Those who choose an academic career face many challenges in managing that career, particularly in the years prior to tenure. Getting hired into an academic position that fits your intellectual and personal goals is the first hurdle (after completing the dissertation, of course). Learning how to balance the multiple roles that faculty members play (research, teaching, service) requires you to be aware of your own strengths and weaknesses, as well as of those of your colleagues and students. Selecting particular publication venues for your work, identifying and working with collaborators, and developing a long-term research plan all affect your research productivity. Seeking grants and managing those received require project management skills, while developing and implementing a new course require knowledge of pedagogy, as well as the topic area. These issues, and others raised by the participants, will be the focus of this panel session.

The goal for this panel session is to provide guidance to those beginning their academic careers, with the hope that they will develop as scholars and contribute to the long-term health of the ASIST community. Specifically, the objectives of this session are that attendees will: 1) be informed about the variety of approaches taken to development of junior faculty at universities with LIS programs; 2) be able to identify academic contexts that are a good fit with their intellectual and personal objectives; 3) have a better understanding of a variety of factors that can affect their career development; and 4) be able to make better decisions about their early career plans.

The entire session will consist of the panelists responding to questions from the moderators, the audience, and those who have submitted questions in advance of the meeting.

"Question cards" will be distributed to the audience as they enter the room. They will be asked, by the moderators, to write down their questions concerning early career issues. These cards will be gathered by volunteers throughout the session; they will be summarized, and the questions will be posed by the moderators for response by the panelists. (This type of question asking format is often used at ACM SIG CHI sessions, with great success.)

In addition, questions will be solicited through messages posted on the ASIST and JESSE listservs in advance of the meeting. These questions will augment those asked by those attending this session.

The panelists will include: Harry Bruce, University of Washington; Ingrid Hsieh-Yee, Catholic University of America; Barbara Kwasnik, Syracuse University; Edie Rasmussen, University of British Columbia; Carol Tenopir, University of Tennessee; and Dietmar Wolfram, University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee.