Hey Constance! Thank you for writing this. I am sorry to hear that this has been stressful. I have had several similar experiences where I felt that I was rejected or treated poorly by CEA or EA funders. Sometimes it really upset me and reduced my motivation for a period.
However, I also believe that the people at such orgs are generally very competent and good-natured, that there are things I don’t know/consider which they account for. They have to do difficult work when filtering applications and leave themselves open for public criticism that is hard to defend against. I know that I would find that last part to be very difficult.
Overall, I feel that mistakes are inevitable in these sorts of application processes—especially in assessments of more unusual or novel people/projects. However, I also feel that if you work hard and keeping having good impacts, you will usually get the deserved resources and opportunities.
For what it is worth, I scanned your application, and I admire and appreciate your work. I hope you persevere, and that I see you at a future conference!
Throughout making this post (especially when writing the criticisms/solutions section) I did experience an expansion of my circle of compassion towards large organizations. It can be really difficult to make everyone happy when the scale of an event is so large. However, I still think that “customer service” has been undervalued and the downstream consequences of rejection have not adequately been taken into account. EA’s expect to rely on CEA as a central organization (and other large EA orgs) in a way that is tied into their identity, career, funding, community, etc. How they interact with individual EA’s really matters.
While I have weighed the pros and cons of posting this, I think ultimately it was a net pro to increase accountability, transparency, and help other rejected applicants not feel so upset. The tradeoff is that the CEA staff involved can experience some discomfort from being publicly criticized despite trying their best to do a good job. I have tried to minimize through not mentioning names directly in my post. I’ve also considered that others may view me in a more negative light for saying something controversial, but I do have to accept that as a potential consequence of my decision.
And thank you for your appreciation of my work! I do plan to keep on going and developing my projects. Hopefully we get a chance to meet in the future!
Hey Constance! Thank you for writing this. I am sorry to hear that this has been stressful. I have had several similar experiences where I felt that I was rejected or treated poorly by CEA or EA funders. Sometimes it really upset me and reduced my motivation for a period.
However, I also believe that the people at such orgs are generally very competent and good-natured, that there are things I don’t know/consider which they account for. They have to do difficult work when filtering applications and leave themselves open for public criticism that is hard to defend against. I know that I would find that last part to be very difficult.
Overall, I feel that mistakes are inevitable in these sorts of application processes—especially in assessments of more unusual or novel people/projects. However, I also feel that if you work hard and keeping having good impacts, you will usually get the deserved resources and opportunities.
For what it is worth, I scanned your application, and I admire and appreciate your work. I hope you persevere, and that I see you at a future conference!
Hi Peter,
Throughout making this post (especially when writing the criticisms/solutions section) I did experience an expansion of my circle of compassion towards large organizations. It can be really difficult to make everyone happy when the scale of an event is so large. However, I still think that “customer service” has been undervalued and the downstream consequences of rejection have not adequately been taken into account. EA’s expect to rely on CEA as a central organization (and other large EA orgs) in a way that is tied into their identity, career, funding, community, etc. How they interact with individual EA’s really matters.
While I have weighed the pros and cons of posting this, I think ultimately it was a net pro to increase accountability, transparency, and help other rejected applicants not feel so upset. The tradeoff is that the CEA staff involved can experience some discomfort from being publicly criticized despite trying their best to do a good job. I have tried to minimize through not mentioning names directly in my post. I’ve also considered that others may view me in a more negative light for saying something controversial, but I do have to accept that as a potential consequence of my decision.
And thank you for your appreciation of my work! I do plan to keep on going and developing my projects. Hopefully we get a chance to meet in the future!