Mr. President,

In your last State of the Union you put public higher education “on notice,” if we do not to try to keep costs down. I’ve been in academe for over 10 years both in information technology and more recently as faculty. Let me give you a little advice. Universities are raising tuition for two basic reasons: cuts in public funding and cuts in student aid. Not loans. Aid.

Universities now receive less funding from state government and more financial patronage from industry. Over the last thirty years, states have cut their budgets for postsecondary education by a national average of 34 percent. At the same time, vocational training in universities increased due to pressure from both students – who want to graduate and attain employment – and industries that need students to have certain skills. Institutions of higher education began engaging in market-like behaviors, a kind of “academic capitalism” in which educational outcomes (students and artifacts of research) are “products.” In the past twenty years, university autonomy has shrunk under the pressure of government, industry and student demands for accountability. Academia is becoming managed. We are doing more with less. This has led to some interesting consequences.

For example, as of 2003 only 44.9 percent of all faculty members hold full-time tenured positions. Schuster & Finkelstein conclude “contingent or term appointments became during the past decade the modal form of new full-time faculty appointments” (p. 55). In addition, from 1993 to the present, the percentage of all newly hired full-time faculty appointed to non-tenure track positions increased every year from barely more than 50 percent to almost three in five. Looking through a wider lens, in the last thirty years the categories of full- and part-time non-tenure-track faculty—both increased by over 200 percent. Just as in other areas of the economy, more and more faculty members are “outsourcers.” Outsourcers are contingent, non-traditional, term contracted employees, who are solely responsible for their career development and receive little, if any, organizational support, benefits, or recognition.

So in reality Mr. President we have been cutting back for years by hiring part-timers over tenure track faculty members. Guess what? It still doesn’t make up for all the cuts in government funding. It’s time to stop treating a higher education as a commodity and like a public good again.

Mr. President, your threat to put us “on notice” is redundant. We’ve been on notice for twenty years.

Sincerely,

Dr. Andrew F. Herrmann

On Teaching Group Communication Well, Pt 2

Serendipity? Coincidence? A link into the divine? Whatever the case, I’ll take it. 

In my last post I began talking about my Group Communication class. I included some of the dilemmas all teachers face when dealing with group work and engaging students in both theory and practice. Well, then a friend and mentor of mine – Bud Goodall – posted something on Facebook. 

It is a New York Times article called “The Rise of the New Groupthink” that plainly states,

“Research strongly suggests that people are more creative when they enjoy privacy and freedom from interruption.”

I agree with some of the assessment – that group work for group work’s sake is a pointless exercise. Anyone who has been sitting in a meeting to ‘brainstorm’ some totally nonsensical idea knows what I mean. (Especially if the boss isn’t going to take those ideas seriously anyway – but that’s another story of faux participation and paradoxes in organizations.)

However, the point of my Group Communication class is to bring communication theory to life and allow students to learn experientially. The author of the Times’ piece writes:

‎"But it’s one thing to associate with a group in which each member works autonomously on his piece of the puzzle."

And this is my thought process when I teach group communication. Sure students work in groups, but each person must come to the group with something of value to put on the table. Nor are the class group projects 'useless,' but vary in degrees of length, from the short to the large, and in complexity. Which brings me to what this post was supposed to be about: The assignments from my Group Communication class.

The first is an individual project: Strengthsfinder Paper: A one page paper that explains your strength based on the Strengthsfinder assessment, including a self-reflection on where you have seen this particular strength active in your own life.

Rationale: Most students haven’t spent a lot of time with Socrates’ dictum “Know thyself.” What can they bring to the table? What do they need to know about themselves and the way they relate to other people? This is an exploration of their talent. It’s what they bring to the table.

“Quad-Group” Discussion (QGD): Each initial smaller group of approximately 4 people (hence the term “Quad”) will lead a discussion (for about 30 minutes) on some section of the Rothwell text, between Chapters 4 through 5 to be negotiated in class with other groups and me. Please note that this is NOT a presentation, but a discussion. It consists of four parts:

One week prior to your presentation you must find and send a related academic article to everyone in the class.

Lead a discussion for 25 minutes on your topic.

A one-page handout for your classmates.

An activity to go along with your discussion.

Rationale: A short project to start. Something within the safe confine of the classroom experience. Think of this as the ‘getting to know each other’ part of this group experience. This is not a presentation (no PowerPoints) but a discussion of the topic they have negotiated with the other groups and myself.

"The Edge” Assignment: Each “Quad Group” will set up a time with ETSU’s “The Edge” radio station and lend their voices for a drop, a legal, a promo, a sting, or an ad.

Rationale: Stepping out into the world, even if it still the ETSU world. The groups have to make the contacts, set up the appointments with the General Manager, and then go into the studio and create what the GM determines needs to be made. This gives them practical experience in those areas, as well as lending their voices to the Broadcast Division of the Communication Department.

Dinner and the FSNP Paper: Two “Quad-Groups” will combine to become a “Double-Quad.” This larger group will have to plan a meal from scratch, eat that meal together, and produce one co-written paper. I will be looking for evidence of your group's development and its accomplishments, and of the various contributions to the dinner and the writing process. This five-page co-constructed paper is your group response to how your “Double-Quad” worked together, concentrating on the forming, storming, norming, and performing (FSNP) aspects of group development. You will present to the class you dinner menu, and a brief discussion of the group project. 

Rationale: Leaders and other roles are generally in place within the “Quads” by the time this project rolls around. This stirs things up. Power struggles often raise their heads as groups come together. Negotiating is more difficult and the number of persons in the group makes every thing more chaotic and complex. HOWEVER, the actual project of making dinner together provides students with a pretty relaxing, fun, enjoyable atmosphere – plus they get to eat well.

