Philosophy Department Survival Strategies: The Personal Invitation
Affirmation. It’s natural to want it and to be encouraged by it. If deserved, it’s good to give. And giving it to your students can help grow your department’s enrollments and majors.
This is the sixth installment in the occasional Philosophy Department Survival Strategies series.
Today’s strategy: instructors contacting promising students of theirs individually to praise them for their work so far and encourage them to take another step into philosophy.
That next step might be to take a particular class that you or a colleague are teaching, to join an occasional reading group or informal independent study, to attend a philosophy department event, to become a philosophy major or minor, etc.
For example, an instructor might write to a student something like the following:
I’ve really been impressed with your work in this course. Your last paper was really well-argued, and I’ve appreciated many of your insightful comments in class about the readings. I can also see the occasional frustration on your face when you think the discussion isn’t getting at what you think are the important points. I take that as a good sign—you have your own interest in some of these topics beyond what we have been able to do in class this term, especially, it seems, the topics that seem to science. That’s why I’m writing to you. Professor Jones is teaching an upper level course on consciousness next term. She’s a great teacher, and I think you’ll really get a lot from her course. And given what I’ve seen from you this term, I have every reason to think you’ll do quite well in it. I’d be happy to talk more about this with you, if you’d like, and about other courses—just let me know.
Now is a good time for this kind of reaching out.
As semesters wrap up, it’s easy to be busy and forget to do something like this, or to push it to the back burner. Departments may want to assign a faculty member the task of reminding others to take a few minutes to send a few notes out.
I’m sure there are variations on this, or related strategies, that professors and departments make use of. Any and all suggestions in the vicinity are welcome. Thanks.
This is great advice. It’s so simple, easy, and free that I’m amazed I hadn’t heard it before or that it didn’t occur to me…!
Insofar as such efforts concern students enrolling in subsequent courses, my impression is that the best time to send these sorts of notes (or send them again) is just before course registration opens (i.e., when there’s a decision point in the near term with concrete payoff).
I do this every semester, and it works great. One thing I started doing more recently: after I thank the student for their effort in the class, and name one or two things they did especially well, I ask them if they have advice for future students. I compile that advice into a document I post to my course’s Canvas site each semester. I think that helps students know that I care about their input–and the advice is usually very good!
I love it. Can I steal this?
Absolutely!
From the other side, I want to chime in and say this works wonders. I’ve done a Masters in philosophy, and I’m currently in a PhD program in philosophy, but in undergrad I harbored a vague feeling that the discipline ‘wasn’t for me.’ One of my professors scheduled a meeting with me where he said that he thought I did good work, that I had a lot of potential, and that if this was something I wanted to pursue, then I could do well.
As a young woman, it was the first time I’d had my intellectual capacities so explicitly validated and, without that kind of affirmation, I don’t think I would have pursued graduate studies. This kind of support can make a huge difference for students who come from social groups underrepresented in philosophy or who might struggle to see themselves in the field.
I can see the appeal of this but I wonder how to do this in a manner that balances our and our department’s desire for enrollment with what is in the best interest of the student given the current and prospective academic job market and the (if we’re being honest to ourselves) often limited appeal of a philosophy degree in large parts of industry.
There is also a case to be made that this might be received poorly by departments from which students are “poached” and might conflict with many statistics that university admins and execs care about (hiring, salary after degree, etc.). So there is a potential (albeit minimal) I think of this backfiring.
I am not denying the value of doing this, just want to raise some complications I believe are important.