Is it time to move on from here?

Yes, yes, it's been many months now, yet again, since the last post. So long now that this is becoming embarrassing. Some quick updates then from the last post. Our son who just turned 18 in July succeeded in meeting all the of the conditional offer that Cambridge University gave him to study Maths (he actually exceeded the offer by doing better than they expected), so he's off soon to start his first year. In the US they get them in quickly after early September Labor Day, but here most universities start in late September. Cambridge even starts later, this year on the week of October 6th, so time is dragging on. Anyway, he is mega excited, feeling privileged, and we've been trying to hold back from bragging too much that our son has got into the most difficult undergrad course in the country at the most prestigious university! Brag over now - we've also had to admit that we didn't know how smart in Maths he really was because it's not exactly our subject. So there you go. Your kids will surprise you in many ways.

Also, the lump in breast - no problem. Fluid build up and nothing else. Had other usual tests to check all and all is fine. I shall live another day...



And now I ask myself this next question: Is it time to move on from here? 

Okay, there is a definite pattern that's developed here - the content in this blog has gone down significantly from its earlier days and each new post reveals all the guilt I feel when I finally do get to writing something new. So, I'm going to come clean and admit to myself and readers that it's probably time to start saying goodbye, at least gradually (it feels too difficult to fully let go at this point) to some of my post-ac writing and sharing.

What I've noticed for a long time is that many of the other high-quality post-ac blogs I've encountered and kept up with, are so much better than me at keeping abreast of the latest post-ac debates and flagging up of the usual resources needed to inspire future post-acs to see their potential futures outside of the ivory walls.This blog has been a wonderful vehicle for me to mull over the academic and post-ac choices I've made. It's been a great place to reflect on how far I've come since the earlier, more frustrating moments when I was unsure of where to turn to make plans for a better working life after contract teaching. From some of the comments I've received it looks like I've offered others useful points for identification. That's the great thing about the post-ac community; we are sure to see bits/chunks of our own stories and feelings in others and that's what keep us together.

I'm thinking that a fair amount of my post-ac stories have been told now and I'm not entirely sure I can give much more that would interest readers. I have now been in my first permanent post-ac/alt-ac job for just over two years, although my role changed, for the better, after just over one year. The hours are perfect and the nature of the part-time week means I have to be clear about how much I can or can't do in a certain time-frame. The organisation and my line manager seem to value and like me a lot. I have a fair amount of flexibility when I need it. They were particularly helpful and sensitive when my mother died last year and I had to pick up and go to the US two different times. The pay for what I am doing is not so great. The same kind of work would definitely be paid higher somewhere else, and this is what prompts me to keep my eyes always open for other possibilities. It's for that reason that I feel I need to keep reading other post-ac blogs and resources every now and then, so that I can find effective ways to hone in on marketing myself as an employable post-ac who has lots of practical experience and skills to offer. The journey isn't over yet. Having said all of this, I'm not rushing to find something else just yet. Most of the time, my working days are good and I can't complain, so I'm not quite ready to rock my boat at the moment.

I've mentioned before that I'm also in a place where I'm enjoying my time off away from this laptop. While I'm no elite runner by any means (and I'm pretty slow still), I'm focussing on fitting in running time, which then needs to be arranged around other necessities that seem to get prioritised over the blog. Some of the writing I've wanted to explore, for example some of the difficulties I've had with bereavement and complex family issues from a complex past, are still in a resting place at the moment. I think, at least for now, that the only way I'll be able to give that any serious attention is if I put some of the post-ac writing aside.

So, it's not quite a firm goodbye just yet, but a 'see you in a while' gesture for now. I can;t quite keep myself away from reading others at the moment when I have a gap of time now and then, but it may be even more time before the next post. In any case, I will let you all know what's happening again at some point in the future.

Catch you later, sometime, for now!

A New Year and A New Ebook

I see again how many months have passed since my last post - shame on me! It's a clear sign that I am trying hard to still enjoy time away from the screen, not sit too long (apparently sitting too long is the new smoking in terms of being very bad for your health), and do stuff with my time that doesn't involve thinking about work/career and the now past life of the PhD experience. Unfortunately there have been some other life events that have prevented me from spending time here too - more below.

