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**Qqmike** · Jul 09, 2011, 07:55 AM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

What, some 7 billion humans on this planet now? Many have no clean water, not enough food, insufficient medical and dental care, inadequate basic education, many are not safe, many live on one or two dollars a day ... and Sissy-Boy didn't get tenure?

The accounts (by husband and wife) reek of insecurity, judged against superfluous--artificial is a better word--norms and expectations. A quote from Don Juan comes to mind (Carlos Castaneda):

"A hunter knows he will lure game into his traps over and over again, so he doesn't worry. To worry is to become accessible. Once you worry, you cling to everything out of desperation. And once you cling, you are bound to get exhausted or to exhaust whoever or whatever you are clinging to."

You will find similar ideas in Buddhism, Christianity, and other philosophies.

Getting tenure ... Of course, you must do the work, get the publications (in acceptable journals), get good teaching evaluations, and do some faculty committee work ("faculty service"). But importantly you must also be accepted by your peers and perhaps even be well liked. It is true that some of your peers may be a*holes and so will vote "no" against you. But it is also true that if you are the a*hole, chances are you will not get tenure. (Who wants to work forever with an a*hole?)

I suppose it makes sense that a civilized society should provide a safe place for each of its subgroups, including the professors. Or does it? I've known many professors, at many universities. I was one, with tenure (got it on the first try). There's many things about many of those profs that I didn't identify with, things that bugged me (maybe I need the therapy). Half of them didn't know how to use a screw driver. Of the half that did, 80% were dangerous with one in hand. A manicurist will not find many dirty or broken fingernails to work on in a group of college professors. If they lost their job and were told to find work without leaning on their bulls* resume, most profs would not survive even a month in the normal, tough, 40-hour job markets. (That's my sissy-boy theory.)

And we could go off on the subject of doctoral degrees (there have been some threads touching on the subject recently). Most college PhDs have learned one single sub-subject very well, a specialty so narrow that it's basically useless. (Many exceptions, of course, mainly in medical, technical, science, and engineering fields). But a PhD in International Relations or Business? Wtf is that! (I've known many such PhDs, btw.)

Say you have tenure. What would happen if you tried to give it back, not wanting to play the game? Suppose you'd rather go it alone, judged on the quality of your "production" each year, working on the basis of the merits of your work and how well you did with your teaching, willing to be assessed each Spring for contract renewal in the Fall? Even willing to work for 75% of the standard tenured rate (for your experience and time on the job). That is, what if you took a normal working person's stance? Chances are your Dean will not understand such a proposal. Even if he (or she) does, he will probably tell you that your colleagues will not understand it.

Fact is, such an idea would frighten (read: scare the h* out of) most professors because they know they need the security of tenure to function not only as a professor but as a human being. And many (again, most perhaps?) of those profs really are not doing a very good job contributing anything useful to anybody--not in their research, not in their teaching, and not in their "faculty service" (seated around a conference table 8-20 hours a week on various committees--at taxpayer expense--following Robert's Rules of Order to make mostly trivial, pompous decisions about next to nothing).

I see no advantage of the tenure system to the students, to the research community, and certainly no advantage whatsoever to taxpayers. For the sissy-boys (and girls) who couldn't function or otherwise get work in another sector of society, of course there is a big advantage to permanent job security at inflated pay rates for the nine-month school year (with weeks off for holidays). Taxpayers would rebel if they knew who they were supporting; if they knew how many tenured faculty didn't teach their own classes; how many can't teach at all! or even communicate normally; how many faculty fail to show up for their office hours to help students; how many paid-faculty hours are spent in silly, petty committee meetings; how many tenured faculty members cease to continue to produce quality, "scholarly" works in respected journals; and so on.

Do we really feel the tenure system is necessary so we can be thought of as a civilized, advanced society? It would seem to me, off the top of my head, that just the opposite should be true.

**woodsmoke** · Jul 09, 2011, 10:40 AM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

Qq

thank you for the very thoughtful post which, it seems is based in real, or NONreal

world experience.

