“While I shook my metaphorical fist at you every time I received a round of edits on job documents, the process empowered me as a job seeker and scholar. Between our one-on-one work, your webinars, and the blog, I came to know what I offer academia and the kind of scholarly community I want to join. I also learned how to present myself as a professional, and to be confident in which of the academic ‘games’ I simply was not going to play” Ph.D., Education, tenure track job at a SLAC
Or, Email me to schedule any of these services.
We have a particular commitment to supporting Black and Indigenous women in the academy. This is a core company mission. If you are a member of these communities, and finances are an issue in working with us, please get in touch to discuss possible arrangements at rates you can afford.
JOB/POSTDOC RELATED SERVICES
- Tenure Track Academic Job Application Materials
In the basic job doc genre for untenured (ie assistant professor or NTT positions), I work on cover letters, CVs, teaching statements, research statements, diversity statements, dissertation abstracts, and syllabi (I do other documents, but they are explained below). When working together on your job documents for academic positions, we will go back and forth through edits until the documents are in short-list-worthy state. Up to four edit drafts are included in the one hour of work, and the process takes about one week per document. Most people ask me to work on 3 or 4 documents–job letter, cv, and teaching statement, and research statement. One document is one hour of work. 3 hours of work at $180/hour, with the 10% discount for 3-4 hours, comes to $486. If you need to add a fourth document, such as a two-three page research statement, the total will come to $648. There is a 15% discount for 5-9 hours, and a 20% discount for 10+ hours. Once we decide on the hours needed, we set a date on the calendar and I invoice you, and payment of the invoice holds the spot. I work only with advanced ABDs, Ph.D.s, MFAs, etc.
- Postdoctoral Fellowship Application Materials (4 drafts)
I edit your postdoc applications to demonstrate the principles of urgency, legitimacy, and viability. The cost of postdoc work depends on the number of documents required and their page length. Most postdoc packages will typically come to about 4-6 hours. A 1-2 page research proposal by itself will take 2 hours, 3-6 page proposal will take 3 hours, and a 7-12 page proposal will require 4 hours. A postdoc cover letter requires an hour. This work is also $180/hour. If you want to work on multiple postdocs, I’ll also inquire how much recycling or overlap you think is possible between the applications, and reduce the cost accordingly.
- Post-Tenure Job Application Materials (ie, for tenured clients; 4 drafts) and Academic Administration positions (even if applicant is untenured):
This work is identical to the Tenure Track Academic Job Application work above; I simply charge the tenured more! The cost is $220 per document or hour of work. The same discounts apply: 10% for 3-4 hours, 15% for 5-9 hours, and 20% for 10+ hours.
- Syllabi/Course Proposals
I assist you in developing your Syllabi and Course Proposals, which I’ve come to understand are much harder for new scholars to develop than one would imagine. I read them for wording and organization, but also for content, level of rigor, reading load, and appropriateness of language and work load for the level and type of student/institution. These are 1 hour each, at $180/hour for four drafts of edits.
- Tenure and Promotion Documents
I do reviews and edits of tenure packages, including the statements of research, teaching, and service. I can also review your CV according to the formatting requirements of your tenure process. I can also consult on choosing external reviewers, handling complicated cases, and answer other queries related to the tenure process. The cost of tenure review help is $250/hour and I can estimate the number of hours once you tell me what exactly is required for your particular institution’s process. The usual discounts explained above apply.
- Job Talk Editing:
I edit Job Talks taking into account both general presentation principles as well as any specific instructions you have been given. I read for professionalism of approach, clarity and organization, persuasiveness, quality of evidence and argumentation, balance of data and theory, and soundness of conclusion. A Job Talk edit requires two hours at $180/hour, totalling $360, plus (only in the cases where a short-deadline overflow edit is necessary due to timing) a reduced overflow fee of $100 = $460. This covers two drafts of edits of your job talk. The tenured rate, as above, is $220/hour.
- Offer/Negotiation Assistance
I assist you in evaluating the offer, clarifying your requests, crafting email and verbal communications, interpreting responses, and knowing how hard to push and when to stop. Most clients increase their offer by thousands of dollars in salary, research support, travel support, moving expenses, etc. Negotiating Assistance is $600/first 7 days of work ($700 for tenured positions), and seven days is virtually always sufficient (it goes down to $500 ($600), and then $400 ($500) for subsequent weeks in the extremely rare event that this is necessary). The 7 days of work don’t have to be sequential – they can proceed by fits and starts, as negotiation back and forth usually does! We can start immediately, and I make myself available by email and then gchat for the quick turnaround of responses required by most negotiations. While I technically don’t work on weekends, for NA clients only I check in to keep up with and respond to urgent updates. I do accommodate budget constraints so don’t hesitate to ask.
- Ongoing “Retainer” Fee for job market-related queries and consultations.
Only for previous document editing clients, I will arrange for a Retainer Fee to answer up to four emails per month on job search-related questions. These are small questions, such as “what should I wear to the interview?” or “Should I tell the committee about my new grant?” These are not major career consultations! (That service is below–please keep reading!). The cost for the Retainer Fee is $125 for up to four emails per month.
- One on One Career Consulting
I take any one-on-one advising and consulting clients from January to March only. During this time I am happy to provide advising/consulting on any quandaries related to the academic career, including publication plans, departmental politics, dealing with Imposter Syndrome or writers block, tenure anxieties, job market struggles, exit strategizing, or the decision to leave academia entirely. There are no wrong questions! You can get help in two ways: a 1 hour skype consult, or alternatively, a 5-email exchange consult. Both are $400.
