Agree or disagree? (see below)
I happen to agree. Not to minimize anyone's stress in their academic job or to discount the anxieties that come with the pressure to get grants, publish papers, advise students, teach teach teach, travel, answer endless surveys from administrators who want to know about our quality of life but whose response seems to be to make life more difficult, and so on, BUT a reader writes:
What other job lets you take 3 months in the summer to work on your own with few other obligations (some faculty I know work from home 4/5 days during the week in the summer)?
I happen to agree. Not to minimize anyone's stress in their academic job or to discount the anxieties that come with the pressure to get grants, publish papers, advise students, teach teach teach, travel, answer endless surveys from administrators who want to know about our quality of life but whose response seems to be to make life more difficult, and so on, BUT a reader writes:
.. from talking to male and female colleagues with kids, and having my daughter recently myself I find the idea that Academia is (more than other careers) hostile to family life to be hugely overblown.
How many other jobs can you basically decide to set your schedule to be whatever hours you want, or even to work from home much of the time (I know several faculty members who have done this when they had young children and remain successful)?
What other job lets you take 3 months in the summer to work on your own with few other obligations (some faculty I know work from home 4/5 days during the week in the summer)?
What other career gives you 6 months to work from home or even another state if you want to, with no other work obligations, every 5-7 years (I know faculty who have taken a sabbatical basically to raise their infants)?
And all of this while you are doing work you love that is intellectually stimulating, allows a standard of living well above average (and job security to rival a government job - even better at present!), and is physically safe.
I am sick and tired of the privilege I see coming from academics. Some people have to actually work for a living. They work their bodies to death, and their minds to jelly because they have to. We are lucky. So, Damn, Lucky.
What we need to do now, is convince more women of this and stop scaring people away with this idea that Academic science is some kind of hell that will destroy your life, your soul, and your family and any sane person would stay away... I think maybe some people have selective memories... It certainly doesn't seem to match with what you've described of your home life, or really that of any academic I've met.
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