Something similar has happened at my college only on the staff side. The fellow that built that is....built... the college and it is considered "the Taj Mahal" of college buildings (we have 7 campuses) for us "only" has a Master's Degree in Architecture and then several sub specialties in various things like building management etc. He has also built most of the buildings for the rest of the campuses.

After 9 years from the very first day, the college decided that it needed to "raise the prestige" of all the campuses by raising the "degree quality" at that position so they had a debate then a "presentation call" for who might best be in charge of the building.

There were two candidates the other from the "main" campus" who was in "purchasing" and had been there one year longer than our guy....

The "purchasing agent" who has...... a PhD in .....purchasing...... is now "the man running the buildings" for all of the campuses....and the man who BUILT most of the buildings in the campuses....

In true......CLASSIC ...Peter Principle.....was moved "sidewise" with a modicum of a pay raise to the main campus and is in charge of........purchasing.....

alll because he didn't have the faux sheepskin.

And what is the first thing the new guy does to the building?

His office always had the door open.....the main door to the four room sub complex always had it's door open and the door to the "photocopy room" was always open....

The new guy immediately closed all of the doors "in the interests of energy efficiency"...

The rooms are going to be re-arranged so that his room is buried in the corner, but is much LARGER and an extra "entry door" is being built....much larger with a much nicer quality door... the photocopy room has been moved to the side and an extra door being built and the inside entry door being closed....so that the teachers don't "interrupt the work flow" by actually visiting with the secretary as they walk by.....

The Secretary's workspace is being rearranged so that she faces AWAY from the doors and is behind a divider... the "entrance person" is now going to be behind a divider.....

behind a closed door....

Yep.....gotta raise the "level" of things.... to inaccessible.

woodsmoke

**GreyGeek** · Jul 09, 2011, 02:56 PM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

Qqmike, your essay is so accurate I suspect that you've had personal experience with college faculty politics. It became obvious to me, while in graduate school, that degrees and tenure have more to do with "office politics" and less or nothing to do with academics, knowledge or skill. The person most skilled in lying, schmoozing or sucking up often floats to the top, and more than likely the Peter Principle, as Woodsmoke pointed out, comes into play. This is most obviously the case when the newly appointed schmoozer has to hire a subordinate skilled in the job he was hired/appointed/anointed to do. The second most obvious sign of a schmoozer appointed above their skill level is that they conceal their incompetence by being "away at meetings" a lot, "networking" with others in similar positions at other institutions. Another sign is the $300 haircut and GQ attire, with the suitable 1 carrot "Diamond" ring on the pinky. Oh, I forgot the leased Escalade.

Three items stuck out when I read the article. The first is the volume of work the guy did in five years:

I've published four books, written or co-written 10 peer-reviewed articles and about 30 book chapters, essays, and book reviews. One of those books was about international relations and ... zombies.

Obviously, he hasn't had time for teaching or for his wife. The typical teaching load is 12 to 16 contact hours, plus office and help time. That doesn't include time spent in lesson preparation, making and grading tests, and grade book work. Making and grading tests is especially time consuming if done properly. Perhaps his wife doesn't mind a 30 minute data at McDonalds once a week, while he peruses his email on his iPhone.

A back-handed "compliment" to his former employer:

I don't know if the University of Chicago's department of political science would change its mind if it could go back in time. It has moved on and will no doubt soon reclaim its historical status as a great place for international relations. I have moved on as well.

i.e., they became a second rate school in IR when they dumped him.

Then, there is this jewel by his wife:

I was nervous. The family breadwinner was going to be out of a job in nine months, and my two master's degrees, in the lucrative fields of English literature and social work, weren't going to take us far.

I hope she was being humorous about English Lit and Social Work being "lucrative" fields. I hired a lawn care company to service my lawn. When the guy came out to apply the first round of weed killer I started talking to him. To my surprise he talked like he was educated. I asked him if he had been to college. He said, "Yes. I have a Master's in Social Work". "What? What are you doing putting chemicals on lawns?", I asked. "I can make almost twice as much doing this as social work.", he replied.

