#like journal articles and my cover letters and research/teaching statements...

[mediaeval-muse]

Academic Book Review

The Professor Is In: The Essential Guide to Turning Your PhD Into a Job. By Karen Kelsky. New York: Three Rivers Press, 2015. Pp. x + 438. $16.

Argument: Each year tens of thousands of students will, after years of hard work and enormous amounts of money, earn their Ph.D. And each year only a small percentage of them will land a job that justifies and rewards their investment. For every comfortably tenured professor or well-paid former academic, there are countless underpaid and overworked adjuncts, and many more who simply give up in frustration. Those who do make it share an important asset that separates them from the pack: they have a plan. They understand exactly what they need to do to set themselves up for success.  They know what really moves the needle in academic job searches, how to avoid the all-too-common mistakes that sink so many of their peers, and how to decide when to point their Ph.D. toward other, non-academic options. Karen Kelsky has made it her mission to help readers join the select few who get the most out of their Ph.D. As a former tenured professor and department head who oversaw numerous academic job searches, she knows from experience exactly what gets an academic applicant a job. And as the creator of the popular and widely respected advice site The Professor is In, she has helped countless Ph.D.s turn themselves into stronger applicants and land their dream careers.

***Full review under the cut.***

Chapter Breakdown: This book technically has 63 chapters, so I’m going to briefly describe each major section.

Section 1: Dark Times in the Academy Overviews the decline in tenture-track jobs in higher education, as well as the challenges facing PhDs, from adjucting to the feeling of losing one’s identity.

Section 2: Getting Your Head in the Game A guide to the realities of the academic job market, including what it is, what unspoken rules/assumptions are present, what grad students tend not to understand or habits that make them a poor candidate, institution types and rankings, and how to (generally) build yourself up as a candidate.

Section 3: The Nuts and Bolts of a Competitive Record Covers the importance of building a CV, getting teaching experience, publishing, obtaining grants, cultivating references, and going to conferences. Also contains advice on how to take control of these situations.

Section 4: Job Documents That Work Advice on how to compose cover letters, CVs, teaching statements, evidence of teaching effectiveness, research statements, diversity statements, and dissertation abstracts.

Section 5: Techniques of the Academic Interview Information about interview basics, including what kinds of questions are likely to be asked (and how to respond). Also includes information about conference interviews, campus visits, job talks, teaching demos, talking to deans, etc. Also contains advice on how to handle outrageous questions and what to do after the interview.

Section 6: Navigating the Job Market Minefield Covers topics that could cause additional stress in the job market search, such as inside candidates, unresponsive references, poor campus climate, department politics, pregnancy, finances, etc. Also contains advice on how to dress professionally and cautions against attitudes like narcissism, grandiosity, self-juvenilization, etc.

Section 7: Negotiating an Offer Advice for negotiating job offers, including sections on partner (formerly, “spousal”) hires and rescinded offers.

Section 8: Grants and Postdocs Contains templates for writing grants as well as an overview of how postdoc applications are different from a job application.

Section 9: Some Advice About Advisors Overview of what kinds of advisors are “good” (one that has your best interests in mind) as well as a section on how advisors/departments discuss PhD debt (and what that can tell you about job prospects).

Section 10: Leaving the Cult Advice on leaving academia, including a list of transferable skills. More focused on “giving permission” to leave as opposed to traditional job search advice (like how to write a non-academic cover letter).

Reviewer Comments: Despite the intimidating size of this book, The Professor Is In is probably the most useful text I’ve come across (so far) in terms of career advice for PhDs. It contains practical information about preparing academic job materials, as well as insights into unspoken assumptions about the job search from the perspective of the hiring committee. It also does not hesitate in talking about the dismal state of higher education, and is very clear that the contents of this book (and individual action) can’t fix systemic problems.

The tone of the writing is appropriate for its audience. Kelsky doesn’t attempt to give readers an inspirational pep talk, nor does she ignore the fact that readers may have very real, pressing anxieties about their futures. Instead, she lays out the facts of the job market so that readers can make informed choices about how to proceed. I liked that Kelsky’s prose was so down-to-earth and blunt, not trying to coddle PhDs but also not trying to blame them for things beyond their control. Instead, Kelsky was able to balance “tough love” with true empathy and compassion, which made me not only feel open to reflecting on my own flaws as a PhD job candidate, but also respected as someone with real concerns. For some, the tone might be off-putting, as it does, admittedly, come off as “angry” in many ways, but I honestly prefer that over other books I’ve read that tries to “cutesify” the problems in academia. I also appreciated that Kelsky offered stats and secondary sources to illustrate everything point she made, so her advice felt less anecdotal and more rooted in research. As PhDs, most of us like supporting research, so I may be a bit biased; I just don’t find anecdotes that inspirational.

While this book is aimed at PhDs from various disciplines, the sheer amount of information and practical writing advice made it *actually* useful. As opposed to books which tend to offer general pointers like “tailor your resume,” Kelsky has specific advice, like “email your letter writer and ask for 15-20 minutes of their time” or “here’s an example of a diversity statement as well as a brief analysis of what it does and does not do.” Kelsky clearly lays out not just what candidates *should* be doing, but also *why* they should be doing it, which makes concepts easy to grasp and see the value in.

The only major thing that made this book discouraging to read was the implicit suggestion that if you haven’t been building your academic job profile from the beginning (or even before entering graduate school), you’re basically f*cked. Looking over some of the advice, I couldn’t help but feel like I had missed out on some things and couldn’t rectify them because I’m out of school. Maybe that’s true, maybe it isn’t, but either way, I wanted to see it addressed (or maybe it was and I missed it?). If I can’t get accepted to lead a conference panel in the top conference in my field, what then? What if I apply for tons of grants and don’t get many? What if a journal holds onto my article for 2 years with the promise of publishing it but never moves forward (something that actually happened to me)? What if my dissertation topic is interesting to me, but doesn’t follow popular trends? Am I a bad candidate? Should I give up? Things like that.

