Can’t Win Them All: A Celebration of Professional Risk Taking by Julia Webster

Professional Development Offering Flop

jwebste2 — 2026-03-17 18:54:44 UTC

Tried to get a professional development series going, but it just didn’t get momentum.

Publication Stall

2026-04-10 21:01:55 UTC

Blog post for journal website drafted but not revised, submitted, or published

Grant Rejection

2026-04-10 21:06:32 UTC

Collaborated with colleagues on writing a grant to support student success that was denied

New class activity struggles

2026-04-11 16:42:49 UTC

Tried to liven up a section of class with a new activity that just didn't work - students looked incredibly confused.

"AI" proofing a test fail

2026-04-11 16:44:55 UTC

I wanted to keep giving out of class moodle tests so I tried video answers instead of written. Took way too long to grade and some student still just read from what seemed to be AI assisted 'scripts'

Methods Training Fail

2026-04-13 15:29:07 UTC

Tried to integrate some data vis methods in an elective class. I underestimated how much leg work was required and now we are all confused

Open House Expectation v. Reality

2026-04-14 15:25:16 UTC

We tried something new to get folks into our office to learn more about what we do and we only had a few people drop in

Research Trajectory Fail!

2026-04-16 20:20:59 UTC

After taking my grad school project to its end state and realizing that it could never work "in real life", I attempted to fix it by making a quick contribution to a fundamental principle of physics. Last month I received my 7th publication rejection. Looking forward to #8!

2026-04-27 23:07:04 UTC

Tried to organize professional groups across campus, and didn't work out quite as planned. I overwhelmed people with too much information.

Zero Emissions

2026-04-28 17:04:27 UTC

While you might lose some battles, but in the long run you can win the war. While EV adoption on campus is not where I would like it to be at this point, it is still more than it was. Last week a student who in his own words is a "gear head" presented an analysis of recent data showing the takeover by EVs by 2030 with elimination of petrol vehicle production by 2040. This concurred with an analysis of trends that I did a few years. After hearing the presentation, I said to myself "Yes, there is Hope." "Resistance (to change) is futile". I guess this is not too anonymous - lol:)

Research stalling

2026-04-30 14:33:50 UTC

One of my research projects with a postdoc at another institution just keeps running into roadblocks.

Signed up to be on an NSF grant subcommittee on a project I REALLY wanted to do but couldn't make the time in my schedule to attend meetings or do the leg work

2026-04-30 14:41:49 UTC

Just Kidding

2026-05-01 13:34:46 UTC

I was asked by NSF to participate on a team that would conduct a site visit in Hawaii as part of a review for a multimillion-dollar grant. The project matched my expertise and I could give valuable feedback. They offered to pay for the whole trip and compensate me for my time. Even though it was during the semester, I of course agreed. Who would pass on a free trip to Hawaii? Several weeks later, NSF canceled the in-person visit and moved the review to three days of 8-hour Zoom meetings. Umm…