Non-Academic Hires
Post information here about successes on the non-academic job market by those with graduate training in philosophy. To the extent possible, please use the following format:
Firstname Lastname (Graduate Program attended*) hired by Employer, title, approximate start date. Previous positions.
Congratulations to the new hires!
UPDATE 5/28/14 — Of possible interest: the Linked In group Professional Philosophers In Industry.
Adam Hogan (Ohio University) Re-hired by Atlas Fibre [http://www.atlasfibre.com/], Sales Engineer, June 9th, 2014. TA, sales, manager, warehouse work.
Don Goodman-Wilson (WUSTL, philosophy) hired by Screenhero [http://screenhero.com], founding engineer, May 2013. TA, RA, hardware engineer at Railstars [http://railstars.com], pizza delivery.
Carl Baker (Leeds) hired by House of Commons Library (UK Parliament), statistical researcher, Feb 2014. Formerly Postdoc at Northern Institute of Philosophy, Aberdeen, UK.
Michel Hebert, PhD Philosophy, the University of Western Ontario, hired by McLean & Company, Consulting Analyst, started May 2013.
Matt Drabek (PhD Philosophy, The University of Iowa) hired by ACT, Inc. [http://www.act.org], Content Specialist, started January 2013. Previously Visiting Assistant Professor of Philosophy at The University of Iowa.
Jesse Houchens (MA Philosophy, Ohio University) Secondary Mathematics teacher at Great Path Academy acquired through Teach for America. Logic Instructor at Ohio University. Intern on Capitol Hill for Senate Majority Leader.
Craig Roxborough (York University, PhD Candidate) College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario, Policy Analyst (start April 2013). Previously Research Manager, Ipsos Reid Public Affairs.
Katie Stockdale (MA Philosophy, Dalhousie University (completed), PhD Philosophy, Dalhousie University (left program), hired by the Maritime Provinces Higher Education Commission (MPHEC), Policy and Research Analyst, started November 2013. Previously a Teaching Assistant (Dept of Philosophy, Dalhousie), Research Assistant (Dept of Bioethics, Dalhousie), and Writing Tutor (Writing Centre, Dalhousie).
Note: I have since returned to my PhD program to finish, but am continuing to work for the MPHEC as a Consultant.
Simone Duca (PhD Philosophy, University of Bristol) hired by Vision Teknology UK [http://vtuk.com/], web developer, October 2012.
Previously: Post-doc at Ruhr University Bochum and University of Dusseldorf and member of the Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy.
Andrew Jorgensen (PhD Philosophy, Temple University, 2002) now Head Brewer at Carrig brewing Co. Leitrim, Ireland. Previously Government of Ireland post-doctoral fellow in humanities and social sciences at University College Dublin, also previously in temporary lectureships at the University of Leeds and the University of St Andrews.
Brandon N. Towl (PhD Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology, WUSTL 2009) started own writing company, Words Have Impact (http://www.wordshaveimpact.com). Started May 2011. Until 2013, occasional did adjunct teaching for WUSTL.
Benjamin R. Roome (PhD Philosophy UC Santa Cruz 2012) Hired as assessment manager for Open English LLC, a web based English language teaching platform for the Latin American market.
Rowan G Tepper (MA Philosophy Boston College 2006, ABD Comparative Literature, SUNY Binghamton). Founding Data Scientist at Terra Data, LLC, started as consultant October 2011, made principal/part-owner in company, June 2013. Previously adjunct in Comparative Literature at SUNY and in philosophy at the University of Rhode Island.
Jeremy Petch (PhD Philosophy York University 2012) Manager, Special Projects at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto, Ontario.
Jared Woodard (PhD Philosophy, Fordham University) BGC Partners, Equity Derivatives Analyst, April 2014.
Lindsay Weir (MA, University of Waterloo), Hired by Lear Communication as an Administrative Assistant since April 2014. Past positions included an administrative assistant in the Oil and Gas industry, and as an HR assistant in big box retail.
Zachary Ernst (PhD University of Wisconsin), hired by Narrative Science as a software engineer, from December 2013. Past position as Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Missouri-Columbia.
Olle Blomberg (PhD University of Edinburgh) hired by Thermo-Calc Software as a part-time technical and marketing writer in March 2014. Past positions include truck driver in a refridgerated warehouse, journalist, and various others.
Daniel Levine (PhD Georgetown 2005), hired by the Centre for Conflict Resolution (Cape Town) as Senior Researcher, Policy Research and Development cluster. Previously Assistant Professor of Public Policy at the University of Maryland – College Park (and maintaining an affiliation as Research Fellow, Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland).
Elena Spitzer (MA University of Wisconsin 2014) hired by Google as an Engineering Education Program Manager, May 2014. Previously, disillusioned graduate student at UW Madison.