I ask all career consulting clients to do at least one document edit with me first (either CV or CL) so that I have a holistic knowledge of your record before starting. The rationale for this is twofold: on the one hand, I get to know your record quickly, so I can advise you better. And on the other, clients tend to find the editing process illuminating in itself, and you will see many basic questions answered by the editing process (and get a finished doc out of it), allowing us to devote the 5 questions to more “advanced” issues. A job doc is $180, so this does represent an additional expense, and I’ll be happy to consider exceptions to this rule for financial or other reasons. Feel free to email me at gettenure@gmail.com with any questions about the consulting/advising process.
GRANT SERVICES
Grant Application Editing:
I edit your Grant Applications to demonstrate the principles of urgency, legitimacy, and viability through the application of the Foolproof Grant Template. The cost of Grant work depends on the number of documents required and their page length. A 1-2 page grant proposal by itself will take 2 hours, 3-6 page proposal will take 3 hours, and a 7-12 page proposal will require 4 hours. This work is also the base rate of $180/hour. If you want to work on multiple grants, I’ll also inquire how much recycling or overlap you think is possible between the applications, and reduce the cost accordingly. Please note that while I primarily work on social science and humanities grants, I do work on science grants on a case by case basis, and am happy to discuss it with you. The usual discounts explained above apply.
Also: See Postdoctoral Fellowship Application Services (Above)
OTHER SERVICES
- Book Proposal Editing and Consulting:
We love to work on Book Proposals! We show you how to organize a Book Proposal to include all the required elements, and to focus on the marketing aspects instead of the excessive scholarly detail that inexperienced scholars mistakenly include. The standard 6-8 page book proposal is 3 hours, and the cost is $210/hour ($250/hour for tenured folks). The discounts explained above apply.
- Single Article or Chapter Manuscript Editing:
On a case-by-case basis Dr. Karen will edit Article or Chapter Mss. I read for organization and language, soundness of evidence and argumentation, balance of data and theory, and suitability for the journal being targeted, as well as basic issues of wording, grammar, sentence structure, and style. In particular I flag weak logic, jargon, word repetition, and the scourge of redundancy. The cost is $240/hour and the number of hours depends on the page length of the mss., but in most cases, the cost is 2 hours for one draft of edits or 3 hours for two drafts. The usual discounts explained above apply.
- Post-Academic Assistance
Find the Out-Academic/Post-Academic/Alt-Academic Services here.
- Graduate School Application Assistance
We now offer assistance in applying to graduate programs. The work is done by a tenured TPII staff member who has served as Director of Graduate Study in her department. She works will all fields, from the initial planning stages, to editing your Statement of Purpose and other application materials, and prepping for admission interviews.
Here is a testimonial: “I already heard back from [Ivy] and was admitted for the Fall 2017 PhD program. I am really excited about this and obviously have some tough decisions ahead depending on where else I get in. Thanks again for all your help with this process, it clearly paid off!”
1. A 2-Email Consultation Service – $150. We can discuss the pros and cons of attending, and also, which institutions, departments, and/or offers are the best for your goals (this service is available only for applicants in humanities and social sciences).
2. 30-Minute Graduate School Consultation by Skype – $125. Wondering whether to go to graduate school? During this 30 minutes we’ll talk about your goals and ask the hard questions that anyone considering graduate school must answer. These may include (but are not limited to) questions of financing and debt, the hierarchy and status of graduate programs, domestic vs. foreign graduate programs, advantages and pitfalls of interdisciplinary PhD programs, the job market, and evaluating potential advisors and areas of study. (this service is available only for applicants in humanities and social sciences).
3. 2-Email “Application Assistance” Service – $150. This service is designed to walk you through questions that may arise in the process of applying to graduate school, for example, how (and whether) to reach out to a potential adviser, who should you get letters of recommendation from, and other miscellaneous issues.
4. Document Editing – $100. We help you edit your statement of purpose; includes two rounds of edits — a structural/conceptual edit (first round) and a line edit (second round). Each subsequent statement of purpose for additional programs is $50. Editing for writing samples, statements of diversity, and other documents that may be required for an application to a PhD program is also available; pricing depends on the length.
5. Interview Preparation – $250. This hour-long Skype session is designed to help you prepare for an interview for a PhD program. We will go over “scripts” for likely questions, streamline your ability to talk about your research experience and goals, develop appropriate questions to ask your interviewees, and make sure that your affect and body language signal calm confidence.
6. NEW: How To Contact a Prospective Ph.D. Advisor Guidance Package – $24.99. A package of materials that walks you through the composition of an email of inquiry to a potential Ph.D. advisor, with instructions and examples drawn from STEM, social science, and humanities. Does NOT include live individual editing. Find this product here.
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TIME CONSIDERATIONS
- Normal turn-around time is 2-4 business days. I do not work on weekends or holidays.
- Last-minute/Tight deadline Overflow responses and scheduling available. Overflow Fees allow you to start earlier on the schedule but don’t change the pace of the work. Quick (48-hour) turnaround edits are always possible through the Quick Reviews of the Cover Letter, CV, Teaching Statement, Research Statement, and Diversity Statement, available here.
PAYMENT DETAILS
- Advance Payment Required After Initial Arrangements by Email
- Forms of Payment Accepted:
- Paypal (I will invoice you once we have set up a consultation plan)
- Venmo/Cash-App
- Check