I think that’s the part of the culture she doesn’t understand: that it really is an institution focused on and dedicated to teaching. It sounds like she’d literally never been in such an institution. She may also really not have grasped the logistical issues that a small department has–things like a small number of preps and repeated semester long absences are a huge deal when there are only three of you, and no pool of grad students who can teach.
But she does have a PhD in Philosophy - I assume she is trained in critical thought. I’d also assume she can read. And she has chosen academia as her field.
It shouldn’t surprise her that a small liberal arts school with no grad program has a teaching focus. It shouldn’t surprise her that their endowment is shrinking, their tuition is going up, and they have to control costs - and from there consider how those external factors would affect professors. It shouldn’t surprise her that with no graduate students, she’ll handle the complete teaching load for her coursework. She should have the research skills to look at their website and count the current number of Philosophy profs - as well as look over the course catalog to discover how many classes are taught. And then perform some simple math.
Yeah, it really sounds like it either wasn’t a good fit or she really didn’t understand the job she was taking - but it also sounds like she didn’t apply critical thought.
And going public - any blame I’d place on the school for rescinding the offer without talking to her - giving her a call and saying “for your response it looks like you’ve misunderstood the focus of our school - these are our priorities, you’ll notice that your research is not a top priority, and we’d like to give you an opportunity to decide if you want to reconsider if this job is for you before we consider your counter” is wiped out by the fact that she went public.
And - again - not bright. I would imagine that its a small world when you start talking about tenured Philosophy professors and if she thinks her name hasn’t been leaked by someone at Nazereth and that is currently making the rounds in the field, she’s nuts.
Oh, absolutely she could have and should have understood. I’m just agreeing with IvoryTowerDenizen that it’s most likely colossal cluelessness, not colossal entitlement.
And I can see why they rescinded the offer. If the hiring committee was split going in because some people had doubts about exactly this issue, getting a response that seemed to confirm their one concern about her–perhaps a concern that was heatedly aired in meetings already–would have been significant.
Obviously I am extrapolating a great deal, but I really do expect the committee talked about these issues–is she serious about teaching? Will she be here for the long haul? Does she understand this isn’t Harvard?–at some length.
I hadn’t thought of this, but you’re right. If she thinks going by “W” is going to protect her anonymity, this is further evidence that she is kind of clueless.
We live in a society where every perceived slight or injustice is worthy of publication and commentary. I can’t figure out if this is an all together bad thing, but it certainly can be dangerous if you aren’t careful. Another lesson learned!
There is another part of the dynamic, when asking for the sky when counter offering, that you didn’t really want the job.
I’ve done it in the past, when I was fortunate enough to have multiple offers. There was one job I didn’t like as much as the others, so I negotiated it first. Basically I asked for a 35% higher salary then they were offering. I figured if they accept, I can learn to like the job. They didn’t match, so I got the job I really wanted, with a template “ask for 10% more, they offer 5%” deal.
When I am hiring someone now, and they counter with a huge change, I figure they don’t really care that much about the job, and are just rolling he dice. I wouldn’t rescind the offer though, just say we aren’t able to meet. Can’t get a rep as a dick in IT, there are only a few headhunters and contract houses that have good people.
ETA: 35% increase not 350%. Even I don’t have that kind of sack 
It sort of comes down to the “incompetent or evil” dichotomy - if your excuse for not being evil was incompetence, it isn’t really an improvement. Obviously, this dichotomy is more along the lines of “clueless or entitled” - but neither is making me feel too sorry for her - I can’t really put a spin on her behavior that makes me feel the school was wrong.
Me either. I am approaching this more as “interesting study in human nature and society”.
I disagree. Any counteroffer constitutes a rejection of the first offer and the formation of a new one. The school is not dumping anyone in a “sour grapes” fashion; they are merely refusing to meet the terms of the new offer and the existing one is already null and void.
And when I learned negotiating (which, granted is mostly in a corporate environment with vendors), what I learned is your most powerful position is when you can walk away - and you always want to know who can walk away - if its the other guy and you can’t, you need to be careful. She said this is how she thought negotiating worked - but she missed that important part - if I counter with this, what is the worst that will happen - can they walk, and is that ok with me?
I’ve pulled offers from people who have countered for far too much money - I really don’t want to be dealing with someone who has unrealistic expectations (the late 90s were filled with people who could spell PC and thought they should make $100k a year - Cisco CCNP yeah, a fresh of the press MCSE with no experience to back it up - NO). And I didn’t respond with anything but a laugh with the realtor when we got a lowball offer on a house we were selling - I have no obligation to counter. And I will say that the echo of howls I’ve heard make me think that her belief that there was some obligation to counter is widely held.
“at a college, like ours, that is both teaching and student centered.”
I read this as “at a college like ours, that exploits the **** out of our professors and staff.” Given her expectations, she’s probably better off not at a small liberal arts college anyway, and I hope she finds the research university job she’s looking for.
Of course, the ultimate problem here is that universities are turning out too many philosophy PhD’s given the demand. (The same is true in fields like the biological sciences, my field, but to a lesser degree, and you can still do biological research at places other than universities- at government institutions or private industry, for example). If there weren’t an oversupply of philosophy graduates, then places like Nazareth College wouldn’t be able to get away with offering such an unappealing package.
What sort of research do philosophy postgrads do?
I don’t really know that I see that as a problem.
Little league teams turn out too many baseball players to play at a High School level. Those turn out far too many players to play in college, which turn out too many players to play in the minor leagues, which turn out too many players to play in the major leagues.
The solution is not limiting people whose passion is playing baseball by only letting a few play - the solution is having realistic expectations about where that passion is likely to lead - and then letting people make informed decisions about how far they want to go to pursue their passion.
Observing the contents of their bellybutton?
Possible, but then why go public?
Tenure track positions in the liberal arts are vanishing faster than whooping cranes in the 1950s. It’s absolutely a buyer’s market, and doing anything to louse up a job as ‘W’ did is rather ill-advised. The request for maternity leave isn’t something I can speak to, but from experience, most professors in their first couple of years are doing three new preps per SEMESTER, and she was out of line asking for a reduction.
My suspicion is that W had another offer, perhaps at a better location or even out of academia, and was seeing what she could get from Nazareth. Likewise, Nazareth probably had another candidate who was comparable to W, so exercising their Plan B was a viable option. It’s not unusual for candidates to hear from institutions after the first choice has not panned out (or at least that wasn’t the case 15 years ago when I was closer to the game), so the entire state of affairs doesn’t surprise me that much.
It’s more common for applicants to back out because they’ve gotten some marvelous deal elsewhere, and I’ve never heard of an institution rescinding an offer in this manner, but I’m not surprised given the market.
The phenomenology of the geist is always open to further sublation.
That’s my question, too.
Not really. It is for the most part teaching the SOS as always. Some do it better, some do it worse.
Recreational outrage?
You mean on the applicant’s part? Yeah, maybe.