It's crucial though that I come back, at least briefly today, to highlight the great news about the recent publication of the post-academic ebook that I and three other amazing post-acs - Kathleen 'Currer Bell' Miller, Julie 'JC' Chmiel, Lauren Whitehead - have been involved in editing.

The title is: Moving On: Essays on the Aftermath of Leaving Academia and it's available now on Amazon at the cheap price of $3.10. You can read more about my leaving academia story there (the only UK based writer), but there's so much more to learn from the other accounts. You will see that I still use my pseudonym 'Jet' as I'm not quite ready to reveal to potential academics I know what I've been up to. But what is quite funny is that after clicking onto the 'Jet' link in Amazon, it appears there is another writer using that name in, I assume, the erotic fiction genre, hee hee. Good luck to this other 'Jet', I hope he/she hits the jackpot like E.L. James did -  I don't think post-academic writing will have quite the same impact!

Back to the ebook....The collection offers a range of rich narratives to inspire many and I hope you'll enjoy reading them as much as we have. You can find it on Amazon here. We are hoping to gain as much feedback as possible about the essays so please leave your reviews!


The end of 2013

As I indicated above, life threw some emotional challenges my way in October, November and December. My mother's cancer outcome was not good and she was diagnosed at terminal stage in early October. By late October she found an in-patient hospice facility that took good care of her and I dropped all at home and work to spend two weeks back in the USA with her to say my final goodbye. Not long after that before Thanksgiving she died. I then flew back and spent some further time for the funeral and other business. Back home and still jet-lagged I was faced with a quick re-entry into family responsibilities to hop on the train to accompany my 17 year old son to his interview to Cambridge University to study Maths - so, yes, a positive duty but tiring. We were all extremely excited for him and waiting on stand-by to hear the outcome. Soon after, the next day, I was back in the office catching up and finishing off work before a holiday break - yay, University closure meant two whole weeks of paid time off!

The start of 2014

Son got his letter from Cambridge this past Saturday morning and they've given him an offer to study there - another big hurrah with loads of hugs and celebrations. It is a conditional offer, which in the UK is common and how they do things. He's got to get two A stars and one A and high grades on two separate Maths exam papers for Cambridge called the 'STEP' exam. If he doesn't come up with the goods he may not get in so pressure is still on. He's quite confident and for a while has been telling us that he wants to work in the future as an academic and spend his life absorbed in abstract Math theories. So some flashing lights have been coming up for me and hubby and we are trying to encourage him to keep an open mind and just look at other opportunities later as well - after all he's only 17! Time will tell, but one thing we are both concerned about is that his love of the subject will turn into unhealthy obsession that may lead to depression if disappointment arrives, which at some point, is inevitable. He will have to find his own way through this - a reminder that parental worries don't cease after they get to this age.

So it was good news for the start of the new year. Now it's back to work and soon to review details over my new role which I am looking forward to as it will have more focus and will be less dispersed than what I have been doing. I've also spent this week catching up with writing up some of the research (in an alt-ac capacity) I carried out last term but which has been hugely interrupted - not helped by having to go to the US. Being part-time also stretched out the time to complete things. I am hoping to wrap it up soon and share it in a good way which I hope will help establish some of what I will be doing in my new role.

I wasn't going to mention this last bit but somehow feel a bit compelled (as none of my personal friends or family are reading this!), even though it probably won't amount to anything. I have seen the doctor about an usual breast lump the other day and am waiting for the hospital referral to come through for further tests. It's unusual because its not like the fibroadenomas I had when I was 30ish and things change when your 50 plus. Won't say more about that but the issue of 'cancer' has been so prominent in my mother's family that it's hard not to think of it that way, although breast cancer is not common in the family. So there's a little silly projecting business happening in the brain now but not too bad. I'm also an optimist generally and think even it there is cancer then breast cancers have better outcomes than others. Hey, let's face it, as you get older these things are just inevitable at some point or another unless you're just lucky and have unusually good genes that keep you going strong til 99 or 100! Being a practical sort of person, a lot of what I'm imagining is being grumpy because it would all interfere with work and family life, which I just don;t have time for - and it would really mess up my running schedule! So, that's that part of my latest story there in a nutshell. More to come later I guess, when I can report that all is fine!

