On the High Wire

A volume in Work-Life BalanceSeries Editors: Joanne M. Marshall Iowa State University Jeffrey S. Brooks Iowa State University BonnieC. Fusarelli North Carolina State University Catherine A. Lugg Rutgers University Latish C. ReedUniversity of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and George Theoharis Syracuse UniversityThe purpose of the work/life balance series is to highlight particular challenges that highereducation faculty face as they participate in the demands of the academy and try to prevent thosedemands from invading their personal lives. On The High Wire looks at a specific subset ofuniversity faculty education faculty with school-aged children and the specific professional/personal balance these faculty need to find. The title On the High Wire suggests the precariousnature of the walk for education faculty who are parents of school-aged children. We know that our identities are central to how weexperience the world and how the world reacts to us. This reality is clearly visible in this book. These multiple identities and rolescome into conflict at multiple points and in different ways. This book explores these identities and roles through autoethnographicaccounts written by varied education faculty in order to make these tensions visible for the field to address.