On the Academic Rat Race
- SJ Williamson
- 6 days ago
- 7 min read
You haven't heard from me much nowadays because I'm trying to keep up with the academic rat race. Here's what is going on behind the scenes of my life during my last year of graduate school.
Present & Publish
I have been hustling to publish my work for the last three years. Different parties have different understandings of the research to publication pipeline. Some recommend turning seminar papers into conference presentations then articles. Others suggest shortening articles into conference presentations. Some do one or the other, not both presentation and publication. I find myself leaning more and more towards publishing first then presenting at conferences. Why? I'm honestly scared of people scooping or AI scraping my work.
Earlier in my graduate career, I bolstered my CV (my life history as opposed to a resume) with conference presentations that helped me build my confidence as a scholar and presenter while also meeting heroes in my field and meeting colleagues to work with on various projects. Conferences such as NCTE CCCC, RSA Conference, and various regional meetings for MLA became the highlight of my semester. I got to travel, meet people, and feel a newly inspired devotion to my field and my students.
However, this left my unpublished work and ideas open to others in search of publication topics. Even in graduate classes, I feared sharing my research and seminar papers with classmates before they were published because classmates who originally had no interest in my research areas suddenly became interested "experts" in my field. People around me without disabilities became scholars of disabilities studies. AI started producing papers on my ideas for undergraduates in my classes. I'd see some shared publications in the field match my own research methods or research questions, making me feel as if my work was no longer viable because of it's lack of freshness.
This led to negative emotions, rejection sensitivity, and a newfound need to research, write, and publish faster than I was. Would I be seen as a rip off if someone scooped my research before I published it? It's been very frustrating. So since 2024, I decided to focus on publishing first then sharing my ideas with others. The problem with that is the publication process varies according to journals, editors, and my writing's ability to "fit" the journal and it's readers. I still feel clueless about how some of my peers are publishing so quickly while my book review from 2023 is still in editing over 3 years later. I've revised it and reviewed it for grammatical correctness over 4 times by now. I'm still waiting for my conference presentation from 2024 to be published in the conference proceedings. I'm still waiting for a book chapter from 2024 to be revised with request for editing before publication. And I have peers publishing research within 7 months of starting their data collection.
I moved to the Midwest and enjoyed the culture out here that seemed to lack a rat race feel that most of my California experiences held. Graduate school in the Midwest did not hold true to this feeling though. Competitive International fellow graduate students brought with their culture the rat race, the competition I did not want to be a part of. Even when I have tried to set boundaries between competition and my own personal and professional goals, the competition leaked in between the cracks. I could delete peers from social media, but could not escape emails on the department Listserv praising each publication announcement. I could work from home as much as possible, but would still run into people when I needed to access school resources. And they would share a piece of their life story with me while I felt uncomfortable sharing any of mine. I could be patient and focus on my work, but still felt pressure from looming deadlines for edits, revisions, and abstract proposals. There is no way to truly separate the work from the competitive context in graduate school.
So where does all this lead? I currently have three book chapters and one article in the revision and editing process. I have a book review and conference proceeding in limbo, waiting for publication after several years and rounds of editing. I am currently finishing edits for an article I have yet to send to a new journal for assessment of fit. I have yet to see any of my publications see the light of day while I see colleagues publishing left and right at the speed of light. And I am exhausted by it all.
The Job Market
The academic job market is not like other job markets. I have applied to over 120 jobs in academia including tenure-track professorships, teaching professorships, research assistantships, post-doctoral positions, and administration positions. Currently, my field and research interests make it hard for me to get a job in a blue state because so many long-standing professors in the field are leaving red states in crowds to protect their teaching and research rights. I heard from one committee that I was one of over 300 applications for one professor position in a blue state. I don't blame anyone for not moving me forward in similar positions. These applications ask for a range of documents: my transcripts, my CV, my teaching philosophy, my research plans, samples of my writing for publication, and sample syllabi, class assignments, and lesson plans. And of course, the boring long online applications about my citizenship status, contact information, job history, education, and demographics. It is repetitive and a pain in the ass. At least in academia I have yet to do a job application that requires me to take a long assessment like alt-ac careers have (gross unpaid labor).
I have done over 40 Zoom and phone call interviews. I feel like an expert at these by now. Some last 10 minutes, some last 45. I've come to feel like the shorter ones don't really introduce the hiring committees to my true self. Many questions are the same, though. Why us? Why now? What influences your teaching? What are your plans for future research? How do you incorporate AI and digital tools into the classroom? What skills did you learn from administration and mentorship positions? What questions do you have for us? I have it down to a science minus the rare outlier question.
After those initial interviews. I wait. Sometimes it is months. Once it was 7 hours. But they let me know if I've been moved forward or not. The next step is usually scheduling a campus visit. I travel to campus, and meet with potential co-workers, supervisors, deans, city councilors, students, and HR representatives. I teach a sample lesson, sometimes to real students, sometimes to faculty pretending to be students. I give a short chalk talk (on my research). I have lunch and sometimes dinner with the committee to see if we vibe well. If I'm lucky, I get a tour of the campus and surrounding town. Then I travel back home until the next reason to leave Fargo. I've done this 5 times so far since December 2025. And it is a lot. Traveling by plane when you're afraid of flying isn't a great effect on the body when you're doing it at least once a month for several months in a row. I enjoy meeting people and traveling, but doing such knowing I am being judged and compared to see if I am good enough adds a layer of complexity to it. It isn't always fun.
Then I wait again. Usually 2 to 3 weeks, and up to 7 weeks for one that I was an early applicant for. Will they call or email me with a job offer? Or will they reject me after all of it, leaving me wondering why I was not the one? So far, I have received 2 offers. I rejected them because they didn't have the right fit, compensation, or workload I feel I need to succeed in my work and survive. The problem with each rejection is wondering if I'll ever get a job that meets my standards or if I will eventually have to settle for a position that is good enough just to not be jobless. The anxiety weighs heavily on me. I think I'd be happy to accept any position in my field where I have friends or family, but the competition is still too fierce. At this rate I am tired of the job market and debate just not applying to anymore positions and if nothing moves forward, I can try again next year.
Diss ain't Shit
This all comes back to my dissertation research. The rejection of my literature review never being long enough or well-worded enough makes me anxious about moving forward. I have already done a lot of data analysis, but feel the need to wait to submit those chapters because my literature review is suffering and I don't know how to fix it. Tutors, committee members, and peers have been unable to give me guidance that I feel I can follow to improve this one dang chapter. It has been the bane of my existence for the last 3 months. Will I finish and graduate this summer? Yes. But the path there is rocky and fueled by negative emotions related to publication and the job market. It all builds up to me feeling like my diss ain't shit. I know only a small handful of people will read my diss and one chapter is becoming an article after revisions. Still, I feel stuck.
Basically, all of these areas cause me anxiety. I love teaching and research. I love conferences and exploring new places. I love working with colleagues across the world on similar issues. Yet all the stress has made me tired of the rat race. I wasn't built to perform. I'm built to accomplish goals and help others without needing to compete. And the competition is ruining my life. But yeah, that's my life this semester. If I seem like I'm just traveling a lot and having fun, I am not. But I know the end of that is on the horizon. I'm just tired of talking about it.
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