Writing and working beyond the MFA

All are welcome to this afternoon's conversation about writing and working beyond the MFA.

Michael Meyer, Bill Lychack, Angie Cruz
“Professional and Publication Options for MFAs”
Fri., Sept. 28 //  CL 216 // 2 – 3:30 pm
This session is a one-stop destination for MFAs at all stages and for wide-ranging questions and discussion. We will cover topics such as submitting work for publication, writing query letters, building a strong résumé, and understanding the book publishing industry.  We will also discuss the range of potential careers and fields that MFAs may enter after the degree, and how to prepare for them.
Inquiries: Ryan McDermott at rjm95 at pitt dot edu

On maintaining your Web presence . . .

Ryan Cordell's blog post about a recent workshop on creating and maintaining your academic Web presence will be especially interesting to Digital Humanities folks.

What's new from around the Web

My friend Ryan Cordell has a great roundup of recent Web resources for the English academic job search on his site. Ryan crowdsourced this post from his substantial Twitter following, which includes most of the folks at ProfHacker, to which he's a regular contributor.

The New Generation of Job Search Advice

When I started tracking changes in the job market several years ago, the big news was that the market was now changing year by year. Now new wrinkles worry the course of the job search month by month. The new generation of job seekers has to be nimble, well informed, and quick to respond. 

Our Graduate Placement Committee has a treasure trove of job-seeking tips, wisdom, and lore we've collected over the years. Much of that is available on our Google Drive site, available to University of Pittsburgh English graduate students only, because it contains a large number of sample personal materials that people from our department and beyond have been kind enough to share, but don't want circulating widely. (To get access, contact Ryan McDermott, chair of the Graduate Placement and Professional Development Committee.)

However, the treasure-trove method can't keep up with the fast pace at which the academic job market is changing these days. This blog will track some of those changes, and also collate some of the up-to-date treasure trove of advice out there in the blogosphere.