USA Today has an article that describes what many of us academics have known all along -- the requirements to become a tenure-track professor these days are becoming higher each day and the competition among newly-minted Ph.D.s in each field is probably the most intense it’s ever been.

Summer is no vacation anymore for those with career ambitions in academia. As teaching positions become more competitive and less secure, college-level educators are scrambling wherever they can to get an edge. Though this new reality bears its marks year-round, never is it more pronounced than now, when today’s frenzied research replaces the leisurely summer sojourns of yesteryear. . . .

“Many people have a misconception that faculty have the summer off, but that’s really not the case,” says John Curtis, the [American Association of University Professors’s] director of research. This picture means more than the fierce competition that Green faces when he goes up against 400 other qualified candidates for a single, tenure-track position next year. It also raises hard-to-meet expectations for academicians to publish research, do community service and supplement their often meager, part-time incomes. . . .

College-level instructors are sometimes quick to say they’re not complaining. Earning a living, however precarious, by following an intellectual passion is a blessing worth remembering with gratitude, say those interviewed for this article. Such attitudes keep the applications coming as schools increasingly hire part-timers to keep payroll expenses down.

For many of us academics, it is indeed a fiercely competitive, almost cutthroat type of environement, with sky-high expectations from hiring committees, universities administrators, and among ourselves. But to have the chance to do what you find interesting and rewarding -- to get paid to learn new knowledge and the chance to apply your skills to make a difference in the world -- it is worth it.