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College Professor
EducationYou teach, research, and publish in a system where getting tenure takes a decade and losing it takes one bad semester of student evaluations. You'll lecture to 200 students who are on their phones, mentor grad students who are one rejection letter from quitting, and write papers peer-reviewed by people who might be your competitors for the same grant.
Salary Range
Low
$50k
Median
$85k
High
$160k
10-Year Growth
average
US Workers
1.3M
Education
PhD in your field (and 5-10 years of post-doc and adjunct purgatory)
Environment
indoor
Tools & Technical Skills
- ▸Curriculum design and syllabus development
- ▸Academic research and peer-reviewed publication
- ▸Learning management systems (Canvas, Blackboard, Moodle)
- ▸Grant writing (NSF, NIH, NEH)
- ▸Statistical and research methodologies
- ▸Academic advising and thesis supervision
People & Mindset Skills
- ▸Public speaking and lecture delivery
- ▸Mentoring and student development
- ▸Written communication
- ▸Intellectual curiosity
- ▸Patience with diverse learners
- ▸Collegiality in departmental settings
What you'll actually do
- 01Lecture to students who are Snapchatting under their desks and somehow still expect an A
- 02Grade papers and exams that make you question whether anyone read the syllabus
- 03Write research papers with titles so specialized that 7 people on Earth care about the findings
- 04Apply for grants that fund your research and salary — rejection is the default outcome
- 05Attend faculty meetings that debate font choices on the department website for 90 minutes
- 06Mentor graduate students through the existential crisis that is academic career planning
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