Assistant Professor of Drama - Costume Design
Position Overview
Organization: Drama
Title: Assistant Professor of Drama - Costume Design
Position Details
Position Description
The University of Washington School of Drama (SoD) is hiring one assistant professor, tenure-track position in Costume Design to begin September, 2022. This is a full-time position with a 9-month service period. The teaching will be within both undergraduate and graduate programs.
The mission of the SoD is to develop innovative and courageous artists and scholars poised to be the creative leaders of tomorrow. We are committed to producing engaged citizens capable of contributing to a more creative, connected, and compassionate world. The School’s graduates go on to careers in theatre, film, television, arts management, advertising, design, creative media as well as other areas such as law and business where the artist’s skills of critical thinking, problem solving, collaboration, entrepreneurship and creativity are essential. The University of Washington serves a diverse population of 45,000 students, faculty, and staff, including 31% first-generation college students, over 30% Pell Grant-eligible students, and faculty from over 70 countries. As a Research I university (meaning the highest level of research activity), UW seeks to hire people with outstanding qualifications who are developing and/or maintaining an ongoing professional career at a national/international level. Seattle is a well-known center of innovation and culture, and the School of Drama enjoys a close relationship with the area’s many performing arts groups. The SoD maintains professionally staffed scenic, paint, properties, electrics, sound, and costume shops.
Duties will include teaching, mentoring, and advising both graduate and undergraduate students in design for live performance (including dance), with specific emphasis on Costume Design. Courses may include: Design Studio for graduate students, Advanced Costume Design for undergraduate students, Visual Narrative in Performance, Tools of Composition and Design for Performance, Costume History, and advance courses in Costume Design for graduate students (including “exit” projects). The design program at the UW School of Drama prides itself on a collaborative, multi-disciplinary approach to teaching design, and some of the above courses are intended to be rotated among the design faculty. Our students produce work with our professional costume shop staff. The program encourages interdisciplinary pedagogy and currently includes courses that are team-taught with faculty of two or three disciplines. This position is expected to actively advise students in costume design when they are designing school productions and dance concerts. This position is also expected to be active in the recruitment of prospective students and in professional networking that might lead to productive internships or other kinds of professional connections for students.
Participation in academic administrative work, including curricular development and committees, is expected along with other forms of service typical of a tenure-track faculty position. Student designers are prioritized in the production season; but faculty may also, on occasion, design within the season as needed. In addition to their duties within the university, faculty are expected to continue to their professional creative practice, within the school’s policies for outside professional work.
Mission/EDIA Commitment
The School of Drama is committed to building and supporting a multicultural community that fosters equity, diversity, inclusion and access. Our faculty, staff, and students are engaged with the ways that race, gender identity, sexuality, ability, class, and ethnicity intersect with and shape the human experience, both inside the educational experience and outside of it. We encourage all members of the School of Drama to think critically about the world around them and engage actively. Thus, we are seeking candidates whose education, work experience and lived experience have not only prepared them to fulfill our commitment to equity and inclusion but have also given them the confidence to effectively engage with students, staff, and community from a wide spectrum of backgrounds. Our faculty and staff are expected to understand and embrace our commitment to respecting and representing diverse ideas, races, genders, sexualities, abilities, cultures, religions, and traditions, and to interrupt behaviors that hinder our work towards anti-racism and our diversity and inclusion efforts. Black, Indigenous, People of Color and members of other under-represented groups are encouraged to apply.
Qualifications
Minimum Qualifications
Equivalent education/experience – including teaching outside of traditional academia - may substitute for all minimum qualifications except when there are legal requirements, such as a license/certification/registration.
- A demonstrated track record of innovative and rigorous expertise, which may include an MFA (or foreign equivalent) in design or related field OR a bachelor's degree (or foreign equivalent) plus at least five years of professional experience in the field of design.
- A minimum of one year prior teaching experience (part-time acceptable) at the college or university level.
- At least two years of demonstrated experience teaching/mentoring learners in their field, within their professional creative practice or in a traditional academic setting with graduate and/or undergraduate students.
- Continuing (i.e. past, present, and ongoing) experience as a professional designer of live performance spaces, transmedia/digital performance, film and/or television.
- Demonstrated experience with programs/efforts to develop and support equity, diversity, inclusion, and access.
- Demonstrated experience of self-education, cultural awareness, and growth.
- A record of educational approaches that stress the value of collaboration between all members of a production team.
- Eagerness to engage in the school’s Mission, Vision, Values, and Commitments.
Instructions
The University of Washington is using Interfolio’s Faculty Search to conduct this search. Applicants to this position receive a free dossier account and can send all application materials, including confidential letters of recommendation, free of charge.
Applications should include:
- A letter of application describing your expertise and experience in research and teaching as well as your artistic curiosities,
- A curriculum vitae
- Contact information for three references,
- A diversity statement (750 words)
In addition to this written content, candidates may also share links to their professional websites and portfolios within these materials.
The diversity statement should describe how your teaching, research and/or service demonstrate a commitment to diversity and inclusion through scholarship or by improving access to higher education for underrepresented individuals or groups. What efforts have you made or been involved with to foster cultural competence and understanding? What have you done to further your knowledge about equity, diversity, inclusion, and access (EDIA)? How have you demonstrated what you have learned to your colleagues? Please discuss how the work you hope to do at the UW will enhance the University’s and our department’s commitment to EDIA. The School of Drama has created and is committed to an Anti-Racist Action Plan, with which we encourage candidates to familiarize themselves.
Priority given to applications received by November 17, 2021.
Questions regarding this posting may be addressed to Valerie Curtis Newton, the Head of the Search Committee, at valcn@uw.edu.
Equal Employment Opportunity Statement
University of Washington is an affirmative action and equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, creed, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, marital status, pregnancy, genetic information, gender identity or expression, age, disability, or protected veteran status.
Commitment to Diversity
The University of Washington is committed to building diversity among its faculty, librarian, staff, and student communities, and articulates that commitment in the UW Diversity Blueprint (http://www.washington.edu/diversity/diversity-blueprint/). Additionally, the University’s Faculty Code recognizes faculty efforts in research, teaching and/or service that address diversity and equal opportunity as important contributions to a faculty member’s academic profile and responsibilities (https://www.washington.edu/admin/rules/policies/FCG/FCCH24.html#2432).
COVID-19 Vaccine Requirements and Information
Under Washington State Governor Inslee’s Proclamation 21-14.1, University of Washington (UW) workers must be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and provide proof thereof, or receive a UW-approved medical or religious exemption. This requirement will be a condition of any offer associated with this recruitment. For more information, please visit https://www.washington.edu/coronavirus/vaccination-requirement/.