I know the academic job market has been tough for decades, but people in my field often do land tenure-track positions. Watching colleagues secure TT roles has become incredibly painful. I recognize that my communication skills aren’t perfect, and my English occasionally has errors, but the value of my research, teaching, and mentoring has consistently been acknowledged.
Does luck play a significant role in this process? Maybe I’m just unlucky or perhaps this world really is unfair from start to finish. Coming from a working-class family background, raised by an abusive single mom, achieving a PhD and postdoc feels like such an accomplishment. But when I look around, it seems like those from wealthier backgrounds secure better positions faster, widening the gap even more. I’m honestly just shattered and emotionally so drained. I am losing my energy and confidence to try another year after endless rejections, and I am afraid that failure after failure is like gravity that never lets me go…
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I don’t know what to say other than it’s tough sledding out there right now, so keep grinding and try to find an instructional or adjunct position to gain experience until the next round in the hiring cycle.
Most people in academia come from middle class backgrounds but they are not “wealthy.” (Most wealthy people would never choose to work as hard as you have to as an academic.)
You mentioned communication skills and English. Are those things you need to work on? Be honest with yourself. Students will complain about heavily accented English and while faculty would never say anything, it could be a factor. I am not saying this applies to you, just brainstorming. (We used to have a faculty member with a heavy German accent and the students complained like clockwork. He was a spousal hire and might have had a harder time otherwise.)
I had to do a postdoc and research in an NGO before getting a job (and I am upper middle class). It’s pretty common that you have to grind through the system.
Maybe the world is unfair. Focusing on that won’t help you. Own_Marionberry had some good advice.
Having been on the tt job market for 7 years before landing one, I definitely feel your pain. Over a long slog of rejection like that, I have learned that we have to start thinking of the application season as a time-tax we pay, and not get our hopes up. You may be surprised with a job offer, but let that be an upward surprise. If you think of the job as in the bag and are disappointed, that is way more painful, especially since they may never call you to reject you. I’m still waiting to hear back from universities I interviewed at about a decade ago…. Any day now, they’ll call with that rival offer, I’m sure. Just find ways to live your life, and let yourself be surprised if you land something.
The job market is not a morality play. Don’t try to map your job offers (or lack thereof) to your upbringing.
Landing a tt job is quite significantly a matter of luck, among other things. Remember that for each job, you’re competing against hundreds of applicants across the world, and you were able to make it on to the short list that gets invited for an on-site interview. That is already a tremendous feat. From there, you are competing against a concentrated mixture of few most qualified applicants in the world. It’s an extremely tough competition. Good luck.