Catch 22

I was up at James Madison University this past weekend for a fun filled and exciting math conference. I drove up Saturday morning, bringing one of my friends who was also talking at the conference. It took about 4 and a half hours to drive up there, which is pretty quick (as I drive pretty fast) :) But I was trying to make good time, because we had to be there by noon.

We got there about 11:50 and hung out while a speaker was finishing his talk. We then went to lunch with all the people and the JMU dining hall. Wow, very nice dining facilities. It is like a food court at the mall or something. All these stations with high quality food. Very nice.

After lunch and talking with some people, we came back and I gave my talk that afternoon. It went fairly well. There was a man who asked a few questions, and while I wasn't prepared to answer them, I answered one incorrectly, and one while my answer was ok, I actually had a much better answer after thinking about it that evening. Turns out that I knew the answers but not off the top of my head, and I guess being put on the spot and not expecting it made me nervous. Oh well, as my advisor says, they don't know what I am talking about so if I said the wrong thing they wouldn't know the difference! :)

We went to dinner with the group as well and I got a chance to talk to a few difference professors at different smaller schools around here (VA, GA). Turns out what I thought about trying to get hired at these smaller schools is not true. I was under the impression that schools like JMU, Georgia State, George Mason, Virgina Commonwealth would hired recent graduates without a postdoc. But turns out even these schools want someone with a postdoc or a lot of research. The problem is that there are hardly any postdocs available for pure math. Even the George Mason guy was like, "yeah it is a catch 22 isn't it." So now I have to reevaluate my planning.

I guess it is great that I am almost done with my thesis and am already starting to work on something else. This way I can try to get something published soon and then have something to say I am working on when I am applying. It was just kind of frustrating to think that I was on the right path and was thinking if I did apply to some teaching jobs at smaller schools, then I might have a shot. It is also good that I found all this out so that I am more prepared too. Most of the people there were very impressed that I also work at Meredith as adjunct faculty.

Also makes me think that the NSA and CIA are becoming more and more appealing!