PHD Required

[SophietheSophist]

Hi All! First time poster here.

I have a master's degree with SIGNIFICANT experience (about 7 years) of full-time teaching (non-tenure track) and administrative experience (director level at two universities) and I'm looking at another director position (the SAME job that I've done in the past) but it says "PHD required"-- which my prior two institutions required only a master's. Is this worth applying to if I do not have a PHD but have done the job in the past? How would you word this in a cover letter? Or, is it just not worth it to even try? 

Does anyone have any experience w schools changing their requirement after posting or hiring someone who doesn't meet a hard educational requirement (not just preferred)? 

[ZeChocMoose]

6 hours ago, SophietheSophist said:

Hi All! First time poster here.

I have a master's degree with SIGNIFICANT experience (about 7 years) of full-time teaching (non-tenure track) and administrative experience (director level at two universities) and I'm looking at another director position (the SAME job that I've done in the past) but it says "PHD required"-- which my prior two institutions required only a master's. Is this worth applying to if I do not have a PHD but have done the job in the past? How would you word this in a cover letter? Or, is it just not worth it to even try? 

Does anyone have any experience w schools changing their requirement after posting or hiring someone who doesn't meet a hard educational requirement (not just preferred)? 

I mean you never know so I would apply.  They might not end up with the pool of candidates that they were expecting and will have to be flexible on some of their requirements.

Before my PhD, I applied to a couple of PhD required research positions, but I was not successful.  I was close to being done with my PhD though (i.e. within a year of finishing) so I would just mention my expected date to finish in my cover letter.  Since it sounds like you are not in a PhD program - I personally wouldn't mention it in your cover letter that you don't have a PhD, I would just focus on your strengths and why you think you would be the best person for the job.  If it is a non-negotiable requirement, you might get autorejected from the application system, but I would still apply if they are only asking for a cover letter and a resume.  If they are asking for beyond that, I would think about it some more.  Some things that I would think about or weigh would be how much I like the position versus how much time it will take to create the additional materials that they are seeking - especially if they don't end up seeing my application because I got autorejected or filtered out of the application pool since I don't meet the minimum requirements. 

[Faith786]

I feel like you could give it a try, but from my experience, when I applied to PhD-normally required and PhD-ABD-is-acceptable-jobs, I still did not get called because they wanted a FINISHED PhD. I am now finished the PhD and still find that it is hard getting jobs because each job posting gets hundreds of applicants and the really nice jobs get up to thousands of applicants. The experience of applying is always a good thing, IMO. 

 

Edited March 26, 2020 by Faith786