HTLA in the Guardian

From an article about supplementing the support you receive from your academic advisor, "PhD supervisor: the perfect one does not exist":

In my final year, especially, I noticed friends who were also completing PhDs questioning aspects of academic life. Is this the best way to write my thesis? Do I have to do all this extra conference-organising to get ahead? Will I be able to get a job when I graduate?

Your supervisor won't necessarily be able to advise you on these issues. It might be decades since they personally encountered the job market, for instance. Discussing your concerns with colleagues might precipitate awkward questions. Online communities express concerns that students dare not speak aloud.

This is evident in the burgeoning network of blogs and forums that explore life beyond academia. Honesty is king here, from the excoriating 100 Reasons not to go to graduate school to the more restrained How to leave academia and the practical VersatilePhD forum. These present alternative voices and viewpoints that are not often found within academic departments.

Lauren and Currer featured in 2 NYT Articles

Both appeared Nov 1 2013.

From "Finding Life After Academia":

While the alt-ac perspective is relatively rosy, some disenchanted academic refugees embrace what they call the “post-ac” identity. The website “How to Leave Academia” recently published a post-ac manifesto, defining the orientation as “a belief that the current system is flawed, cruel, unsustainable and therefore impossible to directly engage with.” In this view, Ph.D. programs, with their false promises, lure students to serve as cheap labor, first as teaching assistants, then as poorly paid adjuncts when tenure-track jobs elude them.

“Post-ac discourages people from pursuing graduate work,” write the authors, Lauren Whitehead and Kathleen Miller, under the pseudonyms Lauren Nervosa and Currer Bell. Dr. Miller also penned the blog post “I Hate My Post-Ac Job: What Happens When You Don’t Land the Perfect Postacademic Career.” In it she writes: “Graduating, leaving academia, moving to a new city, starting a new job, and then hating it? Sheesh. Let me tell you — it’s hard to feel like a success story.” Unable to secure academic employment after completing her doctorate in English literature in 2012, Dr. Miller is now preparing to start her own life-coaching business.

 

"Rehab for Doctoral Defectors":

HowtoLeaveAcademia.com Pages include “How to Quit,” “Emotional Transition” and “Setting Up Your Post-Ac Life.”

How To Leave Academia In the Press

Excited to be mentioned in this article in the Chronicle of Higher Education. 19 Sept 2013.

As Web sites became easier to build, and blogs became common, more and more forums were developed to share information about nonacademic careers. Some of the best include Lexi Lord's Beyond Academe (for historians), Branching Points (for scientists), and How to Leave Academia. (Readers: If you've found other such helpful sites, feel free to mention them in the comments below.)