Professerror

Bryan discusses his sabbatical and shares what went well and what could have been better. Enjoy!

Professor Daniel Hall (TU Delft) joins Bryan and Steve to discuss his experience of growing up and studying in the US, but deciding to launch his academic career in Europe.

Bryan and Steve discuss successes and failures in developing graphics in academia. An audio discussion about visual communication - maybe this wasn't our brightest move??

Dr. Burcu Akinci, a full Professor and Department Head at Carnegie Mellon University, a National Academy of Construction member, and most recently a Peurifoy Construction Research Awardee, talks about how she still experiences imposter syndrome despite her many successes. Enjoy!

Steve's moving - and we're talking about it. We discuss what went well in the job application, interview, and moving processes and what didn't. Enjoy!

Bryan and Steve discuss their typical days as academics. They talk about the fun and not-so-fun parts of their professional lives. Enjoy!

Bryan and Steve discuss their struggles with serving in leadership positions - especially when leading individuals who do not directly report to them. Enjoy!

Kieren McCord joins us to discuss her experience in transitioning from a PhD student to a full time researcher in a national lab. Enjoy!

Bryan, Steve, and guest Professor Rob Leicht (Penn State) discuss sabbatical do's and don't's. Hopefully you enjoy learning from Rob's experience as much as we did.

Bryan and Steve discuss "tropes", or common patterns of behavior in pop culture storytelling, within academic settings.  We talk about these patterns and also how faculty who fall into these patterns can be received by others. This was a fun discussion that may be followed up with a "part II" or more sometime in the future. Enjoy!

Professor Jennifer Lather (University of Nebraska) stops by to discuss her experience in creating, delivering, and learning from a new course that she taught in her first year as a professor. Enjoy!

Bryan and Steve discuss their experiences and lessons learned in trying to attract top PhD students for their respective research groups.

Bryan and Steve discuss academic freedom and how various social and political shifts to impact this freedom can potentially impact students' educational experiences as well as our professional fulfillment as faculty.

Bryan and Steve discuss their experiences and struggles with helping students succeed in their courses now that most have returned to post-COVID modes of traditional in-person learning.

Prof. Kasey Faust (University of Texas, Austin) stops by to talk about finding balance between home life and work life. She offers several practical strategies that have helped her to find fulfillment personally and also professionally. Enjoy!

Bryan and Steve discuss their positive and negative experiences with social media in academia. Enjoy!

Bryan and Steve discuss their experiences (and their hesitancy) with spending their startup funding when they began their faculty careers.

Steve and Bryan discuss their experiences serving on faculty search committees. They share the types of concerns, debates, and challenges that may emerge when serving on a search committee. Hopefully this helps to offer insight if you find yourself on a committee, or perhaps it will offer insights on what may be discussed behind the scenes by search committees if you are currently applying for fac...

Dr. Masoud Gheisari and our own Dr. Bryan Franz discuss their experiences (and challenges) with pursuing and successfully achieving tenure.

Professor Robert LiKamWa (Arizona State University) discusses struggles related to mentoring students and facing rejections on the way to ultimately succeeding in building a large, externally-funded, research team.

Logan Perry (University of Nebraska) joins us to discuss his experience in shifting from a traditional Civil Engineering domain to Engineering Education and some of the lessons he learned related to conducting research in this field. 

Bryan and Steve discuss their failures, and occasional successes, with challenging their undergraduate students to address poorly structured problems. While these types of problems can support the kinds of learning necessary for the students' long-term success, they can also be a major challenge (and change) from what the students are used to, which leads to some unexpected difficulties in teachin...

After a pause in podcasting, Steve discusses his (admittedly brief) experience with becoming a father during the break. He and Bryan discuss successes, failures, joys, and headaches experienced in his journey thus far.

Bryan and Steve discuss their first major in-person conference since the pandemic began. They discuss various uncomfortable experiences, and how some may only be relevant in the short-term, while others may be around for much longer. Then they define a wish list for the conference of the future. Enjoy!

John Messner (Penn State) discusses his experience in working in the construction industry for seven years, pausing his research during this time, and then the challenges associated with returning to academia, shifting his research focus, and taking over an existing research group. Enjoy!