“Service” is a tricky category in a grad student’s career planning. The general advice one gets usually says to keep it to a minimum and focus on your dissertation. This is not all bad advice, but it assumes that time is the only main factor affecting one’s research progress. Now, don’t get me wrong, graduate school is a busy time, especially for those overloaded with teaching obligations and who, like myself, have a family aside from philosophy. Time is valuable, but part of being a good philosopher, in theory and in practice, is to be a (good) member of the profession. This understanding has led me to become a member, and now chair, of the APA’s Graduate Student Council (GSC), and in this short piece I’d like to share with you my perspective on service work for grad students and the invaluable role in making our voices heard within the APA.
Our profession faces challenging times: heightened job-market competitiveness, the general crisis in the humanities, and even recurrent attacks on academic freedom. I believe that if you’re on the boat, you should definitely grab an oar. The future of our profession requires significant attention now, and those of us who will inherit this academic environment have the greatest stake in its outcome. The Graduate Student Council exists as an active and vital body within the APA precisely because the organization recognizes this reality. The APA’s Board has not only created space for graduate students’ perspectives but has intentionally integrated the GSC into its leadership structure, with the GSC chair serving as a voting board member, voicing the concerns and sensibilities of the younger generation. Through this approach—with graduate students at the table—we are better positioned to envision and create a healthier state of the profession as it moves forward.
Besides steering the profession’s ship, much can also be done to make our current stage, grad school itself, a better place for intellectual cooperation and growth. Therefore, the GSC serves an additional purpose within the APA ecosystem: building a robust network among graduate students and providing them with tools for expression, guidance, and professional opportunities. We do this through a number of projects and initiatives led by our twelve members, such as “The Graduate Student Chronicles” at the Blog of the APA, our affiliated sessions at the APA’s divisional meetings, and workshops and seminars for current and prospective philosophy graduate students. Moreover, in direct response to worries shared with us by other grad students, we’re currently developing a comprehensive guide to best Ph.D. practices, particularly on establishing guidelines for more fruitful and significant advisor-advisee relationships. We hope that these and our other initiatives will continue to contribute to a more resilient and adaptable community of young philosophers who feel supported by their peers and mentors.
My experience in the GSC has proven to me that meaningful service isn’t a distraction from academic work, but an enrichment of it. As an ethicist, the connections I’ve formed with fellow graduate students and established philosophers have helped me become more sensitive to mine and my colleagues’ struggles, engaging with finding solutions to things many have taken to just be “part of the job.” This in itself is a nurturing experience for ethical thought, in my opinion. Furthermore, having a more comprehensive idea of what the profession consists of allows me to turn back to my research in a more conscious way, knowing what to expect from this career path.
For graduate students considering whether to engage in service, I encourage thinking more holistically about how you invest your time and considering the GSC as a valuable platform to make your contribution and learn more about what it means to be an academic philosopher, with not only “the philosophy” in mind, but also the profession’s ethics and politics, the constraints that come with a community, and the value of cooperation and mutual growth.
The post Reflections on Service, the Profession, and the Graduate Student Council first appeared on Blog of the APA.
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