In conclusion for today I will say to all you post-acs or potential post-acs, keep looking forward to better things, visualise them happening and a version of this vision will materialise in some form or another. And have a look at the new ebook for mulling over and inspiration. I know if I were reading the essays for the first time as a potential academic leaver, they would probably give me the extra edge I would need to call up my 'inner bitch' (I am quoting directly from Ruth Field's book on running called 'Run Fat Bitch Run' and no, she is not being mean about 'fat' women, she is using the term ironically and explains this in the book) and get myself on the road to 'moving on' from academia. Enjoy the book and good luck to all of you with your various life journeys in 2014.

One year later

Oh, offline life does keep me busy and when I'm not busy with a list of to do tasks I'm relishing in taking a step back and looking after myself. This has included, over several months (close to one year now), taking up jogging. I hesitated for a long time to call my pace 'jogging' or anything close to 'running' when it felt like such a slow slog. But after sticking with it since around last October/November and later getting excited about my discovery of things like the Map My Run internet site which allows me to find out my mileage and pace without using an app, I've learned that I'm a bit faster than an old shuffler and I feel better for it too. Not long after my fiftieth birthday I started some singing lessons and made a point to get out and listen to more live music with my husband (he gave me the lessons as a birthday present) and this has been great. My summer has been very busy. I spent an extended time from the end of July back in the US where my parents live in my attempt to catch up with my mother who has been ill - this was combined with my giving in to my daughter's wishes to have a longer holiday time this year. All in all it was four weeks, which for me is far too long to be trying to find things to do to keep a 13 year old content. Too many details to go into here. (My husband and son left after 2 weeks - smart move, yes.) It was useful in many ways though, I guess. I did spend needed time with my mother and caught up with a dear old school friend who took me and my daughter in for week. It was a great opportunity to reconnect with her and at the same time it all felt so easy, like we'd never been apart. We even organised an evening with two other high-school friends who were still the sweetest of people and I felt all warm and cosy for along time after.

So at the end of August I had a couple of days to recover and the next week was back in work with an onslaught on too many things to sort out, it felt like. It's a busy time with university term time at our place starting a week earlier this year and lots of prep to do. I've also had a meeting about my work one year into the job. We've had some restructuring of sorts going on and just before leaving for vacation I was consulted about my manager's ideas of the direction he wanted to take our department in. He was keen to work with me in a way that would enable me to use more of the skills I had developed from my PhD training and experience and asked if I was interested in developing my role with this in mind and so on. I won't go into too much detail because I don't want to reveal my role but it's just the kind of thing I would have been interested in applying for a year ago. It's a lateral move, so to speak, not a pay increase, but certainly looks better on paper if I decide to move on at some point. I wouldn't anticipate doing that for a while if all stays well (the idea of having to apply for work and all of the stress that goes with it is too much to consider!), but you never know.

This all meant that he was very positive about the way the past year has gone, happy to have me on board still and looking forward to working more closely with me on new ideas. It's all good for me. I can see that this kind of role means that ideas and projects take a while to grow and the benefits are often not noticed for some time. That felt frustrating to me at the start and being part-time means that I take even longer to get through things sometimes, but I've got better at accepting this and won't allow myself to work over my contracted hours. It's all looking good for the future at the moment. I have no regrets in taking this job. It's not perfect and some things can grate on my nerves, but this can be the case in any work context. More and more of the time, I appreciate what I have in life and like to look at the whole of things. I am happy to be in good health at the moment (two years ago I wouldn't have imagined I could have continually jogged for a 3 and 1/2 mile stretch in one go and then done it again for 3 times a week over the course of almost a year. I've surprised myself when I've made it up to almost 5 miles, so can see that I am capable of more than I have given myself credit for. I'm happy to be doing this at 50 and hope with time that all things, work, home and more, will continue to fall in place.

Accepting 'good enough' mothering, 'good enough' academic work, and the 'good enough' alt-ac career

Quite a few things have been happening in my offline world that have halted the time I've had to read others' blogs or to write for my own. In short, my mother who lives in the US and who was a long-term smoker has finally been diagnosed with lung-cancer. There is a close family history on her side of this condition and her smoking parents and siblings did not do well out of it. Unfortunately, the addiction was too difficult for her to kick over the years. In spite of the deaths in the family with lung cancer she couldn't give up soon enough. There also seems to be some question for her oncologist, over the stage of this cancer as it is apparent in both lungs, but with biopsy indicating two different kinds of cancer. She looked forward to her first chemotherapy treatment, hoping it would begin to do its work, but a few days later she became very, very unwell. Making a long story very short here, she ended up having a bad allergic reaction to the drug and almost died at several moments in the time that she was in ICU. So, my time has been taken up with many phone calls to the US, talking with my sister, Dad and a close cousin (the son of my mother's sister who also died of lung-related condition after she had a lung removed years ago to treat her lung cancer).

