Still, We Figure Out the Keys

Just to add a more optimistic take on the problem of figuring out how to sell yourself to teaching departments, it looks like there's some consensus shaping up in that Leiter thread about at least one thing. A couple of different people are making the case for including complete sets of student comments in your teaching portfolio, since a few cherry-picked choice quotes don't say about as much as the quotes on posters for shitty movies. ("[PGS] was. . . interesting! Best philosophy class since Scary Movie 4!) Makes sense, and that's the sort of very concrete advice even I can use without fucking it up.

Oh, and I suppose I should link to this old post. It's the list of 23--23!--teaching interview questions I compiled from the suggestions of tons of people who actually know something about this. (My vote for most horror-inducing question? Number 22: "Suppose someone (perhaps a community member, and not necessarily a student) came to you and asked how to resolve moral problem X. What would you tell them to do?" Sweet holy god, that question would throw me into a mute stupor that'd last for about eight days.)

--PGS