Duns Eith

Congrats! I hope you love it there!

Western Michigan University has two people who do epistemology. Tim McGrew -- formal epistemology, bayesian epistemology, applied probability, historical philosophy of science (he's an internalist) https://philpeople.org/profiles/timothy-mcgrew-1 Marc Alspector-Kelly -- contemporary philosophy of science, epistemic closure (he denies it!), safety/sensitivity conditions, and so on (he's an externalist) http://homepages.wmich.edu/~malspect/

Yes. Prioritize the sample. Send it to people who will tear it to shreds with critical feedback. Then fix all of the things they mention (even the minutia you don't care about), so it will emerge a brightly burning phoenix, about which the admission committee will carry on an oral tradition.

Thanks! This looks like a helpful route. I am not trying to land a teaching gig this new academic year, I'm just thinking about future cycles (I should be done with my PhD in three years) and when I get close to finishing I want to have something lined up. So, I'm not worried about the current hiring season. I'll look into NAIS! This is good to know. Can you say more? I posted some stuff for NY state. Is that basically the same, or do you have something different in mind?

I should also say, I have some criteria before I accept such a responsibility: Must have had me for a class I was instructor of record Must have been in top 5% of the class. Must have talked with me outside of class. If a student hasn't met all these, I cannot write a good letter for them. In my ideal world, I would modify the criteria to be: Must have had me for two semester-long interactions (classes typically, but if we're on the same project for whatever reason that works too) Must have earned over grade 95% in class, or top 3 students Must have talked with me during office hours about their plans and such, not just course material.

Yes. Many times. I warn the student that my word has less weight and that they would be better off asking someone else, but if they persist I still write letters for them.

Hey, only tangentially related, but ...your advice on this site is consistently clear and helpful. It is great to have you here. Many of my posts can add nothing after you've made your rounds. Hah.

I think the answer above mine is pretty good advice. Could you say more about your field? I don't know the norms of your discipline.

Why get a second MA in philosophy? If you got an MA in philosophy you should have a pretty well-rounded basis in philosophy on a graduate level, and you should know how to research. What would a second MA get you that you didn't already get? Or did you not get a decent foundation or not learn how to do research? If it is merely to improve your chances into getting into a PhD (your OP), then your time would be better spent working on your writing sample (and GRE) and continuing to do good self-directed research. You definitely don't need a second MA to change your prospects much. It probably won't make much of a difference.

As a grad student it is becoming more and more important that the humanities is floundering in part because we aren't public-facing enough. A lot of researchers think such an orientation is demeaning, unnecessary, and irrelevant to their interests. I understand the sentiment, but I think it's wrongheaded ultimately. Here's a fun article to the conflict in academia and its apathy over falling apart: https://www.chronicle.com/interactives/20190510-academes-extinction-event But now I am thinking about how grad students are willing to get involved -myself included- in advocating for humanities in public squares and being generally more publicly oriented. However, it seems that grad students are the last people who should be putting the time and effort in on the front lines. They aren't established philosophers, so they don't have financial security. They have less expertise to bear on practical issues. They are less-likely to be invested in a particular local community either (they have not bought a house or a condo, say). In any case, I'm thinking about how I might be misguided on this point. But suppose I'm not, then how do we get academics who are our mentors to get off their duffs and make a case for their field to those who are not in their field? Is this silly to ask?

Looking into National certification standards, it looks like they won't consider my teaching in undergrad adequate at all: https://www.nbpts.org/wp-content/uploads/Guide_to_NB_Certification.pdf

Here's a list of requirements if I wanted to get certified to teach at a high school grades 7-12: http://eservices.nysed.gov/teach/certhelp/CertRequirementHelp.do Education - Bachelors Degree Minimum 2.50 Undergraduate GPA General Core in Liberal Arts and Sciences - 30 S.H. College Coursework - Artistic Expression College Coursework - Communication College Coursework - Information Retrieval College Coursework - Humanities College Coursework - Language other than English (including American Sign Language) College Coursework - Written Analysis and Expression College Coursework - Concepts in Historical and Social Sciences College Coursework - Scientific Processes College Coursework - Mathematical Processes Content Core - Social Studies - 30 S.H. College Coursework - Government College Coursework - Economics College Coursework - Social Studies Set including U.S. History, World History, Geography - 21 S.H. College Coursework - World History College Coursework - U.S. History College Coursework - Geography Pedagogical Core - 21 S.H. College Coursework EXCLUSIVELY at Student Developmental Level - Adolescent - Grades 7-12 - 6 S.H. College Coursework - Human Development and Learning College Coursework - Teaching Students with Disabilities & Special Health-Care Needs College Coursework - Teaching Literacy Skills Methods - 3 S.H. College Coursework - Teaching Literacy Skills - 3 S.H. College Coursework - Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment College Coursework - Foundations of Education Student Teaching - Social Studies grades 7-12, for 40 Days New York State Teacher Certification Exam - Educating All Students Test (EAS) edTPA - Secondary History/Social Studies This is a certification exam: http://www.highered.nysed.gov/tcert/certificate/certexamsedtpa.html Content Specialty Test (CST) - Social Studies or Safety Net Social Studies So is this: http://www.nystce.nesinc.com/ Workshop - Child Abuse Identification Workshop - School Violence Intervention and Prevention Workshop - Dignity For All Students Act Fingerprint Clearance --- Now for me, I'm pretty sure I would need to go back and take more history courses, even though I have done plenty of work and research in history of philosophy. I would definitely need to take courses in teaching methods. I'm all for learning those, but I don't think I can afford 21 credits of undergrad coursework just in teaching. That's over $8,000 just in courses, and that's not the certification exams. I might be able to convince my advisor and DGS that I should take a teaching course in the graduate school of education. But that's just one course. Hardly enough. But returning to the original question, does anyone have any tips on how to go about teaching without certification? Are there some strong recommendations to get certified anyway? How do you tackle this?

Honestly, I am worried for the OP for even posing the question in a public forum. So risky I hope he was using a proxy.

In addition, I think. Not in philosophy

Hey all, I went into grad school with the hope of teaching humanities (philosophy, religion, etc.) at a college level. I knew the odds were (are) against me, and I'm considering alternatives to academia and the university system. If I want to teach at a public high school, teaching certification definitely comes in. But some have told me that I could teach at a charter school (or maybe a prep school?), or some other privately funded school, without needing state certification in teaching. It seems that whether those schools need a certification is determined either by state (some states don't regulate, others do?), or merely virtually through the competitiveness of the market (private schools can afford to require certification) Why Not Certification? I am in New York (upstate, not city), and it looks like NY's education department requires a lot of different things that I don't have the money or time to do, such as taking a pile of courses (6 or more college courses) in my subject area or in pedagogy. (I'm interested in pedagogy and theory, for sure, but there is a lot of fluff and busywork in college courses that I'd like to skip if I can) Yet it seems that some certification requirements can be waived or considered equivalent -- this is where I am getting tripped up: it is opaque whether my credentials get me there or a long ways off. Here's what I do have: en route to PhD in philosophy (ABD later this year) MA in philosophy MA in religion BA in psychology & philosophy Teaching experience as instructor of record with undergrads for over 3 years (non-continuous, irregular appointments), i.e., 9 semesters Any tips on how to go about this process?