Johann Klaassen (PhD, Ethics & Social Philosophy, Washington University in St Louis, 1998). Joined Horizons Sustainable Financial Services, Inc. [www.HorizonsSFS.com], as Chief Investment Officer in January 2013. Previously: Gypsy faculty, 1998-2000; Learned market basics, T. Rowe Price, 2000-2001; VP & Portfolio Manager, First Affirmative Financial Network, 2001-2012.
Terrence Watson, ABD, Bowling Green State University (philosophy), hired by Cengage Learning as a JavaScript engineer.
Eric Rovie (MA Philosophy, Washington university in St Louis, left ABD), teaching high school AP English and coaching cross-country and track at Collins Hill High School in Suwanee, GA. Previously Visiting Instructor in Philosophy and Religious Studies at Georgia State University, Agnes Scott College, and Georgia PerimeterCollege. Currently planning a one-semester Intro to Philosophy elective for high school students.
Stephanie Wykstra, (PhD Philosophy, Rutgers 2009). Currently: Research Manager of Data Publication at Innovations for Poverty Action. Previously: independent research consultant; Research Analyst for GiveWell; Asst Prof of Philosophy, Stonehill College.
Emily Evans (PhD Philosophy, Georgetown 2014). Hired by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute as Program Director in the Comparative Clinical Effectiveness Research (CER) Methods and Infrastructure Program. Previously, Evans was managing editor of American Journal of Bioethics – Empirical Bioethics. Start date: within the last month.
Eric Reilly (auto-didact of Continental philosophy, pre-socratic philosophy, Marxist and post-Marxist social scholarship, Jewish rationalism, mathematical logic and number theory), hired by Autonomy!/The Central Committee (http://thecentralcommittee.blogspot.com) founder and contributing author, 10/2014
Michael Falgoust (Phd Philosophy, Tulane University 2012), hired by Google as Policy Specialist starting 12 January 2015. Previously Assistant Professor of Ethics at University of Twente, VAP at Tulane University, and adjunct instructor at Dillard University.
Andy Specht (PhD Philosophy, Syracuse University 2014), hired by MINDBODY as a Data Conversion Specialist, July 2014.
David Koepsell has left his tenured post at Delft University of Technology in The Netherlands as of January 2015 to become the Director of Research and Strategic Initiatives at the Mexican National Commission of Bioethics, in Mexico City. He will also be a Visiting Prof. at the UNAM Instituto de Filosoficas until July 2015.
Timothy Loughrist (University of Nebraska – Lincoln) hired by the William H. Thompson Scholars Learning Community at UNL as an assistant program coordinator, starting May 1st, 2015. Previously adjunct instructor of philosophy at Doane College in Crete, Nebraska.
Hired May 4, 2015 as Corporate Director, Clinical Ethics for Beaumont Health, the largest health system in Michigan with 35,000 employees and annual budget of $3.8 billion
Joel Uckelman (University of Amsterdam) hired by Stroz Friedberg, Senior Developer, March 2015. Previously co-owner of Lightbox Technologies (now merged with Stroz Friedberg).
Hired by Beaumont Health as Corporate Director of Clinical Ethics. Ph.D. Michigan State, 1992 Philosophy: Bioethics concentration.
Daniel Levine (PhD Georgetown 2005), hired by Community Mediation (Baltimore) as Attendance Mediation Coordinator, starting 12 August 2015. Previously: consultant to the Centre for Conflict Resolution (Cape Town).
Corey Briley (Georgia Southern University – BA, Philosophy and Religious Studies) hired by Cardlytics (targeted, card-linked marketing), Campaign coordinator and analyst, May 2014.
Matthew S. LoPresti, Ph.D. (University of Hawaii at Manoa), Hawaii State House of Representatives, State Representative – District 41, 2014-2016 term. Concurrently employed as an Associate Professor of Philosophy and Humanities at Hawaii Pacific University.
Vaughn Bryan Baltzly (PhD Philosophy, University of Maryland, 2009) hired as a Presidential Management Fellow at the United States Department of Veterans Affairs, 2010. Later hired as an analyst at the U.S. Government Accountability Office, 2013.
Chris Richards (ABD University of Nebraska) hired by Performline as junior developer/data scientist, July 2016, formerly teaching assistant at University of Nebraska
Sarah Adams (PhD Philosophy, University of Leeds UK, 2015) hired by Taylor and Francis as Production Editor, Routledge Books, October 2016. Previously Editorial and Production Assistant at the Institute of Engineering and Technology, and Editorial Assistant at Cambridge University Press.
