knowing when enough is enough

The past couple of days, I’ve been thinking about a memory from my junior year of college. It was the end of a semester, and on top of all of my own finals, I was teaching FREN 102 for the first time, so my end-of-semester was busier than it had been in previous years. I don’t remember all of this busy time, but I do remember specific parts of taking my online FREN 362 (French Civilization II) final while sitting in the office shared by instructors from the Department of French and Italian and the Department of Scandinavian Studies. I had either left this final for last or was trying to get it out of the way first—either way, I specifically remember feeling as I was navigating through different pages in the LMS that I had done enough work—in this class generally and for the final in particular—and that there were other things that needed my time and effort more. It was time to submit and to move on.

Anyway, this has been coming to mind because I just submitted my tenure dossier, and while this is a document with a lot higher stakes than a final for a single undergraduate French class, I’ve been having a similar instinctive feeling. At the University of Kentucky, we have two review processes as junior faculty, and the second year and fourth year reviews are both very similar in format to the tenure dossier. So, I’ve had versions of my research, teaching, and service statements around for a while, and as I’ve been working on my tenure dossier this summer, I haven’t been inclined to spend a lot of time reinventing the wheel. I have overhauled my research statement—largely as an exercise in personal reflection about who I want to be as a researcher—but since my teaching and service statements have gone over well in the past, I’ve made some updates to them but haven’t spent a lot of time doing major edits. Even with my research statement, I’ve reached a point where I feel the same way I did sitting in that student instructor office: I’ve done enough work, and there are other things that need my time and effort now.

That worked out well for me in FREN 362, and I attributed it to a kind of personal instinct for what’s really important to do and when I can afford to quit. As I’ve already mentioned, though, there are more stakes involved in a tenure dossier, and I’m a bit more nervous leaning on that same instinct instead of taking another week or two to fine-tune things before submitting. I do know that I’ve done plenty of work, though, and I’m very conscious that there’s plenty of other things that need my attention now (from a new alternative textbook for the Fall to spending time with kiddo before she starts at a new school). It’s time to submit and turn my attention to other things.

• macro
• Work
• tenure
• tenure application
• French teaching
• BYU
• University of Kentucky
• tenure and promotion

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