Overall, I think this book is one of the most practically useful guides out there, and if you’re a grad student who does not have a supportive job placement program at your institution, this book is invaluable for beginning to understand the realities of the academic job market, as dismal and unfair as it is.

Recommendations: I would recommend this book if

you’re a graduate student or adjunct going on the academic job market

you’re a grad student thinking ahead about how to use your time in graduate school effectively

you’re a PhD thinking about leaving academia

you working in career advising (including positions such as dissertation director or department head)

[janenguyenstudies]

What I think Biotech freshmen should learn during your first year at IU

So my first year has finally ended. The curriculum for freshman year is pre-determined by the Office of Academics so I did not have a chance to change the schedule. I took about 7 subjects each semester, with a total of 2 semesters. If you do not have to take IE1 and IE2 classes, you can “jump” directly into the main curriculum. So in my first year I took: Calculus 1&2, Physics 1&2, General Biology and Chemistry plus 2 Bio and Chem labs, Organic Chemistry, Academic English 1&2 (Reading, Writing, Speaking, Listening), Critical Thinking, Introduction to Biotechnology, P.E. It’s a relief that I could work through the courses although I was not excelling at STEM subjects in highschool. But college taught me all the amazing skills to study on my own and discover knowledge for my self-growth. Apart from schoolwork, I think any Biotech freshmen should also keep an eye on learning other extra skills of a scientist/professional, which I will list below. Do not worry because a year ago I entered this school while being a completely blank state, having seen so many of my friends succeeded in getting scholarships, leading extracurricular activities,... I felt hopeless sometimes but I believe in grinding one step at a time until I could accomplish the job. So my general experience boils down to being humble and let others teach you the skills, then practice slowly but firmly. You will be able to grow so much faster. And do not compare yourself with others’ success stories because everyone has their strengths and their own clock.

These are the lists of skills I have learnt and will continue to improve in the future. I will be expanding and giving more details about each point. This is in no chronological order:

 - Learn to make a positive affirmations/ orienting articles book: 

            During your whole college career, you will have a lot of moments of self-doubt, for example when your grades are not good, you've failed some classes, your part-time job application got turned down too many times (trust me I am so familiar with such rejections), some experiments got messy and returned no results, you wonder what your future in the field would look like. These are all scenarios that have happened to me in freshman year. 

Therefore, I have found a way to cope with self-doubt and boost my confidence, which is to make a collection of positive affirmations and orienting articles. I would form an imagined overview of my own career path reading all these writings and finally came to recording my own path . I use all forms of note-jotting tools to record them. I tend to record 1) Experience snippets from influencing scientists in my field, whom I happen to follow on Facebook 2) Lists of “What college kids need to practice before they graduate” (Dr.Le Tham Duong 's Facebook) 3) Ybox 's Shared tips for career orientation column (Link) 4) Short paragraphs from the books that I have read. The paragraphs often contain insights into what successful people (in Biotech or in Finance) have thought, have planned, and have acted on. For digital copy of the books, I save the snippets into a file called "Clippings" and later export them through the website called clippings.io

- Have an online note-taking tools for jotting down important thinking (recommend Keep or Evernote for quick jot, while Onenote is more suitable for recording lectures thanks to its structure that resembles a binder)

A snippet of my Evernote, where I store career advice:

- Learn to do research properly (what is a journal, what is a citation management software, what is the structure of a paper[abstract, introduction, methods, data analysis, discussion, conclusion], poster, conferences). You can begin to search for academic papers using Google Scholar scholar.google.com. However, there are countless of other websites for published journals that serve different sience fields. You need to dig into Google further to find them.

- Learn to write essays (basic tasks are covered in Writing AE courses including brainstorming, reading, citings, argumentative essay, process essay, preparing thesis statement)

- Join a lab: learn the safety guidelines, learn who is in control of the lab, what researches/projects are being carried there). As for this, you need to make contact with professors from our department. Most professors here are friendly and willing to help if you just come up and ask a question after class. To be eligible to join their labs,  - Learn to write a proper email to a professor: to ask for what will be on the next test, whether you can be a volunteer in their lab (usually by cold-email, and the professor will likely ask for your background: your highschool grades, your motivation,...); write email to an employer asking for a temporary position. - Learn to write a meeting minute: a sum-up of your meeting with other team members - Learn to answer basic questions for a volunteer opportunity: what is your strength, what is your past experience, what do you know about us, what is your free-time - Learn to write a CV: using topcv,... or downloading free templates on the Internet and write a motivation letter: What you are currently doing, what problems have you solved for your employers, and what can you do to help your new employers solve their problems.

- Learn to create an attractive presentation by using Canvas and learn to deliver ideas effectively (recommended book Think on your feet [Lib 1]).

I have discovered Canvas only for a year, but its graphics are so attractive and appealing to my taste, so here is my presentation for Finals using Canvas:

- Learn a programming language or a second language: recommend Python or R, and any foreign language that you feel interested in, but your ultimate goal would be to comfortably use that language in academic reading and exchanging ideas through writing and speaking (which is a long journey of 4+ years learning), so choose wisely. - Learn to create an online presence through a blog (Tumblr, Wordpress, Github, StackExchange,...), stalk your favorite experts on Quora and Reddit, make a habit to have a journal article delivered to your inbox every morning (me being Medium, Pocket, Nature); then Instagram or YouTube - Recommended books for incomming freshmen: How to be a straight-A student, Do not eat alone (socializing skills) - Recommended Medium sites: - Recommended Newspapers: The Economist, The Guardian, The New York Times Opinions Columns, Nature’s columns, The Scientific American. - Recommended Youtube Channels:  - Recommended Podcasts: listen passively on the bus, but try to paraphrase in your own words what you have understood about their conversation: - Recommended study spots: Den Da Coffeeshop, The Coffeehouse, Library of [...] in District 1, Central Library (Thu Duc District), IU Library.