Stephen Downes, MS (philosophy) University of Calgary (went ABD at University of Alberata) – National Research Council of Canada research 15 years now, expert in e-learning and new instructional technology. http://www.downes.ca
Anna Pons (MA Philosophy – San Francisco State University) hired by Rubicon Programs Inc., Career Coach, January 2015.
Dani Ochangco (BA, Philosophy and French Studies, University of Sydney). Hired by ServiceNow as an executive assistant, June 2015. Previously spent the past five years since graduating either travelling aimlessly or simply confused and torn between devoting myself to a life in the arts and a life that pays the bills. Plans to do MA and PhD in near future. And write a book on Nietzsche and Quantum Physics.
Over the past ten years, after my time in the classroom as a philosophy/logic instructor, I’ve contributed to philosophy as a discipline as the creator/author of the Aplia online homework content for logic and critical thinking courses, and I am co-host of a weekly podcast about Star Trek and philosophy on the Trek.fm podcast network (Meta Treks: A Star Trek Philosophy Podcast).
Brent Silby (University of Canterbury). Hired by Unlimited secondary school, Philosophy Teacher, 2004.
Adam In Tae Gerard (MA Philosophy – Northern Illinois University). Hired by Microsoft through Aquent as a Content Developer. Content Development combines technical writing, programming, teaching, and content creation. About 5 years of Software Engineering and Development experience.
Please feel free to network and connect with me: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adamintaegerard
Ashley Acosta-Fox (ABD University of Kansas) hired by the Johns Hopkins University as an Instructional Designer, August 2015.
Steven Yates (PhD, University of Georgia), taught in non-tenure track capacities at several universities around the Southeast, ghostwrote two books to supplement his income; final lengthy teaching stint was as an adjunct instructor at USC-Upstate (Spartanburg, South Carolina) from which he resigned in 2012, obtained a TESOL and moved overseas, discovered he did not enjoy teaching English; trained online with American Artists and Writers, Inc. who train copywriters; now owns Copywriting Solutions (founded in 2018) which offers copywriting services to success coaches and personal development companies.
LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/steven-yates-ph-d-49b63b6/
Celina Durgin (University of Notre Dame) hired by Skyword, Editorial Manager, June 18, 2018.
Steven Patterson (PhD, Wayne State University 2005), hired January 2019 by Noodle Partners as General Manager for the University of Michigan. Previous roles include (Full) Professor of Philosophy (with tenure) and Chair of the Division of Letters, Marygrove College (position lost after 12 years due to closure of all undergraduate programs in 2017). Prior to joining Noodle Partners I also did brief stints as a Sessional Instructor at the University of Windsor and as a Senior Lecturer at the Honors College of Wayne State University.
Lynn Chiu (PhD, University of Missouri 2015), hired June 2019 as the Communications Officer for the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis project at University of St. Andrews, Scotland, and started self-employed work as a communications consultant for the KLI, Austria since September 2019. I was a postdoc under the ERC-IDEM project at University of Bordeaux/CNRS from 2015-2018.
Brian Embry (Ph.D., University of Toronto 2015), Software Engineer at Google. Previously a postdoc at the University of Groningen.
Kevin Gin (Ph.D. UC Riverside, 2017), hired Oct 2019 Software Engineer at Google. Previously Software Development Engineer and Knowledge Engineer at Amazon.
I’m Emmanuel
This is a really beautiful idea.
Would you like to do so for graduates of English too? So many of us think the only career for graduates in the field is Teaching (Pre-High up to Lecturing).
Doing this for us would help us explore more opportunities in our chose field.
Cara Maritz (MA in Philosophy, Johns Hopkins University, 2017), hired May 2017 as Researcher in Tech Industry. Academic background in Psychology, formal training in social sciences.
David Lu (ABD, Syracuse University), Tripwire, Inc. Security Researcher, 2018. Also NTTF appointment in the CS department at Portland State University since 2015.
Jonathan Hall, a philosophy Ph.D. student at Edinburgh, has been appointed as an external member of the Bank of England’s Financial Policy Committee. https://www.gov.uk/government/news/jonathan-hall-appointed-to-the-financial-policy-committee
Daniel Turski (BA & MA, philosophy, Regina Apostolorum University, 2013; MD, McMaster University, 2019) Currently training as a resident physician in psychiatry at Western University, London, ON, Canada.
Zac Cogley (Ohio State University), Director of Customer Success, Balto Software, April 2019. Previously Associate Professor at Northern Michigan University and Lecturer at UCLA.
Jacob Andrews (Loyola University Chicago, ABD on hire, PhD 5/21), hired by Covenant Classical School (Naperville, IL), Middle/high school Latin/Logic Teacher, 7/20. TA, RA, Building/community manager at transitional housing program.
Johnny Brennan (PhD Fordham University, 2021) hired by the American Council of Learned Societies as a Program Officer, International Programs in July 2022.