Summers are lean if you’re teaching faculty at a modest Midwestern college on a nine-month contract. Leaner still when you’re supporting your wife through a doctorate and every week groceries and gas seem to cost more while the paycheck stays the same. So when I didn’t get a summer course this year to tide me over, I found myself considering all options. Would I drive a rideshare, as my brother did to support his family when he was a postdoc? Might I work with my hands, landscaping or cutting grass, like I used to during summers in college? Would corporate retail hire someone who had a CV instead of a résumé and who’d worked only for colleges for the past two decades?
I know that people find opportunities through their networks. But as I began to write a social media post, the exposure of my circumstances hit me. My Stanford classmates are now doctors and lawyers, vice presidents and business owners. “Stanford grad seeking charity, anything helps” is not exactly where I meant to end up in life.
Mind you, I’m a writer with some 80 publications, with one book published and another soon going to market, and I’ve chosen to teach and work in diversity retention because I care deeply about my students. My wife is studying how to help marginalized communities affected by heavy metal toxins in soil. I know that just because my life hasn’t resulted in great material wealth, that doesn’t mean I’m a failure. I know there’s no shame in seeking work. But even so, as I sat and finally wrote a post asking for leads, I couldn’t help but feel exposed, as if I’d done something wrong to end up where I am.
Michael Copperman (Photo: Mashal Copperman)
Still, I hit post. And the response was extraordinary. One friend reached out to her dean and tried to get me hired as graduate faculty at her college; another offered me academic copy editing work; another writer hired me to edit his manuscript; and yet another connected me to a literary arts organization that needed online summer teaching in creative writing. My community believed in me and valued me; this summer will be fine.
I just needed to let go of my pride—and my perception of what others think—and remember that I am lucky to have so rich a life.
Michael Copperman, ’02, is an assistant professor in the Department of Writing, Rhetoric, and American Cultures at Michigan State University. Email him at stanford.magazine@stanford.edu.