- Learn the Pomodoro technique and Forest app: - Important websites for study resources: libgen, khanacademy, Coursehero (post only a short paragraph to get 1 free upload), scripd organic chemistry tutor, for jobs: ybox.vn - If your laptop is capable (with decent hardware), learn Adobe Tools (Video editing, Photoshop,...). My laptop can only run Linux Mint, so I chose to learn the skill of citation management and research (using less resource). Basically do not become computer-illiterate. - To reduce eye-strain, buy an e-reader to read scientific papers, do not print out all of them. - One exception to IU: you can bring one two-sided A4 paper into certain exams: this is my note for Calculus class:

- Learn to write a grand summary of formulas for Physics 2, meta-sum of all exercise questions - Prepare for IELTS (if you haven't taken IELTS already): you'll need it to pass IE classes, or apply for an exchange program. Ultimately, you need at least 6.0 in IELTS to graduate. I stumbled upon this careful list of tips from a senior student in our BT department who got an 8.0 => Link

Basically, follow Ngoc Bach’s page on Facebook to receive fully-solved exam materials, add ielts-simon.com into the mix, learn 560 academic word list, listen to Ted Talk and podcasts, do tests on ieltsonlinetests.com, do Cambridge IELTS book 9-14 and you’re good to go. - Have your eyes on competitions that spark your interest (innovative competition, writing contests, speaking and debating contests,...)

- Develop your fitness routine to protect your sanity when academic coursework overwhelm you and make you gain 15 pounds.

I do home HIIT exercises on Fitness Blender’s Youtube channel, Emi Wong, Chloe Ting home workouts in the beginning. 

Later I went to the gym and do split routines with weights, then threw in squats, deadlifts, lunges and HIIT on treadmill. This is how my current routine look like: (I work out only 4 times/week)

- Learn to use flashcards. (Quizlet has premade flashcards for biology class)

- Learn to manage personal finance: what is budget, expenses, income,... - Learn some google tweaks to pirate stuff. (especially textbook files and solutions files) - Learn to make handwritten A4 notes. I will post my own handwritten notes for Critical Thinking Mid (final is taken), Calculus II Mid and Final. - Learn to create meta sets for formulas and problems. I will post my formula set for Physics II and Problem/Skill set for Organic Chemistry. For Physics II, I learned my hard lesson is that it is better to do past exams than to solve advance textbook problems, so I stuck with past exams posted by TA and learnt by heart all the formulas, SI units. For Organic Chemistry you need a skillset checklist (like in the Wade textbook). Also there are questions from the slides such as the connection of amylopectin,... But they won't challenge you to think much. Only the amount of information to be memorized is deemed challenging here. - Intro to Biotech was quite easy and you could prepare in advance. 3 faculty members (from 3 fields: plant, animal, pharma) will take turn giving you an overview lecture. The exam will ask “Write what you know about those fields and their applications”, openbook-style. So hear me out and search for Overview powerpoints of that field, then write your own essay, print it out and bring it with you into the exam. Your power should be spent on Calculus and Physics, not on memorizing the essay.

[wikitopx]

How to Write an Academic Cover Letter With Examples? You can find the answer to your question in this post. Read the following.

Updated March 13, 2020

When you are applying for a faculty position at a college or university, your cover letter will differ significantly from the standard business cover letter.

Your cover letter may be reviewed by Human Resources department staff to determine if you meet the basic qualifications for the job. If it does, it will be forwarded to a search committee comprised mostly of faculty members and academic deans.

These individuals will be accustomed to reading more lengthy academic cover letters and resumes or curriculum vitae (CV) than would be customary in the business world. They will also often be more interested in the philosophical foundations for your work than the typical business recruiter.

1. Tips for Writing an Academic Cover Letter

Your initial challenge will be to pass through the Human Resources screening. Review each of the required qualifications included in the job announcement and compose statements containing evidence that you possess as many of the skills, credentials, knowledge, and experiences listed as possible. Also, address as many of the preferred qualifications as possible. Give concrete examples to support your assertions about your strengths.

2. Be Prepared for Faculty Review

Your faculty reviewers will typically have an interest in your philosophy and approach to teaching and research within your discipline. They will also be evaluating how your background fits with the type of institution where they work.

Research the faculty in your target department to assess their orientation and expertise. Emphasize points of intersection between your philosophy and the prevalent departmental philosophy.

3. Target Your Letter

If you possess traditionally valued areas of expertise which are not already represented by the current faculty, make sure to point those strengths out in your cover letter. Tailor your letter to the orientation of the college and adjust the mix of emphasis on teaching and research based on the expectations in that setting.

Colleges will typically want to hire new faculty who are passionate about their current research and not resting on past research credits.

Describe a current project with some detail and express enthusiasm for continuing such work.

Try to do the same with any evolving teaching interests.

Highlight any grants and funding you have received to undertake your research activities. Incorporate any awards or recognition which you have received for your teaching or research activities. Some text should also be devoted to other contributions to the college communities where you worked such as committee work, advising, and collaborations with other departments.

3. Cover Letter Format

  Your cover letter should be written in the same basic format as a business cover letter. An academic cover letter is typically two pages compared to a single page for non-academic letters.