Using the words "Political" and "Science" together has always been a oxymoron to me.

**Qqmike** · Jul 09, 2011, 04:34 PM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

GG, yep, as I said above, I've had personal experience (PhD w/tenure at a state U., got it on the first go-around, Operations Research w/supporting Master's + 2 yrs in pure Math). But I felt like an outsider, though I "earned" respected insider status and had top-notch pubs, a textbook (now dead), teaching-evaluation scores, and was well-liked by faculty. I quit after 10 yrs and started my own businesses (that were fun but not very lucrative).

I sure didn't like the way professors looked down on and talked down to the working classes--secretaries, carpenters, the janitor, basically everyone! And, as I said, in my experience, many/most profs are helpless without the benefit of their b*sh* resume to lean on. I happen to pride myself on my many, varied trade skills (sure wish I had learned plumbing though! maybe it's not too late).

You mentioned the high productivity of the prof in the article. It is suspicious, I agree. OTOH, a lot of those turkeys spin out some really low-quality pubs, esp in b*sh* fields (not so easy to do in the tech fields, as you know), and esp doing collaborating or co-authored work.

If you can get a Master's degree, and if you did so easily with good grades, and if you are well-liked by your professors, I believe anyone can then continue on to get the PhD. Getting a PhD, given the conditions I listed, amounts to being willing to submit to torture and being willing to endure torture and humiliation a bit longer post-Master's (mental, physical, financial tortures, inflicted by your profs through your course work and finally the defense of your thesis). If you schmooze (lobby for yourself), you'll probably get through fine and receive the PhD.

Watch what a prof does after getting tenure: productivity goes to h*ll, office hrs are cut, he/she gets grants to do b*sh* "research" that funds his getting out of the rest of his teaching assignments, he hides in truly silly committee meetings (as you said), on and on and on. It's difficult to respect the (many) profs who abuse the system and use it to hide from reality.

It's all, as you said/implied, quite a game. One paid for at much higher rates by the taxpayers than they fully realize.

The price of freedom is insecurity. (The price of security is loss of freedom.)
The prescription for insecurity is posted in my Don Juan quote above.

I thought this Topic by woodsmoke would generate a lot more lively discussion by now. Maybe we have a lot of members who are tenured PhD profs here!

**de_koraco** · Jul 10, 2011, 03:13 AM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

Originally posted by Qqmike

You mentioned the high productivity of the prof in the article. It is suspicious, I agree. OTOH, a lot of those turkeys spin out some really low-quality pubs, esp in b*sh* fields (not so easy to do in the tech fields, as you know), and esp doing collaborating or co-authored work.

Not really, Dan Drezner is among the most respected members of the IR community, and one of the few mainstream American IR experts who is actually interesting to read - for instance, he's the only thing keeping Foreign Policy a balanced journal since the Washington Post took it over and made it into a left-wing whitewashing piece of ultimate crap. There's an unusual amount of whining in the article, but I'm guessing it's more like he's poking at his former University, due to political reasons and such.

**Qqmike** · Jul 10, 2011, 06:11 AM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

de_koraco, I see, yes, interesting. Yes, there are plenty of truly prolific academics, tenure or no, and it sounds like he's one of them. They are doing what they enjoy, nothing can stop them, and they do make solid contributions to their field, sometimes working around the clock. (As you noted, however, there is a heck of a lot of whining in that article. It seems professors lose perspective on this tenure issue. There are much more serious problems in life on this planet than not having tenure. And probably he is making jabs at his former U. for political reasons, as you say. Politics at universities--as you seem to know--and wrt the tenure system runs thick and stinky at times.)

In my general comments, I'm thinking of all the Assistant Profs who make a mad dash for their tenure review, scouting out all the 3rd- & 4th-tier pubs they can get into quickly and with fast turnaround, scouting out all the possible co-authors they can ride with, and so on.