I am 49 now, 50 in June, and my mother has only just turned 68. These days that's considered on the younger side of older age. She was a teenage mother when she had my sister and me and life hasn't been easy for her. But she worked hard and later in life got her high school diploma and then finished nursing school, the respectable occupation in the US for many working-class women like her. It's hard not to project into the next few or several months, but what I'm hoping is that she can enjoy this spring and summer and reflect on her life with some good memories and have a sense of satisfaction that she made the right decisions about how she wanted to live.

Looking at other things in my life at the moment, I'll say that I've had some emotional challenges with my thirteen year old daughter that are actually so intense and personal that I think I will need to keep silent about the details. But going through some of my worries around her right now, while also worrying about my mother, makes me wonder how indeed my young, working-class mother ever survived at the time when my older sister was putting her through emotional hell during a time when my young Dad would have been completely unsupportive and mostly absent. Mom always told me that she tried her personal best at the mothering job and that was all she could do. This is where I see the value in D.W.Winnicott's assessment of  'good enough' mothering. I can be pretty hard on myself, always looking at the areas where I'm lacking as a mother. In reality, I'm sure what I've been doing is 'good enough'.

. . . . . . . . . . .


So how does all of this tie in with the post-ac side of things in my life now? In this midst of all of this personal stuff, about a week and a half ago, I received an email from a local academic contact where I used to work, who passed on a message from another academic in my field. This academic apparently, she said, wanted to get in touch with me about contributing to a collection that he was editing. Could I please get in touch? It was quite a strange experience reading this email. I re-read it several times, feeling a bit of a physical change at the same time. I felt a bit like my heart was racing faster with a sense of excitement at one moment yet also I felt a bit sickish in the next moment. I didn't know what to do with it all. A large part of me felt honoured that this person had read my work and thought me worthy of contributing when there are so many other choices out there to consider. My mind wandered and I questioned what I might write about and I then had visions of myself on my days off work getting books out of the library and sitting in my office and mulling over the ideas. I wondered if there was some older material I could salvage. I even saw myself meeting this academic and others at a conference having a laugh and going out for a meal afterwards to talk over new and exciting ideas in the discipline.

Well, I have to confess this flight of fancy didn't last very long. The reality soon hit me and I asked myself if I could realistically manage such a feat, and even if I could manage this after being out of the game for this long, would I actually enjoy it enough and find value in the exercise. The quick and short answer was, 'No'. I felt relieved that it didn't take too long to get my head out of this temporary haze and see that there was nothing in it for me. I assured myself that I needed to keep my new alt-ac head clear of all of this and look forward in another direction.

My next challenge was whether I should be 'polite' and respond to this academic and come clean. I felt if he had taken the time to enquire about me that I should at least, respectfully, respond. Being me then and knowing my tendency to complicate or over-think everything I do (it seems sometimes), I wrote a considered response that, I guess, tried to capture some of what it has been like to have to 'leave academia'. In short, I summarised that I had to exit the field at a time of major cuts in Arts and Humanities, and knowing that I did not have the flexibility of my younger post-PhD contemporaries to apply for posts across the country or beyond, etc.

I received a nice and respectful reply. While it left me feeling a little embarrassed I guess I felt this academic was a useful outlet for my 'coming out' of academia. He sympathised with my position and shared that he was struck with the academic situation now in which three recent colleagues from his department were made redundant. He saw less and less support from higher education institutions and understood completely why some academics were finding other alternatives.

