The purpose of the work/life balance series is to highlight particular challenges that higher education faculty face as they participate in the demands of the academy and try to prevent those demands from invading their personal lives. On The High Wire looks at a specific subset of university 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 precarious nature of the "walk" for education faculty who are parents of school-aged children. We know that our identities are central to how we experience the world and how the world reacts to us. This reality is clearly visible in this book. These multiple identities and roles come into conflict at multiple points and in different ways. This book explores these identities and roles through auto ethnographic accounts written by varied education faculty in order to make these tensions visible for the field to address.

The purpose of the work/life balance series is to highlight particular challenges that higher education faculty face as they participate in the demands of the academy and try to prevent those demands from invading their personal lives. On The High Wire looks at a specific subset of university 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 precarious nature of the "walk" for education faculty who are parents of school-aged children. We know that our identities are central to how we experience the world and how the world reacts to us. This reality is clearly visible in this book. These multiple identities and roles come into conflict at multiple points and in different ways. This book explores these identities and roles through auto ethnographic accounts written by varied education faculty in order to make these tensions visible for the field to address.

Attrition among doctoral students has become a perennial issue in higher education (Gardner, 2009; Golde, 2000) as 40 to 60 percent of doctoral students do not complete their program of study (Bair &Haworth, 2005). Such outcomes are inconsistent with the rigorous evaluation that occurs prior to being accepted into a doctoral program (Bair & Haworth, 2005). Despite deemed levels of student excellence, promise and efforts made by programs to counter student departure (Offerman, 2011), attrition rates remain alarmingly high (Bair & Haworth, 2005; Gardner, 2009). The purpose of this book is to provide a view into doctoral student work-lives and their efforts to find a balance between often seemingly conflicting responsibilities. In addition to contributing to the ongoing dialogue on work-life balance in doctoral studies (Brus, 2006; Golde, 1998; Moyer, Salovey, & Casey-Cannon, 1999), the intention of this book is to provide other doctoral students with potential coping mechanisms, guidance, and assurance that they are not alone in this process. Lastly, we anticipate that these doctoral student narratives will help illuminate potential strategies that doctoral programs, departments, and institutions can incorporate in their efforts to help students successfully complete their program of study. As such the intended audience is doctoral students, higher education professionals, faculty members, and educational leaders.

Attrition among doctoral students has become a perennial issue in higher education (Gardner, 2009; Golde, 2000) as 40 to 60 percent of doctoral students do not complete their program of study (Bair &Haworth, 2005). Such outcomes are inconsistent with the rigorous evaluation that occurs prior to being accepted into a doctoral program (Bair & Haworth, 2005). Despite deemed levels of student excellence, promise and efforts made by programs to counter student departure (Offerman, 2011), attrition rates remain alarmingly high (Bair & Haworth, 2005; Gardner, 2009). The purpose of this book is to provide a view into doctoral student work-lives and their efforts to find a balance between often seemingly conflicting responsibilities. In addition to contributing to the ongoing dialogue on work-life balance in doctoral studies (Brus, 2006; Golde, 1998; Moyer, Salovey, & Casey-Cannon, 1999), the intention of this book is to provide other doctoral students with potential coping mechanisms, guidance, and assurance that they are not alone in this process. Lastly, we anticipate that these doctoral student narratives will help illuminate potential strategies that doctoral programs, departments, and institutions can incorporate in their efforts to help students successfully complete their program of study. As such the intended audience is doctoral students, higher education professionals, faculty members, and educational leaders.

Challenges of work-life balance in the academy stem from policies and practices which remain from the time when higher education was populated mostly by married White male faculty. Those faculty were successful in their academic work because they depended upon the support of their wives to manage many of the not-work aspects of their lives. Imagine a tweedy middle-aged white man, coming home from the university to greet his wife and children and eat the dinner she's prepared for him, and then disappearing into his study for the rest of the evening with his pipe to write and think great thoughts. If that professor ever existed, he is now emeritus. Juggling Flaming Chainsaws is the first book in a new series with Information Age Publishing on these challenges of managing academic work and not-work. It uses the methodology of autoethnography to introduce the work-life issues faced by scholars in educational leadership. While the experiences of scholars in this volume are echoed across other fields in higher education, educational leadership is unique because of its emphasis on preparing people for leadership roles within higher education and for preK-12 schools. Authors include people at different places on their career and life course trajectory, people who are partnered and single, gay and straight, with children and without, caring for elders, and managing illness. They hail from different geographic areas of the nation, different ethnic backgrounds, and different types of institutions. What all have in common is commitment to engaging with this topic, to reflecting deeply upon their own experience, and to sharing that experience with the rest of us.

Challenges of work-life balance in the academy stem from policies and practices which remain from the time when higher education was populated mostly by married White male faculty. Those faculty were successful in their academic work because they depended upon the support of their wives to manage many of the not-work aspects of their lives. Imagine a tweedy middle-aged white man, coming home from the university to greet his wife and children and eat the dinner she's prepared for him, and then disappearing into his study for the rest of the evening with his pipe to write and think great thoughts. If that professor ever existed, he is now emeritus. Juggling Flaming Chainsaws is the first book in a new series with Information Age Publishing on these challenges of managing academic work and not-work. It uses the methodology of autoethnography to introduce the work-life issues faced by scholars in educational leadership. While the experiences of scholars in this volume are echoed across other fields in higher education, educational leadership is unique because of its emphasis on preparing people for leadership roles within higher education and for preK-12 schools. Authors include people at different places on their career and life course trajectory, people who are partnered and single, gay and straight, with children and without, caring for elders, and managing illness. They hail from different geographic areas of the nation, different ethnic backgrounds, and different types of institutions. What all have in common is commitment to engaging with this topic, to reflecting deeply upon their own experience, and to sharing that experience with the rest of us.