Here’s an example of the appropriate format for a cover letter and guidelines for formatting your letters.

4. Academic Cover Letter Example

You can use this sample as a model to write an academic cover letter.

Academic Cover Letter Example #1

Firstname Lastname Your Address Your City, State, Zip Code Your Phone Number Your Email

Date

Dr. Firstname Lastname Chair, English Department Search Committee XYZ College Charlotte, NC 28213

Dear Dr. Firstname Lastname,

I am writing to apply for the position of assistant professor of English with an emphasis in nineteenth-century American literature that you advertised in the February 20XX MLA Job Information List. I am a Dean’s Fellow and Ph.D. candidate at XYZ University, currently revising the final chapter of my dissertation, and expecting to graduate in May 20XX. I am confident that my teaching experience and my research interests make me an ideal candidate for your open position.

Over the past five years, I have taught a variety of English courses. I have taught a number of American literature survey courses, as well as writing courses, including technical writing and first-year writing. I have extensive experience working with ESL students, as well as students with a variety of learning disabilities, including dyslexia and dysgraphia, and disabilities like ADD and ADHD. I pride myself on creating a classroom environment that accommodates the needs of my students while still promoting a high level of critical thought and writing skills. Some of my most satisfying experiences as a teacher have come from helping struggling students to grasp difficult concepts, through a combination of individual conferences, class activities, and group discussion. I know I would thrive as a teacher in your college, due to your belief in small classroom size and individualized support for students.

Not only does my teaching experience suit the needs of your school and department, but my research interests also fit perfectly with your description of the ideal candidate. My dissertation project, “Ferns and Leaves: Nineteenth-Century Female Authorial Space,” examines the rise and development of American female authors in the 1840s and 1850s, with a particular focus on patterns of magazine publication. I argue that, rather than being submissive to the requirements of the editor or publisher, female authors, in fact, developed a more transparently reciprocal relationship between themselves and their readers than previously has been assumed. I apply recent print-culture and book-history theory to my readings of novels, magazine articles, letters, and diary entries by various female authors, with a particular focus on Sara Willis (known by her pseudonym Fanny Fern). I plan to develop my dissertation into a book manuscript and continue to research the role of female writers in antebellum magazine culture, with a particular focus on the rise and influence of female magazine editors on literary culture.

My research interests have both shaped and been shaped by my recent teaching experiences. Last spring, I developed and taught a course on the history of print culture in America. I combined readings on theory and literature that addressed issues of print with visits to local historical museums and archives. My students conducted in-depth studies on particular texts (magazines, newspapers, novels) for their final papers. I believe my interdisciplinary teaching style, particularly my emphasis on material culture, would fit in well with the interdisciplinary nature of your English department.

I am therefore confident that my teaching experience, my skill in working with ESL and LD students, and my research interests all make me an excellent candidate for the assistant professor of English position at ABC College. I have attached my curriculum vitae and the two requested sample publications. I would be happy to send you any additional materials such as letters of reference, teaching evaluations, and past and proposed course syllabi. I will be available to meet with you at either the MLA or C19 conference, or anywhere else at your convenience. Thank you so much for your consideration; I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Signature (hard copy letter)

Firstname Lastname

Academic Cover Letter Example #2

Firstname Lastname Address City, State Zip Code Phone Number Email

Date

Dr. Firstname Lastname Chair, Department of Biology XYZ University Address City, State Zip Code

Dear Dr. Smith,

I am writing to apply for the position of Assistant Professor of Biology with a focus on molecular biology at XYZ University, as advertised in the February 20XX issue of Science. I am currently a postdoctoral fellow at the University of XYZ in the Department of Molecular Biology, working under the advisement of Professor Linda Smith. I am confident that my research interests and teaching experience make me an ideal candidate for your open position.

My current research project, which is an expansion on my dissertation, “[insert title here],” involves [insert research project here]. I have published my dissertation findings in Science Journal and am in the processing of doing the same with my findings from my current research. The laboratory resources at XYZ University would enable me to expand my research to include [insert further research plans here] and seek further publication.

Beyond my successes as a researcher (including five published papers and my current paper in process), I have had extensive experience teaching a variety of biology courses. As a graduate student at Science University, I served as a teaching assistant and guest lecturer for both biology and chemistry introductory courses and won the university award for outstanding teacher’s assistant. As a postdoctoral fellow at the University of ABC, I have had the opportunity to teach Introduction to Biology as well as a graduate-level course, Historicizing Molecular Biology. In every class, I strive to include a blend of readings, media, lab work, and discussion to actively engage students with the material. I would love the opportunity to bring my award-winning lesson planning and teaching skills to your biology department.

I am confident that my research interests and experience combined with my teaching skills make me an excellent candidate for the Assistant Professor of Biology position at XYZ University. I have attached my curriculum vitae, three recommendations, and the two requested sample publications. I would be happy to send you any additional materials such as teaching evaluations or past and proposed course syllabi. I will be available to meet with you at the ASBMB conference in April or anywhere else at your convenience. Thank you so much for your consideration; I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Signature (hard copy letter)

Your Name

5. Job Application Materials

It’s important to submit all your application materials in the format requested by the college or university. You may be asked to email, mail, or apply online via the institution’s applicant tracking system.

Send only what is requested. There's no need to include information that the institution hasn't requested. However, you can offer to provide additional materials like writing samples, syllabi, and letters of recommendation in the last paragraph of your letter.

6. Submitting Your Application

Follow the instructions in the job posting for submitting your application. It should specify what format the college wants to receive.

Here are some examples of what you may be asked to include with your cover letter and resume or CV:

A cover letter, CV/resume, and contact information for three references.

