Associate Professor and Director of the Academy of Transdisciplinary Studies

The College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences at Virginia Tech (https://liberalarts.vt.edu ) seeks to hire a tenured Associate Professor whose research and teaching examine the human impacts of digital technologies, broadly construed. The successful candidate will also serve as Director of the Academy of Transdisciplinary Studies (ATS). The workload will combine administrative duties, research, and a 1:1 teaching load. The position will begin in August 2024.

Associate Professor

The successful applicant will demonstrate an active program of research and scholarship, with commitment to participating in transdisciplinary collaborations that address contemporary, complex challenges and opportunities related to digital technologies. Applicants should be prepared to teach a variety of courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Applicants are expected to pursue extramural funding in support of their research and scholarship. Occasional travel to attend national conferences and meetings is required. Candidates from diverse backgrounds are strongly encouraged to apply.

The successful applicant will be appointed as a tenured faculty member in one of the departments or schools in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences (https://liberalarts.vt.edu/departments-and-schools.html). The ability to teach within the Science, Technology, and Engineering in Policy Graduate Certificate Program (https://step.vt.edu/) is highly desirable.

We seek applicants from multiple disciplines in humanities and social sciences who are keenly attuned to the ways that digital technologies are affecting the human experience.

Examples include:

• Complex decision-making at the nexus of digital technology policy and large-scale systems and structures, e.g., economic, governance, climate and natural resources, schools, families
• Ethics, equity, parity, and social justice related to digital technology, e.g., artificial intelligence, machine learning, analytics, algorithms, including impacts of technology on humanity and the natural world
• Regulatory challenges of emergent digital technologies
• Algorithmic decision making, predictive analytics, and social justice
• Social media, regulatory policies, and individual identity
• Systemic inequality, institutional racism, algorithmic bias, and data collection
• Technology-facilitated gender-based and sexual violence
• Surveillance, tech platforms, and structured inequality
• Intersection of digital technology policies and non-human systems, e.g., energy, environment
• The transformation of work and occupations related to emergent digital technologies
• Social and political impacts of disinformation and misinformation.
• Impact of digital technologies on mental and physical well-being.

Director, Academy of Transdisciplinary Studies

The Academy of Transdisciplinary Studies is the academic home of established transdisciplinary curricular offerings at Virginia Tech as well as an incubator for innovative transdisciplinary minors and majors (https://liberalarts.vt.edu/research-centers/academy-of-transdisciplinary-studies.html). The key aims of the ATS are to facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration and teaching within CLAHS and across Virginia Tech and to emphasize the critical roles of the social sciences and the humanities in informing and shaping the transdisciplinary endeavors of Virginia Tech.

The ATS Director is responsible for the growth and vigor of curricular offerings and programs in the ATS. The ATS Director is expected to have an established reputation as a transdisciplinary scholar. The ATS Director will be expected to facilitate and support transdisciplinary endeavors within the Academy that focus on how academic inquiry can address issues affecting human beings in the 21st century and beyond.

The ATS Director has primary administrative responsibility for all personnel, budget, curricular, program, equipment, and facility matters relating to the Academy. The ATS Director will have staff and advising support. The ATS Director reports directly to the Associate Dean of Transdisciplinary Initiatives in CLAHS.

Required Qualifications

• Doctoral degree or equivalent in related field.
• A record of scholarship and teaching experience meriting the rank of tenured Associate Professor in a school or department in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.
• Demonstrated teaching, research, and outreach related to the human impacts of technology.
• Demonstrated commitment to transdisciplinary academic inquiry.
• Experience with curriculum development and governance.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with budgets and business processes.

Appointment Type