Today is the start of the AALS meat meet market, the annual hiring conference for would-be law professors. My wife is the chair of our entry-level appointments committee, so she's in DC along with the rest of our committee, while I'm minding the home front.
The law school has a lot of openings this year — six by some counts, although I'd guess that one or two of those jobs may be earmarked for lateral offers. But whatever the number, we're hiring, and it's a recession year. If this turns out to be anything like the year I was on the market, many state schools will find their budgets being cut between now and summer, and some of the jobs they thought they had may evaporate. There are some disadvantages to being in the private sector — high tuition burdening students with debt chief among them — but this may be one of the times when being private works to our advantage.
A few weeks ago I published an extended essay on this blog in which I tried to describe some of the salient features of life at UM from the point of view of entering faculty. I titled it “Ten Reasons Why You Should Teach Here — And Three Why You Shouldn't”. In case anyone is reading this from the AALS, I repost a slightly amended version of the same essay below.
But before I do that, I can't resist quoting from our student newspaper, the Res Ipsa Loquitur, which recently interviewed our most recent hire, Charlton Copeland, about his initial impressions of UM Law. This is part of what he said:
The faculty stood out for me a the AALS recruiting conference as one of the most intellectually engaged faculties with which I met over the weekend. They actually were interested in my writing projects, and gave me the sense that they took them and me seriously. My time with the committee ran out too quickly for me. My feeling of intellectual comfort with the faculty was only enhanced during my visit to the campus later in November, but that was augmented by my delight that this would be a group with which I'd be comfortable beyond simply discussing scholarly work. They were a bit quirky, and in a way about which I am excited. I am excited about the diversity of the city of Miami as well, and the opportunities that I think it will provide me to think about my areas of research in new ways — ranging from race and the the law (where the Law School has long been at the forefront in American legal education) to comparative separation of powers issues in Latin America.
And that maybe sums it up better than I can. It's certainly shorter.
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I've just learned that UM Law prof and all-around great guy 
There will be a ceremony at lunch on Jan 5 at the 
