Do tenure-track search committees using mathjobs.org receive revisions to job applications after the initial submission date?

Question

this is a somewhat specific question aimed especially at people who have experienced in serving in tenure-track search committees that use Mathjobs.Org.

Many of the job descriptions say something in the lines of "Review of applications will start on 1 November" (or any other date) or "For full consideration please apply before November 1", etc.

The question is: I am waiting for a couple of papers to be accepted (already have reviews, but no official acceptance since the editorial process sometimes takes longer). I know that applications can be updated in Mathjobs. Do the committees print all the Mathjobs application on November 1, or they look at them online? I'm asking because if I update it, say, on November 15 (suppose a paper is accepted by then), then maybe the won't even look at the updated version and only at the old one. On the other hand, if I don't apply now and wait until Nov 15, maybe it will also be ignored since it will be too late.

Do you have any particular recommendations?

Answer 1

I have not seen anyone print any files from MathJobs.org, but only look at them on-line, so certainly any updates will be seen.

Also, even when deadlines are relatively early, it's not the case that the relevant committee or other people are so eager to start looking at files. It's just that when people do start looking, they'd want files to be as complete as possible, rather than there being a reason to have to do another pass, or two, through the whole "pile".

Seeing that papers are "submitted (to X?)" is worth something, though obviously "not as good as" "accepted", status-points-wise.

Answer 2

It's relatively easy to download a set of applications from mathjobs.org as a huge .pdf file. In our last search, the committee members looked at the applications in that way rather than looking at them online. Thus in our first round of evaluations we would have missed any updates that were submitted after the deadline. For candidates that made it to the phone interview stage, we did keep track of updates to the application, but in most cases the applicant sent us an email saying "... Also, my paper XXXX was just accepted for publication in YYYY..."

Thus I wouldn't count on any update to your mathjobs application that comes after the deadline being seen by the search committee. If you do update the appliction, you should probably send an email to the search committee chair.