Job searching...
Well, my first post-graduate interview went well. After some excitement involving sprinklers Saturday morning, we managed to just barely make our plane up to Denver/Boulder/Longmont. Coronation was coronation - long court followed by many long meetings that don't involve me. Accomplishing what we had set out to do - saying goodbye to the former King and Queen - we decided to forego the rest of the event and spend time with faeflitt's family. My only gripe about Coronation was the cost - I think we ended up spending something like $70 for a morning of court with no chairs and no food. I shouldn't really bitch - I understand that event costs can get pricey... but I also begin to understand some of the disgruntlement about site fees climbing in cost.
Anyways, the rest of the weekend was nice - it was good to get to meet a fairly large part of faeflitt's family. Soon enough, Sunday was here and it was off on a plane to Phoenix and then taking a rental car up to Prescott. I got in about 11:30 and crashed as soon as I was able. The next morning, I woke up, showered and discovered that my new shirt needed ironing. Got that accomplished, got breakfast, and made it to campus within moments of my appointment (on time, but closer than I like). I got to meet the department chair and several of the professors, sit in on a the Physics class I would be teaching, discuss salary and initial negotiations with the Dean of Arts & Sciences and then have an impromptu seminar on my past and future research plans. After the seminar, we went out to eat at one one of the resturants off of Town Square, followed by walking the historic district. I made it back to my room about 9:30 and spent a couple of hours finishing my preparations for class the next day.
Tuesday, I woke up, got breakfast and headed in to campus. My first meeting was with HR and that went quickly. "Here are our benefits, here is how a 9-month schedule works, and if you have any questions here is my phone number." Then hanging out in a conference to finish final preparations for class. I was overly nervous about the teaching and I didn't think that went as well as I could have hoped, but they seemed to be mostly happy and liked the various things I tried - even if at one point my mind saw my notes and then translated them into something complete different and *wrong* on the white board. Apparently, I got points for recovery. Then the department chair took me out to lunch and we toured Prescott in some detail looking at housing opportunities. Finally, it was time for me to head back to Phoenix - returned the rental car and made it back to Albuquerque, where I pretty promptly crashed.
This morning, I had a phone interview with Areva. This also went well, and it sounds like the are looking to fly me out to Lynchburg, VA fairly soon. I have another phone interview with the University of Missouri-Rolla tomorrow afternoon.
My impression is the ERAU liked me and I am almost certainly their first (or only) choice for the position. I expect to get an offer from them sometime in the next day or so. Areva also sounds very interested and we shall see how UM-R pans out. I also have several other applications in the works that I haven't heard back on.
Depending on what the ERAU offer looks like, I am going to be *really* tempted - I liked the school, the town, and the people I would be working with. The Space Physics program there is new and the exotic propulsion part would be mine to develop as I want. I think this is a great opportunity that is probably once in a lifetime. I only have two worries - the first is that the money is not likely to be as high as I would like - certainly it is a good paying job, but since ERAU is essentially a baccalureate only school, the starting Assistant Professor pay scale is less than it might be elsewhere (at least that is my perception). On the other hand, I have to balance this with job satisfaction and quality of work experience. I can probably make an astounding amount of money if I go commercial nuke, but everything about the ERAU job seems to fit better with my personality and style... and I think it has the potential to be a lot more rewarding in the long run. My second worry is that having this much freedom to develop the program and experience I want also comes with a lot of responsiblity - and that is, in some ways, more than a little scary.