My sense is that true academics, truly dedicated researchers and contributors, truly dedicated teachers, wouldn't need the tenure system at all. The tenure system is most certainly abused by a lot of profs who otherwise wouldn't have a clue how to earn their living if it weren't for tenured, life-long job security. One problem with tenure is that little can be done with a prof after he/she gets it, many of whom seem to lapse into doing very little, they cease to challenge themselves academically, and basically tenure often seems to be taken as retirement (or, maybe, semi-retirement).

Thanks for your comment. And we don't want to pick specifically on Dan Drezner too much here (I'm not even familiar with him or his field). The article is whiny, but it more generally highlights the issues surrounding tenure, and it's a good example of the extreme stress tenure places into the academic system.

When I was in the game, strangely (or not so!) I noticed that the profs I was attracted to as friends and that I respected academically and enjoyed talking to often did NOT get tenure! I always suspected heavy political goings-on in such cases, popularity issues, failure-to-lobby issues. You may be smart, productive, dedicated, serious, and valuable as a colleague, but that doesn't mean you'll get tenure.

**de_koraco** · Jul 10, 2011, 08:31 AM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

It kinda surprised me as well that he whined so much in the article, because his writing is usually very prone to self-criticism and honest self-reflection. I was just pointing out that he's not a kinda guy who didn't deserve tenure with his achievements, and I'd personally say that a faculty that doesn't go to great lengths to keep someone like him on staff is crazy.

As for tenure itself, while it may be everything you describe, it is at least in theory better a organized system than the one in Europe, where every college professor has something like tenure. In theory, at least, US professors are subject to a much more rigid peer review and competition process, that should benefit both them, the academic community, and, most importantly, the students. More often than not, in practice it seems to boil down to politics and favors, as you describe it.

Re: Drezner himself, I'd guess the main reason he didn't get tenure is due to purely political reasons - I'm willing to bet the faculty is not in line with him leaning more to the conservative right. In general, I think Allan Bloom did describe the roots of problems with the US academia in "The Closing Of The American Mind" extremely well.

**woodsmoke** · Jul 10, 2011, 11:32 AM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

Thank you de_koraco

I had given a read to several of Bloom's books over the years and, for some reason had started Closing of the American Mind but, for some reason, never finished it.

I'll pop over to my favourite second hand book nook and purchase it this week.

Here is a bio which, I think, don't know, seems to very well written:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Bloom

Bloom had a very long essay on the influence of "rock and roll" Frank Zappa, considered to be one of the "roots" of rock and roll responded:

It starts out as what seems to be a "throwaway" reply but, if one reads down through it, there are some salient points.

http://wiki.killuglyradio.com/wiki/O...d_for_the_Soul

But then, we get into "metalanguages".

Zappa is writing from within the "ethos" while Bloom is commenting from outside the "ethos".

This was a VERY SURPRISING hit when I was googling:

It is an archive of a physics forum which was discussing the book and it brings in a VERY WIDE RANGING discussion of various things such as "lumpieness" of society and the idea of "scaling"

The basic idea being that the "uttter" liberalization of everything produces a system with "no scale" and then a discussion of whether that is bad or good and then there is mention of the "internet" as having "no scale".

The discussion begins with a post by aperion, unfortunately because of the way they posted there is an over and over repeat of the original post by aperion, it may have been an IRC channel, don't know...but anyway it is a good read about various viewpoints, especially from a "physics" view of "society".

http://www.physicsforums.com/archive.../t-480326.html

woodsmoke
woodsmoke

**GreyGeek** · Jul 10, 2011, 01:50 PM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

Originally posted by de_koraco

.....
As for tenure itself, while it may be everything you describe, it is at least in theory better a organized system than the one in Europe, where every college professor has something like tenure. In theory, at least, US professors are subject to a much more rigid peer review and competition process, that should benefit both them, the academic community, and, most importantly, the students. More often than not, in practice it seems to boil down to politics and favors, as you describe it.
.....