I was embarrassed because he revealed that my contact person who passed on the message to me, actually got the story wrong. He didn't want to contact me to contribute a chapter at all. He wanted to get my author's permission to use an extended quotation/passage from a piece I wrote as he is intending to write about it in a new book he will publish in a few months' time. He attached the chapter for me to read to check that the context was acceptable and offered to send me a copy of the book when published. At that point I experienced another range of feelings. Wow, my work was applauded by him, referenced in the same page as other long-standing pros in the field. Over the last few months I was reminded that others had referenced my work as well. In some ways, I confess, I felt, yet again, that sense of failure of not doing more worthy work beyond this point.  But again, this feeling didn't last too long. There is a huge part of me that is pleased I left the field at this stage before reaching an over-exhausted state of collapse. I've left a small mark and that's that. Indeed, I guess it feels like this mark is 'good enough' for me, personally - I've done the best I could for what I and my circumstances are capable of.

I will confess that I experience various emotions around my current alt-ac job at the moment. I am heading the start of what I see is a nice little research project at the moment. I've put an academic research proposal forward to one of the faculties in the university for ethics' approval (and received approval) and I'm excited about the later prospects and outcomes. There are other aspects of the work that I'd rather do without and some things that come up regularly can be quite irritating. This is the normal state of affairs for any job though, and I think if I can keep this at the forefront of my mind, then this work will be absolutely just fine, another example of something in my life that is 'good enough'.

My experience of postgraduate studies, illness and recovery

In my last post I mentioned I'll be trying to put a bit more much needed writing time into my ebook contribution for the How To Leave Academia project. On top of having to deal with a couple of intense  domestic crises at the moment, this leaves little time for my blog.

I've decided then for today to leave my readers with this link to a recent piece I've added to the How To Leave Academia website. If you've followed my blog you might recall some references to my experience of Relapsing Remitting Multiple Sclerosis. Luckily, I'm feeling pretty good at the moment, like there isn't much of an MS reminder anywhere with the exception of some usual numbness that happens in strange places (like my tongue or lips!), or the occasional spasms. Taking daily injections is a pretty obvious reminder too, but hey, they seem to be working a treat so I can't complain. Thank you, once again, UK National Health Service - where would some of us be without you?

Anyway, this piece looks back at the earlier days of my postgrad studies, some of the craziness involved in aiming for academic perfection, and the eventual signs and 'attack' of Multiple Sclerosis that stopped me in my tracks. I hope it's a useful narrative for some readers who might be trying to figure out the sort of things that I've been working on for while - like what exactly is it that makes us happy, or at least content, and how can we break away from some of the things in our lives that just drag us down? The piece is called: Jet's story of illness, diagnosis and the long road to recovery.

Happy reading - all comments welcome here or over there!

A good read with Long Leggety Beasties and other things that fill my postacademic free time

It seems the frequency of my blog posts has been in decline since I started my new-ish postac job back in August/September. This isn't unusual for lots of postac bloggers. For many, once they've got to a positive point in their lives after leaving academia perhaps they find there is less to ponder or worry about. I'm not quite sure I'm totally at that point yet. I'm working part-time and I love the fact that I have time to catch up with myself a bit. But I'm also finding that this catching up means I have less time and sometimes less enthusiasm to get going in front of the computer to read other blogs and then write on my own blog. Some of this is a good sign. And then sometimes I feel a little sense of loss there.

One of the things I'm trying to fit into my evenings is a bit of good fiction reading. I have come across a wonderful local Southwest UK author and blogger, Alienora Taylor, who has published her first ebook: Long Leggety Beasties. The story focuses on the secondary school English teacher Geraldine's (Gerri) first person narration of her experiences in her first teaching job in a small village in Cornwall. I've had my own (shortish) stint of state secondary school teaching when I lived in London and thought I'd find some common ground here. While the story feels different from mine there are many connections that I've found lots of pleasure in recognising. I'm still only just over half-way through the novel but my experience so far has been full of giggles and page-turning excitement about where this Gerri may take me next.

One of the things I'm enjoying is Taylor's absolute love of playful language, which her believable English teacher narrator captures so well. At no point does the witty writing style ever seem out of place from what the reader would expect from Gerri's voice. Without trying to give away too much, my other main pleasure are the moments of Gerri's wonderful confessions of alcoholic weakness where the cupboard that holds the gin and tonic is just too irresistible. Consider this long passage, Gerri's tale after she's had an English teacher's lesson from hell from her beloved fifth year bottom set class:

Soon after this, my flat fell through - both literally and metaphorically. It was a top floor flat and I'd long been fascinated by the promise of an attic apparently lurking above my bed. There was a trapdoor. Under normal circumstances, I would have left well alone. In recent days, however, I had become rather too familiar with the soothing qualities of alcohol. 