A cover letter (PDF format) of interest indicating your qualifications and reason for application, Curriculum Vitae (PDF format), and a minimum of three professional references, including phone and email contact information.

A letter of interest, a Curriculum Vitae, a teaching vision statement, a research vision statement that specifically indicates how you would interact with or collaborate with other department faculty, and three references.

A cover letter, CV/resume, and contact information for three references. Please upload these as ONE document in RTF, DOC or PDF format.

I hope this post can be helpful to you. You will be solved the problem with Wikitopx.com. More ideas for you: Block Format Style Cover Letter Template

From : https://wikitopx.com/job/how-to-write-an-academic-cover-letter-with-examples-712963.html

[biofunmy]

A Stanford Professor Says Juul Stole Her Anti-Vaping PowerPoint Slides

SAN FRANCISCO — When vape pens began flooding classrooms, bewildered teachers didn’t know what to do about it. Bonnie Halpern-Felsher, a Stanford University pediatrics professor who had spent years researching how to get kids to stop smoking, did what came instinctively to her: She educated them.

By 2018, she’d created a free online class for middle and high schoolers about the dangers of e-cigarettes. That year, she updated her course to explicitly call out one up-and-coming brand in particular: Juul. The biggest e-cigarette manufacturer in the country, Juul has been accused by public health advocates and regulators of creating a new generation addicted to nicotine at a time when youth smoking rates have been dropping to historic lows.

So she was surprised to learn around that time that Juul, too, had an anti-vaping curriculum — and was offering thousands of dollars to schools to implement it. When she got ahold of what Juul wanted to teach, she was even more surprised: Many of its slides were copies of hers, down to the exact words and cartoon images of the brain.

But Juul hadn’t asked to use them. And the rest of its slides, in her view, dangerously downplayed the addictive aspects of Juuling. The company’s presentation didn’t discuss how flavors attract children, for instance, or how the chemicals in flavors can be harmful, or that a Juul pod contains as much nicotine as a pack of cigarettes. Her slides without this context presented what the Stanford professor felt was a deliberately rosy picture of Juul’s health effects.

Do you work, or have you worked, at Juul? Contact this reporter at stephanie.lee@buzzfeed.com or stephaniemlee@protonmail.com. Visit tips.buzzfeed.com for other secure ways to get in touch.

In another misleading move, the materials Juul circulated said that the class was based on Stanford’s, giving some educators the false impression that the professor worked alongside the company to develop its anti-vaping curriculum. “That’s when I said, ‘This is not OK,’” Halpern-Felsher recalled.

Juul, whose stated mission is to help adult smokers quit, has denied that it ever marketed to teens. But studies have reached the opposite conclusion, finding that, particularly in the company’s early days in 2015 and 2016, it hired influencers to make #juul go viral, handed out free devices at concerts and movies, and ran colorful “Vaporized” ads that featured twentysomethings and mimicked cigarette ads.

Today, 28% of high school students use e-cigarettes, and more schools by the day are suing Juul on the basis that their students’ habits are a financial burden. Parents are suing, too, saying that their kids are addicted to Juuling. Lawmakers, struggling to find a policy approach that would actually work, just succeeded in changing the federal age for smoking and vaping from 18 to 21.

And Juul is responding to the scrutiny, too. This fall, the company suspended all its advertising in the US and stopped US sales of all its flavors, long a big draw for young users, except for tobacco and menthol. Although the $24 billion San Francisco startup laid off some 600 employees last month, it is still staffing up its youth-prevention team and hired a prominent teen nicotine addiction researcher to help lead those efforts.

But Halpern-Felsher is unconvinced that Juul — which is partially owned by tobacco giant Altria and run by a former Altria executive — has proven it can be trusted to police itself.

“How do we know they’re not going to repeat what they’ve already been doing, when they clearly have a history over the last three years of attracting youth?” she told BuzzFeed News.

Courtesy / Bonnie Halpern-Felsher

Stanford’s Tobacco Prevention Toolkit, Juul’s curriculum obtained in May 2018, and Juul’s curriculum obtained in June 2018.

Even after receiving a cease-and-desist letter from Stanford’s lawyers in April 2018, Juul kept circulating versions of Halpern-Felsher’s materials with tweaks, according to PowerPoint slides seen by BuzzFeed News. And although Juul publicly said it abandoned the curriculum a month later, shortly after introducing it, the startup’s employees continued to pitch educators on using it into that summer, new emails show.

A Juul representative declined to comment on these allegations. In a statement, spokesperson Ted Kwong acknowledged that the company “discontinued the initiative in 2018 in response to feedback from those who thought our efforts to dissuade youth from using nicotine were being misunderstood.”

He added, “We fully understand the need to earn back the trust of regulators, policymakers, key stakeholders and society at large and reset our company and the vapor category.”

Halpern-Felsher, who was the first to sound the alarm about Juul’s curriculum in an October 2018 journal article, has spoken before about the unsanctioned use of her materials. Most recently, she testified during a July Congressional hearing, as reported by NBC News. Emails from Juul representatives and slide-by-slide comparisons of the courses are printed here for the first time.

In under two years, the Stanford class — which is meant to be an alternative to suspension — has become a key tool in the fight against the teen e-cigarette craze. More than 1.1 million students have sat through it and more than 2,000 teachers have been trained to teach it. And it seems to be working: In a survey of 325 students, the percentage who said they were “very unlikely” to try Juuling jumped from 74% to 89% after they took the class, according to preliminary data from Halpern-Felsher’s team. Students were also more likely to come away thinking of Juuling as “highly addictive” (38% before the class compared to nearly 50% afterward).

