Job Hunt - An offer!

So we've been looking for a job. We applied to 65ish schools starting in last October and heard back from a handful. There was a little hiccup with getting the second letter of recommendation a few months late but got that secured at the beginning of the year. We had some interviews and I've back posted about those if you really want all the details.  Worried about the lack of prospects, in early March we redoubled our efforts to contact ideal schools we haven't heard from and schools we did phone interviews with throughout the winter but haven't heard back from.  No luck. No hits. Every now and then we'd get an email from a school we haven't been contacted by at all and hear that although they were impressed with Chris' credentials they were overloaded with excellent candidates and had to be extremely picky with even who they wanted to invite out to interview and they regretted to inform us that we were not able to offer us a position at that time but they were appreciative of our interest in their school. Blah, blah blah.  Its a tough market.

Chris set up an meeting with his boss here to talk about the job hunt and see about what options (if any) he'd have here. Turns out, we could maybe extend for 6 months longer IF we could find funding, but 6 months doesn't really get us more academic options.

Just as Chris got in from that meeting he was dialing home to tell me about it all when he looked at his email and found a message from the Department Chair at Mississippi State saying she wanted to set up a time to call and discuss an offer! We were so relieved to have something, and as the details of the offer came through we were pleased to see that it was a really good offer. We also like the way the Computer Science and Engineering Department is organized there in its support of new professors.  They require all new professors to apply for tenure each year (even if they're not eligible to get it) so that they have yearly formal feedback on how well they're doing. They also require more grants and more yearly published papers than BYU requires of their professors.  So this position seems like a perfect place to hone Chris' research and leadership skills. Tenure track, academic jobs are hard to come by at the moment and we are grateful to be given a chance to pursue the lifestyle and career we've always wanted.  After a few emails back and forth we settled on a final offer and after some weeks finally saw the official offer for tenure-track assistant professor.

We took some time to think about it and pray and fast and go to the temple and with no red flags we decided to accept the offer and emailed Mississippi State with our intention.  I guess the Department Chair was so excited when she got that email, she screamed and had people coming to her office to see what the fuss was about. :)  Did I mention Chris said that everyone there seemed really nice? Southern accents to boot.

So we're going to live in the heart of the south and cheer for 'State'. Go Bulldogs!