A Story of Transition and Transformation: Making the Career Switch from Corporate America to Higher Education

Abstract

Abstract: In recent years, the purpose and function of the university has been highly debated: what should be the balance between theory and practice? Higher education has been seen to provide radical new ways of thinking, but there have been calls to place much more emphasis on tangible, applied professional skills to provide students with more returns on their investment. Knowledgeable and experienced faculty contribute to a more open-minded culture with greater productivity, which is also connected to higher levels of personal accomplishment, confidence, and engagement. This reflective essay explores the experiences of an HBCU alumna who transitioned from a career in corporate America to higher education. The first in a new series for Advertising & Society Quarterly , our objective is to share experiences about this transition from practitioner to professor for those who may want to forge similar paths. Just as Advertising & Society Quarterly seeks to build bridges between higher education and industry in order to better understand advertising’s place in society, culture, history, and the economy, similar efforts can be made to envision pathways for faculty with scholarly and applied backgrounds.