In contrast, there is no evidence that tobacco industry–sponsored youth-prevention programs decrease use. Instead, they are viewed by many as a more sinister form of marketing.

If Juul’s stated purpose is to help adults quit smoking, “then why are you going into schools and talking about your product, period?” Halpern-Felsher said. “We see it as a ploy, in my opinion, to be able to get into these schools to have a dialogue about their product and not be fully honest.”

The first time that California educators got wind of Juul’s curriculum was in December 2017.

A company memo, sent to the then head of California’s Department of Education a few weeks before Christmas, said that as part of a broader youth-prevention strategy, Juul was designing an educational program that would be an alternative “to traditional prevention programs and discipline.” The curriculum was “drawing on best practice resources, such as Stanford Medicine,” the memo said, as well as from a nonprofit and two public health programs.

A colleague forwarded the memo to Halpern-Felsher, who found the reference confusing but didn’t think to dive deeper. A developmental psychologist at Stanford since 2014, Halpern-Felsher studies what drives adolescents to make risky health decisions, from drinking alcohol and having sex to drunk driving and, especially recently, smoking. In the fall of 2016, she and her team created the Tobacco Prevention Toolkit, an online class that covered nicotine addiction to both cigarettes and e-cigarettes.

Not long after, she kept hearing about one particular e-cigarette brand: Juul. With their sleek, USB drive-like design, high doses of nicotine, and sweet, fruity flavors, Juuls were popping up in cafeterias and teenage bedrooms everywhere.

As the company rose to become the market leader, Halpern-Felsher heard that it was developing a youth-prevention curriculum. Urged by educators to come up with one of her own, she added a section specifically about Juul to the e-cigarette portion of her Toolkit. It went online on Feb. 1, 2018.

Five days later, in Sacramento, a Juul representative pitched the company’s class at a meeting of California’s statewide tobacco-prevention education committee. Bruce Harter, a Bay Area superintendent turned Juul consultant who’d been reaching out to school districts on the company’s behalf, insisted that Juul was “appalled and distressed” by underage use and reassured attendees that it was “interested in promoting health,” according to meeting minutes.

Halpern-Felsher wasn’t there. But she was alarmed to hear about it — and to learn that academics were getting the impression that her curriculum was affiliated with Juul’s.

Over the following weeks, Halpern-Felsher sought to get her hands on Juul’s curriculum. It wasn’t available online, so she relied on people sending her bits and pieces of it. Her fear was confirmed when she was sent the company’s syllabus: It described the science portion as “drawn largely from the work of Stanford Medicine,” and linked to Halpern-Felsher’s Tobacco Prevention Toolkit.

That spring, school districts were being offered as much as $10,000 to $20,000 to implement Juul’s curriculum. In a February email, a California state education official told schools that the curriculum was considered an attempt to “coerce” schools “to support the addiction of youth to nicotine.”

Scott Gerbert, who works in tobacco-prevention education for Alameda County schools in the Bay Area, remembers getting a call from a health educator and anti-smoking advocate he used to work with, Deborah Messina-Kleinman. She was about to accept a job at Juul, she told him, and wanted to provide his district with educational materials. Gerbert quickly hung up.

“I certainly would not invite Juul in to be a partner in education,” Gerbert said, “the same way we would not invite Anheuser-Busch in or Altria or any of the other Big Tobacco companies.” (Messina-Kleinman did not return a request for comment.)

And one day in New York, Meredith Berkman’s ninth-grade son came home to tell her that he and his classmates had just listened to a Juul representative — with no teachers present — reassure them that Juuling was “totally safe,” Berkman said. (Berkman did not know whether this was an official presentation of the Juul curriculum.) Horrified, she and two other mothers went on to found the national advocacy group Parents Against Vaping E-cigarettes, which Halpern-Felsher advises.

“You don’t typically expect companies to be trusted to educate the public about themselves.”

Not even everyone inside Juul thought the program was a smart move.

When then-CEO Kevin Burns announced the new initiative at an all-hands meeting in the early spring of 2018, no one openly questioned him, according to a Juul employee present for the meeting who spoke to BuzzFeed News on the condition of anonymity. But in private discussions afterward, several employees agreed that the move was “misguided.”

“You don’t typically expect companies to be trusted to educate the public about themselves,” the individual said. “Juul is obviously not an impartial purveyor of information.”

And in internal emails unearthed by a congressional investigation, Juul employees spearheading the effort acknowledged the youth-prevention programs were “eerily similar” to those used by Big Tobacco.

In early April 2018, based on what Halpern-Felsher had heard about and seen so far of the Juul curriculum, Stanford lawyers sent a cease-and-desist letter to the company. In response, Juul attorneys said that the company had never linked to Stanford — despite evidence to the contrary — and wouldn’t link to any materials in the future, and claimed that it wasn’t using the Toolkit, according to Halpern-Felsher.

In May, Juul sent a letter asking her to meet; she declined. It also asked her to change what it perceived as unfounded opinions and statements about Juul in the Toolkit. Halpern-Felsher said that the curriculum wasn’t inaccurate, but she made some minor changes, including changing her course’s title from exclusively calling out Juul to “Juul and Other Pod-Based Systems.”

She also added a disclaimer stating that the Toolkit was not affiliated with any e-cigarette companies, and any implication otherwise was “simply not true.”

Courtesy / Bonnie Halpern-Felsher

Stanford’s Tobacco Prevention Toolkit, Juul’s curriculum obtained in May 2018, and Juul’s curriculum obtained in June 2018.

Around the same time, a colleague finally sent Halpern-Felsher a complete copy of Juul’s class. A lot of it looked awfully familiar.