So there I was, sloshing back the gin and crunching cashew nuts - an absolute MUST with any self-respecting G and T - when a sudden devilish thought tickled my mind. Explore the attic. It seemed so obvious at the time. My inner rebel was calling to me stridently. Naturally enough, I had no ladder, so had to improvise: the chest of drawers and a chair seemed to do the trick. 

Up I went, pushed open the trap door, hoisted myself into the attic, tripped and fell through the bedroom ceiling. If I'd had any sense, I would have phone my landlady, claimed a tragic accident and the day could have possibly been saved.

But no: I was at that stage of drunkenness where bizarre ideas positively stream over one. Thus, the next logical step was for me to mend the hole - she'd never notice - with Sellotape. 

I sat on the bed and surveyed the damage. The hole was bigger than it seemed at impact; it seemed to stretch for acres. I picked up the pieces and, with neck-cracking obstinacy, rammed them back into place, using yards of tape in the process. 

The only positive thing I could say about the finished result was that you could no longer see straight into the attic.

Gerri's love of G and T lead to another scene in which she gets completely off of her head, strips off to then don a 50 pence charity shop bargain of a black lacey dress and heads over to the nearby field where a group of builders/all brothers, are living in a caravan. Curious about catching sight of the one on which she's developed a distant crush, she stumbles around peering in the windows only to be spotted by another.

The rest you will have to read yourself! And this joy of a first novel is now available as a free download, so what can you lose?

Have a look here for the free download and enjoy! Long Leggety Beasties, by Alienora Taylor.

And one more thing...

I've mentioned in some previous posts my involvement with a new postacademic website How to Leave Academia and upcoming postac ebook project that involves fellow bloggers Lauren, Currer and JC. 

We are all going to be working on developing our own contributions for the ebook, so I'll be putting some time and energy into my text. For the time being if you haven't done so already then have a good look at how the website is coming along and feel free to add your own two cents or become a guest author!

Why US students choose the UK for postgrad study

I've had the pleasure of discovering a great blog resource recently called The Professor Is In. It's created by Dr. Karen Kelsky, a post-academic from the US who decided to leave academia even when she has a successful career with tenure. I love finding blogs like this because they provide an honest narrative of why people initially aspired to the academic life, and what they learned about its realities after investing so much of themselves in it. The thing that also makes Dr. Kelsky's blog a great resource is the author's willingness to offer realistic career advice for post-acs as well as solid advice young academics just starting out. She's aiming to train postgrads in career preparation in a way that she never experienced when she finished her PhD. She is clear at the start that she is not in the business of creating illusions that there is a fruitful and abundant academic job market out there for new post-PhDs, but she does claim that she can offer strong advice about how to be competitive in these conditions if you are convinced you want to give it your best shot. On the other end, she offers some great thoughts about what it means to quit academia and doesn't stop at warning those potential grad students to rethink their move before getting themselves into major debt when signing up after they are encouraged by their undergraduate mentors.

After reading one of her great 'Guest' postings Don't go to graduate school shared by a tenured friend of hers, I spent some time thinking about why bright spark US graduates might be so keen on packing their bags and flying over here to the UK to take postgraduate MA, MSc courses and PhDs. The post is really an exchange between Karen and her friend, who tells the story about one of her talented undergrad students in English who has finished his/her degree and is passionate about becoming an academic. The student has applied to an MA grad programme in a prestigious university in the northeast and has not secured any funding, but is so stuck on pursuing this dream that they are willing to pay the 45,000 dollar a year tuition fee and go into massive debt to prove their commitment. The student letter/email to the professor is a kind of expression of intent with the hope that the professor will praise him/her, encourage their academic interests and open their arms as a welcome into the life of academia. The prof's response, however, is something unexpected. We don't know what the student's final decision was after that, but at least he/she can't say they weren't warned.

The wonderful twist to this scenario is that this prof tells it like it is and advises the student not to take the MA course, especially if it's unfunded, but even if funded, warns the student that this is not the way to go either, especially with worsening academic employment prospects that are not showing any sign of improvement. She stresses to this bright young star that he/she has a lot going for them and there are so many other avenues he/she can choose to exploit their talents while not breaking the bank. Yay for her for playing it straight, and yay for the student if they take seriously the advice.

