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jobhunter08's Blog Part IV: Interviewing at the Joint Mathematics Meeting

By jobhunter08
Posted Wed Jan 14, 2009 at 05:25:47 PM PDT

742 applicants, 114 employers. That was posted at the front of the Employment Center at the Washington, DC Joint Mathematics Meeting. How's that for intimidating/depressing? This is the time when it starts to set in for all of us applicants that no matter what our CV looks like, there are at least 741 other people out there vying for the same positions.

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There were people camped outside the employment center, filling out form after form requesting to interview with schools and preparing packets to place in the employers' folders. Having only applied to two schools, I had one interview scheduled, towards the end of the first day. Despite not being overly nervous, I made stop after stop to check my folder and didn't actually do much until the interview. On the other hand, this was a great opportunity to see some old friends... several who were also on the job market and a few who were performing interviews for their colleges.

Having only one interview, I can't really say whether it went well or not. It did seem a little bit awkward to me. The interviewees seemed slightly unfocused and unsure of what questions to ask me. I'm not sure if it was me or them, or perhaps just part of being near the end of the long line of applicant after applicant after applicant. I can only hope that I made a favorable impression and will be called for a campus visit, but it seems you never can tell with these things. I'm still confident that applying to just the two places that I really want to attend this year will be the right thing to do, and praying that things will work out. I'll report more later as I hear back.

I'd be curious to hear from someone who interviewed with lots of places and can talk about the different kinds of interviews they had. Anyone else out there have stories to report on the meeting?

Also, thanks to dkung for posting some advice for campus interviews. Great stuff! Now to actually get a campus interview... [ed: added link]

< Graduate School: Choosing One, Getting In, Staying In | Joint Meetings interviews redux >

jobhunter08's Blog Part IV: Interviewing at the Joint Mathematics Meeting | 4 comments (4 topical, 0 hidden)

[new] I heard rumors of concern (none / 0) (#1)
by halewis on Sat Jan 17, 2009 at 06:00:03 AM PDT

I wasn't involved with interviewing at all (and I'm also eager to hear from folk who were), but the scuttlebutt was that it was going to be a hard year. I spoke to one person who had already heard from a few schools that they were canceling their searches this year, and people were especially worried about next year. More than one comparison to the mid-90s job market that sparked the YMN! But in good news, I did talk with several people who were the interviewers, and the brief impression I had was that it was business as normal. I remember last year having several candidates tell us that they'd gotten jobs before the Joint Meetings. I don't know if that's going on more this year (I suspect not), but I do wonder if there are more schools who are skipping interviewing at the JMM this year, but still might be hiring.

[new] Interviews at the JMM (none / 0) (#2)
by dkung on Sat Jan 17, 2009 at 06:52:38 AM PDT

We're hiring this year for a tenure-track position. We had almost double the number of applications we've gotten in the past, though that's probably some combination of the bad job market and our use of mathjobs.org for electronic submissions. Like many schools, we chose not to use the Employment Center, interviewing our candidates in various locations around the Marriott. Judging by the number of small circles of people, mostly focused on one particularly well-dressed, slightly nervous person, lots of other schools did the same. So I don't think the numbers are as bad as the ones posted in the EC. That said, it does look like the worst job market in quite a while - probably since the mid-90's.

[new] Lots of interviews (none / 0) (#4)
by now searching on Sun Jan 25, 2009 at 09:05:44 AM PDT

I interviewed with lots of schools. Some interviews had a list of questions they wanted to go over, others asked a couple of the standard questions, but really wanted to just chat. The impression I got was that the interviews that went well were really just conversations, both of us asking questions where appropriate. I figure at this point they know about your credentials, and that these interviews are more about fit, hence making conversations a more productive interviewing technique.

The conversations that felt forced and unorganized were the schools that I don't think we will really be a good fit for each other. The conversations seemed to morph into more of the question/answer no follow-up format, then awkward silence. I'm assuming they had other candidates where that did not happen.

The most thorough and relaxed interviews were the ones held in other locations. Most of those interviews were not held to as strict time constraints and many times had more members interviewing, although not in all cases.

The best question I got was to list what the deciding factors for me in terms of taking or turning down a job. Luckily for me this was at a school that is one of my top choices, so my answer helped land me an on-campus interview. Still, I was honest about one factor that they didn't rank as highly as some others. I think they appreciated my honesty about that and it made the rest of my answer (in which I pretty much described their department) much more believable. Otherwise they might have thought I was just answering what I thought they wanted to hear.

[new] Interviewing at the Joint Mathematics Meeting (none / 0) (#5)
by House on Mon Oct 19, 2009 at 12:28:52 AM PDT

Thank for the info!

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jobhunter08's Blog Part IV: Interviewing at the Joint Mathematics Meeting | 4 comments (4 topical, 0 hidden)

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