Most of the two dozen or so slides in its “science of e-cigarettes” PowerPoint were nearly or fully identical to the nicotine-addiction slides that she’d first put up back in 2016, according to screenshots she captured. Echoing the layout, colors, language, and images, the slides showed graphics of brain synapses and discussed the “work in progress” that is the adolescent brain. Even the accompanying teacher talking points and PowerPoint comments from Halpern-Felsher’s lab members, visible only in editing mode, appeared to be copied over. “Would love for this to be animated,” a research assistant noted on one slide.

Halpern-Felsher said there’s nothing inherently wrong with teaching teens about nicotine addiction, “aside from the fact you can’t steal someone else’s curriculum and pretend it’s yours and push back when we tell you not to.”

The real problem, in her view, was this: Even though the class acknowledged that nicotine is highly addictive, it failed to connect the dots to Juuling. It didn’t mention, for instance, that a single 5% Juul pod contains as much nicotine as a pack of cigarettes — more than many other e-cigarettes on the market, and almost triple the legal maximum for pods in Europe.

“If you’re really trying to prevent people from using your product, then your curriculum would be about the harms of your product,” Halpern-Felsher said. “We know they do not make any of those connections.”

In addition, Juul’s curriculum taught mindfulness meditation practices as a technique to avoid vaping, even though there isn’t evidence that they are an effective tobacco-prevention strategy in schools.

And there was an evaluation worksheet, ostensibly to test students’ knowledge of the lesson, that asked: “What’s appealing about using e-cigarette or JUULs? Why do students use them?” To Halpern-Felsher, this question belonged in a marketing survey, not an educational program.

“If I know the kids are using it because of flavors, or it’s cool, that’s fantastic — I can use that information to turn it around and market it back to kids again,” she said.

In the end, Juul distanced itself from the curriculum. The company has said it stopped distributing its curriculum in May 2018, not long after the whole idea was hatched, after blistering criticism from anti-tobacco advocates and government regulators.

But for at least another month, Juul kept promoting the curriculum to educators, emails show.

Courtesy / Bonnie Halpern-Felsher

Stanford’s Tobacco Prevention Toolkit, Juul’s curriculum obtained in May 2018, and Juul’s curriculum obtained in June 2018.

On June 7 of that year, Julie Henderson, Juul’s director of education and youth prevention, emailed the slides to a health educator in Connecticut and offered to collaborate on outreach. “Our efforts are not limited to adolescents, but include young adults as well so we welcome the opportunity to work with colleges and universities in promoting non-nicotine use among non-smokers,” Henderson wrote.

And on June 22, Samanta Beltran, a youth prevention and communications analyst at Juul, similarly responded to an inquiring educator in Orange County, California. “If you’re interested in developing a partnership with us, whether through use of curricula or a co-convened community conversation, please let us know,” she wrote, attaching the slides.

Henderson and Beltran did not return requests for comment.

This version of the curriculum, which was sent to Halpern-Felsher, did differ from the earlier version she had seen. The white background was now blue. “The Adolescent Brain: A Work In Progress” became “Your Brain: Still Developing.” A photo of overlapping freeways, meant to illustrate the complexity of a young adult’s brain, was swapped for one of tangled wires. Some slides were condensed, others expanded. But in many cases, the teacher talking points and even editing comments remained verbatim.

Since that summer, Halpern-Felsher hasn’t heard of any more instances of Juul’s curriculum being promoted to or used by schools. But when she goes on the road to train educators on how to counter vaping, she warns them to keep a watchful eye.

“Even if Juul is trying to do good, they should not be in the business of doing their own prevention,” Halpern-Felsher said. While she can’t say, based on what she saw, that the company was actively marketing Juul in schools, she added, “what I do know is that Juul’s curriculum was not preventing Juuling.”

