After not getting a faculty job (and after a couple of postdocs) a wrote an essay about failure in academia. At the urging of a friend, I pitched it to a place that liked it and published it. The response was really surprising to me, all the kind random messages I got. And someone asked if I wanted to apply for a job opening they had, teaching writing at a university. A couple of weeks later I had moved and was in the classroom, the last place I expected to be. It was teaching in an area I never expected and not research in my field, but I've always enjoyed the teaching part of university life.
And that story, along with all the rest here, is what I tell my students about putting work out there. Good and surprising things happen!
After not getting a faculty job (and after a couple of postdocs) a wrote an essay about failure in academia. At the urging of a friend, I pitched it to a place that liked it and published it. The response was really surprising to me, all the kind random messages I got. And someone asked if I wanted to apply for a job opening they had, teaching writing at a university. A couple of weeks later I had moved and was in the classroom, the last place I expected to be. It was teaching in an area I never expected and not research in my field, but I've always enjoyed the teaching part of university life.
And that story, along with all the rest here, is what I tell my students about putting work out there. Good and surprising things happen!