I am reminded then about the perverse business of these elite US higher institutions that can charge whatever they like to allow their perspective students the 'privilege' of studying there. In the UK students have been up in arms and protesting in the streets when Higher Education institutions here went public with their intentions to raise yearly undergrad fees from 3,000 pounds a year to between 6,000-9,000 annually (home students costs) for their three-year undergrad degrees. For graduate MA or MSc courses, home students will be expecting to pay around 6,000 a year full-time or 13,000-14,000 pounds if international. These estimates are based on my scan of an equivalent 'elite' UK university (they are called 'Russell Group' universities here because they are the older institutions). Other non-Russell Group universities will often charge on the lower end of that spectrum but some go higher. At this point in British history these public institutions cannot simply charge whatever they want, and we don't have the large culture of private university options like in the US. They've been forced to raise fees because of less government funding and they've taken advantage of aiming for the higher fee demand, but that's the threshold at the moment. They're not allowed to go higher.

So for those talented US undergrads hoping for a future in academia they can see the benefits of studying here in the UK. Laying out 13,500 pounds for an MA converts, at current rates, to 21,567.60 dollars (to be exact), a massive savings of over 20,000 (using the northeast ivy league example above) if they are convinced they should go in this direction. For many of us post-acs who have been there, however, and who have suffered the debts of undergrad education in the US (myself included - I moved to the UK after finishing my US undergrad degree), and then accrued more postgrad debts, we wouldn't want to repeat the experience. Enough is enough, I say.

In my current alt-ac work, I encounter many international postgrads, a good percentage of them from the US, taking wonderfully intellectually fulfilling postgrad degrees. I am happy for them if they've been able to put a middle finger up to the US and have found a way to get off a bit cheaper for a quality postgrad education. But I want to also have long and extended conversations with them about how higher education institutions in the US and here now, who are rubbing their hands together in excitement at the prospect of taking in the postgrad student, and even better if they are a nice international money-maker. I want to remind them that years ago when my UK friends were undergrads the government paid their full education costs and even gave them extra stipends for living expenses. Of course, in those days higher education in the UK was even more elitist with a very small percentage of mainly privileged middle-class young people attending. With increasing widening participation there has been a large increase in those achieving degrees here. This is a great thing for sure, but any increasing fees will not help a lot of prospective students achieve their educational potential if they are faced with years of debt. Getting out in the streets across the UK to protest hasn't solved the problem but it it has increased student awareness and given students a strong voice and presence here that was potentially waning  before fee increases.

So while the UK might offer some attraction for prospective US postgrads (and undergrads too, especially as they will be on a degree programme here for only three, and not four years), I want to signal to these prospects that there must be another way to reward your intellectual curiosity. Unfortunately, with unemployment so high at this time of world recession, there is no easy solution, and many are choosing postgrad courses as a way of buying more time before they have to compete in the job market. And with the extra MA/MSc they will see themselves as being one step ahead of others, I guess. But they are also a few steps behind financially and will have the added pressure of seeking employment in highly paid private, commercial sectors in the hope that they can pay their student loans quicker. Many will find they are working 13 hour days in a career they are unhappy with and are simply looking forward to that one big annual holiday where they can bask in the sun and recharge until they are back in the rat race again. My advice to these postgrad want-to-bes is to take a long, hard time to think about this. It's hard when you're young in your twenties to imagine where you may be when you are forty when you might have regrets about your choices. Think hard about the core of things that help make you happy. And if confused about whether you should sacrifice financial stability for the love of your academic subject, read many of the well-considered post-ac stories in the post-ac blogging community.

That final word, of course, leads me to plug again, the collective post-ac website that I am jointly editing with Currer, J.C. and Lauren, called How To Leave Academia. This is the newest post-ac resource that can guide you in the right direction if you are pondering what to do about academia. As time goes on, readers here might see that I'm posting less - that's because I'm busy with the demands of work and family, and there are times when I really need to go offline! But I will also have to choose to allocate some well-spent time over there. Some of posts here may be repeated there too - why not. Have a look and think about contributing somewhere to share your experiences.