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NOTE: I will look over literally anybody's funnel here online and provide you feedback - FREESo here's some quick and dirty background for you.I'm 31 now and I've been a full-time freelance writer for over seven years. In just the last three years or so I've started commanding very good pricing (I make at lest $10,000 a month and I charge at least $10,000 per project for most of the big projects I do - I have some examples of that later in this post).I'm a high school dropout with no college education (although I DO have a Good Enough Diploma - GED).I've been traveling around the world the last two years, primarily throughout Southeast Asia. I live in Chiang Mai, Thailand right now.I first got published when I was 19 years old in Savannah, GA. I lied about my age (had a fake ID saying I was 21) and got a job as a bar/lifestyle reporter for a regional magazine around at the time called The South Magazine covering bars and restaurants and that sort of thing.Here's a 2006 scanned article with my name in print from that time (William McCanless): LINKOf course, they eventually found out that I was a 19 year old writing about drinking in their magazine and - for some strange reason - their lawyer thought I was a "liability" so they fired me. But I came away from it with three contributor copies and my name in print.Then I started doing music writing for a music magazine in Atlanta...stuff like this: LINKBut of course I wasn't getting paid much. Eventually I moved online and started using (at the time) sites like Elance (now Upwork), freelancer, and more.I was doing SEO, web content, batch blog writing.Eventually I started doing ghostwriting, which made me a little more money (and also crushed my soul as I was writing insane amounts of content every week...I would write 60,000 words in a week).Then, i started learning about Direct Response Copywriting. I started studying the Great Masters like David Ogilvy, Robert Collier, Claude Hopkins, and Gary Halbert. I learned, for example, that many of the great copywriters over the last 100 years could routinely make more money for a single sales page than a best-selling novelist makes for an entire year of book sales.I saw how people like Dan Kennedy don't even start negotiations until $30,000 is on the table for him to start writing a promotion.Eventually I got good and I started getting paid. And now I make at least $10,000 a month and charge at least $10,000 + 3% - 5% royalties on sales my promotions generate.Some examples of what different types of writing looks like based on payHere's a promotion that's not live yet, in fact this version is for the Legal Department to review (you must rigorously backup all claims and have this type of copy reviewed by a legal department). This is for a financial advisory (for natural resource investors). This advisory is SEC-regulated. You have to be REALLY careful with these because ad networks like Facebook, Yahoo, Bing, Google, Revcontent, tabloo, Outbrain, and more are very leery of financial copy (LOTS of scams) so it takes a lot of research to write one of these, lots of revisions - goes through Editorial, Legal, Ad compliance. This is an example of a $10,000 project with 5% royalties - LINKHere's another promotion, but rather than online, this is Direct Mail. This type of promotion is called a "Magalog" which is a combination of the words "Magazine" and "Catalog." One truth in Direct Response Marketing that was learned over the last 100 years of just...MILLIONS of various campaigns...that is that advertising that looks more like an editorial always does better. That's why - for example - Facebook has timeline ads (they look like a post). It's why Google Adwords has their ads look like actual search results. And, of course, it's why sending something that is perceived as a magazine is less likely to be rejected outright than a blatant "THIS IS AN ADVERTISEMENT" type of ad would. This is an example of a project that costs $10,000, but because it's to generate qualified leads and not immediate sales, there is no royalty other than a $5,000 bonus if it becomes a "control": LINKI don't JUST do $10,000 jobs and stuff like that. I would say I do about 6 promotions a year of these (one every two months).There's also many jobs I take on from online marketing clients who have online businesses for...$3,000 to $6,000 and they can be done very quickly because they don't require as much research or back-and-forth.For example a 45-minute VSL (video sales letter) script is something that I could pound out in about three days. So I will do one or two of those a month.Finally, the third type of project is just VERY small - absolutely no research required - things that I can pound out in literally a couple of hours in the afternoon.Here's an example of a script I wrote along those lines for $500: LINKHere's some of my favorite sales pages of all timeThis ad for Rolls-Royce by David OgilvyThis subscription direct-mail sales page for the Wall Street Journal, which is the most successful single piece of advertising in advertising history and brought in over nearly $3 BILLION in subscription sales for the nearly 30 years it ran (imagine being the copywriter who got 5% of THOSE sales, eh?)This sales letter for International Living written in the early 1970s by Bill Bonner, which launched a billion-dollar international publishing company called Agora (which is one of my clients). It returned $3 for every $1 in advertising costs.HERE'S A VIDEO I DID FOR THIS AMAWARNING NSFW: I cuss like a sailor, drink like a fish, and smoke like a chimney in this video. At least I'm a stereotype for writing...Video: https://youtu.be/P0Hdud6bd74Time Stamps:0:01 - 1:06Rambling introduction. I'm in Koh Phangan. I'm on vacation. It's Sangkron, Thai New Year. People throwing water on each other. Ridiculously transparent attempt to use Sangkron as an excuse to drink and smoke excessively on camera.1:07 - 5:17Why am I doing this AMA. No, it's not purely selfless - I was using previous AMAs to gauge audience response and see if people were hungry for a copywriting course. I was doing market research, essentially. r/writing had a bigger response than r/entrepreneur and r/marketing.I've been heavily considering teaching for some time and this was my attempt to see if anybody even wanted to learn what I had to teach.Got invited to a copywriting conference (big one) flaked out, was scared to teach, thought it was pointless. It bothered me - I felt like I had failed myself. A little bit about why I was scared. This is my attempt to get out of my comfortable seclusion and contribute.5:18 - 7:16Why would people in r/writing be interested in copywriting? Why I chose copywriting as a money-maker (versus novels, screenplays...etc).Quick background on me - ADHD (clinically), authority issues, bad around people, introvert, anti-social, writing for a living was really the only thing I could do.If I didn't make money writing - as a living - I'd be dead.7:21 - 9:47How and why I ended up in direct response copywriting after starting as an aspiring novelist and screenplay writer.9:48 - 11:04Does being a direct response copywriter make you a pathetic fucking sellout?11:05 - 17:25How and why doing Direct Response Copywriting for a living, helped me be a better, more disciplined writer in general (including the number one most important thing I learned about the writing process).Putting words down on paper - and writing FORWARD - no matter what, even if you don't feel like it.Crafting your writing with a "marketing mindset."17:28 - 23:53What the fuck is Direct Response Copywriting?23:54 - 29:10Is Direct Response Copywriting used to sell scam products (like penis pills and and get-rich-quick schemes).Some products you know that were marketed direct-response style (and written by copywriters). The George Foreman Grill, P90x, Nutribullet, real estate, car dealerships.29:11 - 33:43How can I charge so much money for this type of writing, and why are companies so willing to pay $10,000, $20,0000, $30,000 (or more) PLUS royalties on sales?33:45 - ENDConcluding thoughts on why I think direct response copywriting is a good option for people who love writing in general and who want to live a more location and time independent lifestyle.DISCLAIMER - At no point during this AMA, on any of my replies, nor any of the PMs I get will I reference you to an affiliate link, try to pitch a course that I've created, or essentially try to sell you anything unless I'm directly approached for it via PM - that's it.I'm only here to give the best answers, help, and advice I can for whoever wants it.For Those That Want Me To Show Bank StatementsI've been asked this before then when I refused there was an "ah-hah! Liar!" accusation. First of all, I don't feel comfortable sharing bank statements or account screen shots on the Internet. I'm scared there's going to be some telling information on there that gets me hacked or....identity stolen or something (by people who are a lot smarter than me).But here's my constellation. This is a recorded Skype call between me and a man named Joe Schrieffer who heads-up Agora Financial, in this 30 minute call I land a $10,000 job from him