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Forms of People, People and Forms

By Rob Heverly

In our exchange a couple of days ago, Tim asked (in the comments) my thoughts on the AALS "Faculty Appointments Form" used for the Faculty Recruitment Conference. His questions:

My question for Rob, in his capacity as a candidate, is whether he would revise the FAR form in any way (perhaps the topic of another post). Does it solicit info that shouldn't be requested (e.g., ethnicity) or is of little use? Does it fail to solicit info that might be helpful to committees? Query what might happen if candidates were identifiable solely by a number, and all scheduling of interviews in DC was coordinated on a "blind" basis through a central agency. Good idea? Or have I lost my marbles? (It certainly would be a challenge to go "blind," as published scholarship is traceable to an author. But there are ways around this.)

I have thought a lot about these questions over the past few days while I was attending the Intellectual Property Scholars Conference at Cardozo Law School  (Cardozo put on a wonderful conference, by the way, and the presentations -- and the in-between conversations -- were interesting and thought provoking; see Rebecca Tushnet's blog for further details of the event).

Why have I thought so much about it since Tim asked? Because I'm so conflicted about it. There are a lot (and this year there promises to be a LOT) of candidates, and thus a lot of forms. Given the sheer volume, something has to give if schools are to see and be able to handle in some way (if not, perhaps, the best way) the number of candidates interested in teaching. In choosing what "fits" on the form, then, we need to consider not only what we need to know to find the best candidates (and to allow the best candidates to be found), but also what hiring committees can reasonably be expected to consider in the time available to them (while continuing to teach, research -- let's not forget the fall publishing window is open during the period prior to the Faculty Recruitment Conference -- and, oh yeah, have lives and families).

It seems to me that I need more information about how the forms are actually used before I can realistically say what I would like to have added or removed. If ethnicity is not actually used by schools as an element of hiring (ie, if it's there for statistical reasons but schools don't rely on it), then we need not even talk about it (I think ethnicity is an important element in obtaining a diverse faculty, a goal I strongly support, but for now, we'll put that discussion aside). But even more basic than what information is used is the question of how it is used. That is, I understand some schools print all the forms in an entire distribution, put them in binders, and committee members actually look through each one. At other schools the forms are divided up, and committee members see only their own and the "best" of the other batches as chosen by their colleagues.

I also understand that the forms are available electronically. If this is the case, do some schools or committees first search for certain characteristics and then print only those forms? Or do they print them all and then run searches to get lists of the forms for "relevant" candidates?

If I had a better idea of what committees "do" with the forms, I might better be able to think about ways I might "improve" the form from a current candidate's point of view, to let you know what I know about myself that might be relevant in this context (keeping in mind committee members have already been through this, and so have perhaps even better insights than I do at this point with my one-sided experiences with them). I would be very much opposed to a "blind" process, but I'll go into that with a post that responds to any comments on this one.

That brings us to some questions for committee members about the form and related activities:

1. How much time do you spend with each form on the first pass (please be realistic here)?
2. Are all the forms printed for all committee members at your school, or are they "divided up" or not printed at all?
3. How do you use the electronic versions of the forms?
4. If you "sort" (either manually or electronically), what are the primary sorters (ie, education, teaching interest, geographic interest, etc.)?
5. How do you handle "cold sent" CVs to the committee (a "cold sent" CV is one that is sent directly by a  candidate without a relationship with the chair or committee member to whom it is sent)?
6. How do you handle "referral CVs" (a "referral CV" is one forwarded by someone known to the committee, either another faculty member at the institution or a faculty member at another institution

I'm sure there are some things that I'll want to know later, but if we can get some input here from committee members and chairs (current or past), I'll do my best to rethink Tim's questions and provide some current candidate feedback on the form itself. Oh, and please feel free to answer just some of the above, even if you don't answer all of them.

Full post as published by The Faculty Lounge on August 09, 2009 (boomark / email).