In my experience (two universities and one college) tenure is used to "stack the deck" in favor of a particular political ideology, even in the sciences, where one might think that "theory proposes and experiment disposes". That's how the AGW gang gained control of various climate journals -- loading the "peer review" folks with ideological clones. Thus, an MIT prof in Climatology with 30 years experience and an international reputation suddenly finds that his publications are not acceptable. That's how essentially all journalism majors are from the left side of the political spectrum. If you don't parrot the party line you don't get tenure.

I knew of one individual who was working on his PhD in history. After four years his major prof died and none of the other docs in the dept would adopt him because of political differences his prof had with them. He went to another school, worked another 3 years only to have the same thing happen again. Seven years with nothing to show for it. It soured him and he quit graduate work altogether.

Of course, at the HS level, there is no such thing as tenure. In Nebraska, for instance, the law reads that a newly hired teacher can be fired at any time during their first two years, without cause or reason. After that the board must show incompetency or immorality, both of which are subject to interpretation of local morays. Nebraska allows for 27% "dislocations", i.e., teachers teaching subjects for which they've had no formal training or certification, like coaches teaching Chemistry, Physics, or Math, which is a travesty. So, a teacher can be hired for his teaching and fired for incompetency because of his coaching. That he was teaching as a "dislocation" doesn't matter. In many economically strapped Nebraska schools it is becoming common for boards to hire new teachers fresh out of college and fire them at the end of their second year just to keep the payroll expenses as low as possible. Only an outstanding teacher is kept, like the history teaching coach who takes his team to state before the end of his second year. Or, a teacher who is related to a board member. It has reduced HS teaching to the status of a "second job", not one used as a primary income generator.

So, de_koraco, what's your degree in? Curious minds want to know!

(I've notice that there seems to be a high level of educated and talented people in this forum 8) 8) 8) )

**de_koraco** · Jul 10, 2011, 02:57 PM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

Originally posted by GreyGeek

In my experience (two universities and one college) tenure is used to "stack the deck" in favor of a particular political ideology, even in the sciences, where one might think that "theory proposes and experiment disposes". That's how the AGW gang gained control of various climate journals -- loading the "peer review" folks with ideological clones. Thus, an MIT prof in Climatology with 30 years experience and an international reputation suddenly finds that his publications are not acceptable. That's how essentially all journalism majors are from the left side of the political spectrum. If you don't parrot the party line you don't get tenure.

Yup, now extrapolate it to Europe, where the very essence of higher level education is the ideological divide ad a tenure-like system. Not only does it stack the deck, but is a perfect staging grounds for political corruption. Hell, if you guys had a hands-down experience as to how things are run in the Balkans, where I live, you'd sing praises to the US system for ever

The whole thing goes back to the Frankfurt school regression, which introduced the Hegelian moronical dialectic even into the fold of hard science - to hell with the facts, they can always be distorted to fit the imagination of the time, be it psychology, literature, economics or climate science.

My degree is in English and German, btw

**Snowhog** · Jul 10, 2011, 03:03 PM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

"The only way Kubuntu could be more user friendly would be if it came with a virtual copy of Snowhog and dibl"

Just noticed your sig line!

You flatter us more than we deserve! But, thank you anyway.

[me=Snowhog]is humbled by the praise.[/me]

**de_koraco** · Jul 10, 2011, 03:10 PM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

That was GreyGeek's line on a thread a while back. Given the work you guys have been putting into helping people here, I thought it fitting

**dibl** · Jul 10, 2011, 03:21 PM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

Definitely more flattery than I deserve. But thanks!

**woodsmoke** · Jul 10, 2011, 04:46 PM

Re: whats wrong with US education in 1 whiney pity poor me essay

dlbl
that is not your avatar for no reason
thank you for being here and doing what you do
i will be offline probably for a while and if you might watch for me I would greatly appreciate it
wooddoesnotdeserveitsmoke

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