The “Double-Quad” Volunteer Project & Paper: Each “Double-Quad” will volunteer with a nonprofit organization in the greater Johnson City area to complete a project of some significance both to the agency you're working for and to yourselves and your group. Group members must work together on location for at least 7 hours during the semester--some might involve much more than this, depending on how much off-site preparation is required. The objective here is, as best you can, to do something for an organization that involves your group as a group and that utilizes your group's unique abilities. Documentation is essential. The grade for this project consists of two components on which you will be graded: A professional presentation to the organization for which you volunteered, which I also attend. A co-constructed paper of 12 pages (not including references) on how the team worked while doing your volunteer project, what theoretical concepts you found informative as you worked through the process of becoming a group, the accomplishment of the necessary tasks, as well as the struggles and dilemmas you encountered.

Rationale: The big Kahuna!: serving the Johnson City community. Getting students involved with individuals they don’t necessarily run into in their daily lives. For example when I did this at USF, one group worked at the Moffett Cancer Center. At Mizzou one group worked with a home for abused children. Another for a literacy program. Another for the local animal shelter. Another for undernourished kids. A LOT of planning and collaborating and negotiating goes into, not only the project, but the co-written paper. Students found these projects not only useful, but self-fulfilling.

So that’s it. Taking theory and making it practical. Going from small groups and small projects to larger groups and larger projects. While Organizational communication is my passion, this is –by far – my favorite class to teach.

Speech Com/Com Studies Career and Job Titles

Whenever I see 'lists' of career choices for Speech/Communication Studies undergraduates, I always laugh at their ridiculousness. Speechwriter. Novelist.  DJ. Actor. Actress. That is a very idealized list and always irritates me. How many of us are going to be this guy?

Yeah. 
None of us. 


He is Bob Costas. 


I am not. 


You are not.

Or this guy?

Sorry, there's only one Letterman.


Just 
like 
there 
is
only 
one......

David Boreanaz

aka

Angel

aka

Special 

Agent

Seeley

Booth.

So let's get real. 

Sure you could become a famous actor or broadcaster or DJ or talk show host, but it is much more likely you are going to have a successful career doing something else. Like working in investor relations, or as a crisis communication specialist, or a human resources manager, or a recruiter, or any number of awesome career options. 

I worked in publishing, graphic design, advertising, and information technology. I got these jobs why? Not because I was the most brilliant, but because I could communicate. For example I did not get my technology position only because of my tech skills, but because I could make technological information understandable to non-technologists. 

I could communicate about technology.

Communication has also helped me change careers...important in this ever-changing world of globalization, where this year's job is next year's place on the unemployment line. 

Given the goofiness of "the famous people/famous careers" list that proliferates for Speech/Communication Studies, here's what I did. I went online and did a search via LinkedIn on individuals who studied Speech and/or Communication Studies as undergraduates. From the data I collected, I created this Wordle that presents the most commonly found career/job titles.

The original link to the Wordle site (and the ability to see it larger) where I created this cloud is here.

So there it is. An updated and realistic look at 

Speech Communication/Communication Studies careers and jobs. 

Talk to the professors who will be teaching 
the classes that interest you.

Look into the classes you want to take. 


For ETSU Students:

Communication in Organizations

Interpersonal

Business & Professional 

Argumentation & Debate

Gender & Communication

Persuasion

Dynamics of Group Leadership

Speech Communication

Skills for Life

Where I'm Not Doctor H (A Letter to Christian Friends)

HI there my church people!

You know, once upon a time believers used to be THE most important intellectuals. Believers were the philosophers, the theologians, the scientists, and the sociologists. Here is a short list of fantastic Christians who used their brains to accomplish God’s work:

Soren Kierkegaard, the (grand) father of psychiatry and existentialism

Michael Faraday, physicist

JRR Tolkien, Lord of the Rings

Fyodor Dostoyevsky, author of The Brothers K, The Idiot, Crime & Punishment

Leo Tolstoy, author of War and Peace

Friedrich Schleiermacher, theologian and philosopher

Blaise Pascal, mathematician, physicist, and religious philosopher

Gregor Mendel, founder of modern genetics

John Wallis, cryptographer who helped develop calculus

John Ray, botanist

C.S. Lewis, Chronicles of Narnia

Arthur Compton, Nobel Prize winning physicist.

T.S. Eliot, Poet

Of course this list does not include all brilliant religious writers: Augustine, Aquinas, Anselm, Jerome, Gregory of Nyssa, Luther, Calvin, John Knox, and Jacobus Arminius. The writers of the Bible were all literate. St. Paul was, in fact, an intellectual.

God didn’t give me George Clooney or Brad Pitt looks. He did not load me up with the athletic ability of a Michael Phelps or a Serena Williams. He did not don me with the skills of oratory like Barak Obama or Winston Churchill. He did not bestow upon me a voice like Bono or Sting. He didn’t hand me the musical ability of an Andy Summers, Jimmy Page, Kevin Max or either of the White siblings.

No God didn’t bless me with any of these things. What He blessed me with was a sharp mind and the ability to use it. He gave me the brains to get my Ph.D. And I did. Yet I feel so uncomfortable that I don’t want to tell anyone in church that I am Dr. Herrmann. We have a “Check Your Brain at the Door” policy. Smart people are somehow not to be trusted. I don’t know why this is. We shouldn’t be afraid. We should be up to the intellectual challenge.

All I know is that God gave me my mind and I intend to use it. In church. 


If you will let me that is.