Career (PhD) advice
Career (Post-phD) advice
- Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught, Gian-Carlo Rota
- Tips on cover letters 1
- Tips on cover letters 2
Landing a position in academia
My philosophy on Teaching
Teaching is probably one of the most challenging and fascinating experience one can make at university. At least if what you like is to be intellectually challenged. Standing in front of a large group of curious cheeky students, eager to learn and to prove logically that you made a mistake (be it the slightest, we all know the “Sir, shouldn’t there be a plus instead of a minus ?” roaring at the end of an hour-long mathematical proof conducted at the board) in order to be fawned upon by the whole group. Well believe it or not this is what really makes the teaching job challenging and interesting for I’m convinced that in no other places, be it companies with crowds of shareholders, trade unionists or political debates where the smallest miscalculated gesture can lead the audience to assume that you’ll be on the loser’s side, you will never face such a thrilling environment increasing your level of adrenaline when a question is raised, asking you to go to the board for which you don’t know the answer yet.
Below I gather some movies describing what in my opinion teaching should ideally be :
- Finding Forrester
- Good Will hunting
- The emperor’s club
Another great movie on mentoring is “Scent of a woman” with Al Pacino.
Here is another very nice list of statements on education and learning by late Gian Carlo Rota
Discussions 