These essays are incredible. I used to joke that my job was to explain the university to the world and, sometimes, the world to the university. This description of teaching trade-offs is constructively instructive for all involved-students, parents, professors, politicians and the public.
As you add courses to faculty teaching loads it also seems to encourage more standardization across courses and I think this is one of the ways quality can decline. The response makes sense as a standardized course shell can help ease the burden of prep but then you lose some of the distinct ways individual faculty would approach a course.
I agree with the critiques of these mandates, but I'm not sure this argument will convince state legislators. Their thought seems to be that if faculty aren't actively teaching, they aren't actually working. This is part and parcel with more attempts to dictate college curricula and treat higher ed as an extension of K-12. The blurring of the lines with dual-enrollment and online courses is not helping there either.
And that critique might well be true for some faculty members who can finagle ways out of teaching without providing much in return even if it's unfair to the majority of faculty. Other faculty actually do a ton of service and other outside-of-class work, but outside of research it's not well-measured. And many faculty themselves also fail to appreciate any activity that is not part of an official (tm) committee meeting.
Thank you for the comment. I agree that a lot of choices being made in state houses are consistent with legislators believing universities are fundamentally the same as K-12. That shows up in not understanding the value of research, or its connection to the teaching mission, or understanding the difference between textbook driven teaching and frontier content teaching. And it feeds into micromanaging university behavior in the same way that K-12 is micromanaged.
But part of what we're trying for in these essays is to help people who are open to learning to better understand what it is that faculty and universities actually do and why micromanagement is counterproductive to the aims of the university. That includes legislators, but also faculty who are super-focused on their own research agenda and/or their own classroom, and insufficiently attuned to what it takes to make the operation as a whole run.
This defense of the status quo is fine, and at least you're willing to deploy data. But general faculty laziness and work effort is not really what's being questioned most pointedly. Most people (and state legislators) aren't going to expect an annual audit of the business school faculty or the faculty in the engineering school. They will leave you alone.
People have doubts about the strange and unusual stuff being studied, taught, and supported with public funds. Some would even say goofy, useless and stupid content.
So it's not that some accounting professor, or someone researching flood water management technology is spending too much time at home and insufficient time at work. It's that the anthropology professor insisting on biological sex being in error that is of concern, regardless of whether she's teaching or staying home (see recent Chronicle piece on this, plus Wash Post reply by Megan McArdle). Arguably, many would want the anthro prof to stay at home and propagate less of that nonsense in the classroom. But if she's being paid from public funds, why have this position at all? (though the particular instance in the Chronicle piece was from P'ton anthro, not a public university).
So the real grievance is not how you're making it appear. It's not that all faculty are lazy and useless, it's that enough of them are, and especially the ones that teach useless subject matter with no value, that there are these loud and persuasive calls for reform.
Great concise piece on teaching loads. I noticed this quote: "But if the goal is really to legislatively manage the cost of a college education, it’s not clear you can make much progress by squeezing the amount universities spend on faculty."
I would welcome legislative mandates to control the share of spending spent on administration.
These essays are incredible. I used to joke that my job was to explain the university to the world and, sometimes, the world to the university. This description of teaching trade-offs is constructively instructive for all involved-students, parents, professors, politicians and the public.
Many thanks for your support Chris - this is high praise coming from you! If you have thoughts on other topics we should tackle, let us know.
This should be required reading for every state legislator!
Thanks Dinah for your support!
As you add courses to faculty teaching loads it also seems to encourage more standardization across courses and I think this is one of the ways quality can decline. The response makes sense as a standardized course shell can help ease the burden of prep but then you lose some of the distinct ways individual faculty would approach a course.
I agree with the critiques of these mandates, but I'm not sure this argument will convince state legislators. Their thought seems to be that if faculty aren't actively teaching, they aren't actually working. This is part and parcel with more attempts to dictate college curricula and treat higher ed as an extension of K-12. The blurring of the lines with dual-enrollment and online courses is not helping there either.
And that critique might well be true for some faculty members who can finagle ways out of teaching without providing much in return even if it's unfair to the majority of faculty. Other faculty actually do a ton of service and other outside-of-class work, but outside of research it's not well-measured. And many faculty themselves also fail to appreciate any activity that is not part of an official (tm) committee meeting.
Thank you for the comment. I agree that a lot of choices being made in state houses are consistent with legislators believing universities are fundamentally the same as K-12. That shows up in not understanding the value of research, or its connection to the teaching mission, or understanding the difference between textbook driven teaching and frontier content teaching. And it feeds into micromanaging university behavior in the same way that K-12 is micromanaged.
But part of what we're trying for in these essays is to help people who are open to learning to better understand what it is that faculty and universities actually do and why micromanagement is counterproductive to the aims of the university. That includes legislators, but also faculty who are super-focused on their own research agenda and/or their own classroom, and insufficiently attuned to what it takes to make the operation as a whole run.
This defense of the status quo is fine, and at least you're willing to deploy data. But general faculty laziness and work effort is not really what's being questioned most pointedly. Most people (and state legislators) aren't going to expect an annual audit of the business school faculty or the faculty in the engineering school. They will leave you alone.
People have doubts about the strange and unusual stuff being studied, taught, and supported with public funds. Some would even say goofy, useless and stupid content.
So it's not that some accounting professor, or someone researching flood water management technology is spending too much time at home and insufficient time at work. It's that the anthropology professor insisting on biological sex being in error that is of concern, regardless of whether she's teaching or staying home (see recent Chronicle piece on this, plus Wash Post reply by Megan McArdle). Arguably, many would want the anthro prof to stay at home and propagate less of that nonsense in the classroom. But if she's being paid from public funds, why have this position at all? (though the particular instance in the Chronicle piece was from P'ton anthro, not a public university).
So the real grievance is not how you're making it appear. It's not that all faculty are lazy and useless, it's that enough of them are, and especially the ones that teach useless subject matter with no value, that there are these loud and persuasive calls for reform.
Great concise piece on teaching loads. I noticed this quote: "But if the goal is really to legislatively manage the cost of a college education, it’s not clear you can make much progress by squeezing the amount universities spend on faculty."
I would welcome legislative mandates to control the share of spending spent on administration.