I’m currently on a search committee, and part of the job is to sift through nearly seventy sets of cover letter and curricula vitae and teaching statements and research statements and credit reports and vaccination records and whatnot to decide which applicants merit consideration for the position.
Sometimes this can be tricky. Should an excellent cover letter and glowing teaching record outweigh a sparse vita? Conversely, should an epic vita speak for a lackluster letter? How do you properly suss the “fit” of a potential colleague from 5-10 sheets of paper?
Fortunately, sometimes it’s easy:
Yeah…. no.