Conditionally Accepted was created as a freestanding blog in July 2013 as an online space for scholars on the margins of academe. It has steadily grown since, becoming a career advice column for Inside Higher Ed [here] in January 2016.  In our column, we provide news, information, personal stories, and resources for scholars who are, at best, conditionally accepted in academe. We aim to present a safe and inclusive space.  As such, voices from academics of various backgrounds, disciplines, and career paths are encouraged to contribute to the blog.

Suggested Guidelines For Guest Blog Posts

In order to maintain the site’s climate of diversity, inclusion, support, respect, and accessibility, we offer the following suggestions for guest blog posts.

• Attempt to ground personal anecdotes in larger patterns to ensure that sharing your experiences may offer something to other readers.  This may mean speaking about broader patterns in your own life, institution, or field, including (but not necessarily) reports from research on academia and other post-PhD careers.

• However, be sure to speak only for yourself.  Avoid naming others without their permission, and speak in general terms to make it difficult to discern the identity of others you reference in your posts.  This does not include references to the actions and statements of others that are publicly accessible; in such cases, please provide links and citations when available to give more context.

• Write with the intention of being accessible to a broad academic audience. Specifically, this means attempting to avoid academic jargon or at least taking the time to explain complex concepts, ideas, and perspectives for unfamiliar readers. Consider explicitly stating the you argument or goal of your essay, and noting your intended audience.
  

• As much as comfortable, please note your background to allow readers to understand your perspective.  This may be as simple as being clear that your post generally reflects what you have noticed in your own discipline.  Or, in the spirit of feminist discussions, you may fully disclose your social location at the introduction of your post (e.g., “I am a brown queer middle-class man sociology…).

• Ideally, blog posts should be about 1,250 words in length.  If a post is longer, you may consider breaking it into parts, and invite readers to return again to parts 2, 3, and so on.
  

• Consider using meaningful section headings to breakup long posts and allow busy readers to skim if necessary.
  

• Ensure that posts are relevant, in some way, to academics.  Certainly, the other many aspects of our lives are deeply intertwined with our education and careers; but, posts should relate to the site’s readers (academics on the margins).

• Please proofread your posts for grammar, spelling, and clarity.

• Consider writing more than one guest post, and build upon posts to tell a larger narrative.  Find ways to work in your own blog site, your research, or other aspects of your professional and personal life.  This may give some readers more ways to identify with you and your experiences.

• Consider whether you should write anonymously or using a pseudonym in order to minimize personal, professional, or political risks.

• If possible, please conclude with something either positive or useful for readers to leave with.  Be as candid as you would like as difficult and challenging situations.  But, we would like our readers to find some sense of hope, rather than leaving the site feeling more helpless, hopeless, or defeated than before they visited.

Guest blog posts can emailed to conditionally [dot] accepted [at] insidehighered [dot] com.