teaching and COVID concerns

[downer]

Besides, its really depressing to not try to do your job well..

Citation?

My point is that anecdotal evidence and everyday observation speak against this. Indeed, it might be more depressing to try to do your job well and then be defeated by external constraints and bad policies from above.

As I always say, my standard is to do my job well enough, which I suspect is a lower standard than well. Occasionally, I do a great job, but more by accident than by intention.

[research_prof]

Besides, its really depressing to not try to do your job well..

Citation?

My point is that anecdotal evidence and everyday observation speak against this. Indeed, it might be more depressing to try to do your job well and then be defeated by external constraints and bad policies from above.

As I always say, my standard is to do my job well enough, which I suspect is a lower standard than well. Occasionally, I do a great job, but more by accident than by intention.

I would also argue that if you are one of the research-intensive faculty that brings indirect cost equal to their salary (or even more) every year to the university, then you basically work for free (the university saves your entire salary every year). Thus, the university should at the very least let you pick the modality you like for your courses. Otherwise, they can go hire an instructor with all the indirect cost that you have brought.

I made exactly this argument to my chair, since he asked me to teach in-person this semester at a university that I cannot even require my students to wear masks. Still, my chair screwed me and did what he thought best for the university. Usual kind of university administrator... Not to mention that he has protected all the faculty that deny science and refused to get vaccinated. This is unthinkable..

[Ruralguy]

But bringing in that money is a condition for having your job. I assume you wouldn't get tenure if you didn't bring in this money. I also presume most other faculty in similar fields are bringing in money. I guess what I am getting at is that making designer rules for people who bring in money at a place where many or even most do so could get chaotic.

Not that I don't sympathize. It sounds like your schools rules suck and mine aren't much better.

[dismalist]

... if you are one of the research-intensive faculty that brings indirect cost equal to their salary (or even more) every year to the university, then you basically work for free (the university saves your entire salary every year).

This is illusory.

Suppose the researcher got the full grant monies. S/he would keep some to live on, maybe called a salary, and spend some on lab rental, equipment purchases, office space, RA's, and so on. Instead of the university signing the checks, the researcher would be signing. No difference to pulling in grants the university administers.

No one who is drawing a salary is working for free.

[research_prof]

Well, I would expect if you are at the end of your second year as an assistant professor and you already generate close to half the indirect cost of your entire department, probably they would take you a bit more seriously.

Also to dismalist's point: I disagree because this is not the case at my university. The vast majority of faculty they hire bring no indirect cost but they simply suck in their salary. Especially at my department. So chances are that if they had hired someone else (someone like the last 10 hires my department  has done over the years), this hire would simply suck in a salary without bringing any indirect cost. Yes, if you were at a top 10-20 institution where even the least successful  faculty brings in 3x of their salary as indirect cost, I would agree with you not because of the rationale of your argument, but because it would very hard to make a distinction among so highly successful faculty. But definitely that's not the case in my department where you have people that bring no indirect cost and also refuse to get vaccinated, but you still protect them. Not to mention that I also essentially pay for the TA positions their students get, since they have no money at all to support them. So yes, I feel I work for free at this point and I would expect a bit more flexibility.

[dismalist]

Well, I would expect if you are at the end of your second year as an assistant professor and you already generate close to half the indirect cost of your entire department, probably they would take you a bit more seriously.

Also to dismalist's point: I disagree because this is not the case at my university. The vast majority of faculty they hire bring no indirect cost but they simply suck in their salary. Especially at my department. So chances are that if they had hired someone else (someone like the last 10 hires my department  has done over the years), this hire would simply suck in a salary without bringing any indirect cost. Yes, if you were at a top 10-20 institution where even the least successful  faculty brings in 3x of their salary as indirect cost, I would agree with you not because of the rationale of your argument, but because it would very hard to make a distinction among so highly successful faculty. But definitely that's not the case in my department where you have people that bring no indirect cost and also refuse to get vaccinated, but you still protect them. Not to mention that I also essentially pay for the TA positions their students get, since they have no money at all to support them. So yes, I feel I work for free at this point and I would expect a bit more flexibility.

That's an argument about inequality. If one is so efficient, contract with the grantors directly. Or go to a different university. If none of that can be done, there must be something missing.

The personal is not political.

[research_prof]

Dismalist: I see. You are probably one of these admins that believe they do a favor to faculty for hiring them and paying them a salary. I have seen admins like that at my university too. You clearly do not see that what brings in external funding is the research of faculty and has nothing to do with your institution. FYI: in case you have not written any grants recently, they typically are evaluated quite thoroughly nowadays and most of the times (if not always) the decisive factor is the faculty's research novelty, track record, and qualifications. To the best of my knowledge, no grant proposal reviewer ever said: "oh, this research is crap but let's fund this proposal because the administrators at this university are very good".

So, be grateful for the indirect cost you get because of someone else's bright ideas and hard work. The sooner you realize that, the fewer faculty you will lose to other institutions that understand that.

Having said that, you can reply to my message and say whatever you like,  but you will not receive any further responses from me. Thanks!

[Bbmaj7b5]

Besides, its really depressing to not try to do your job well..

Citation?

My point is that anecdotal evidence and everyday observation speak against this. Indeed, it might be more depressing to try to do your job well and then be defeated by external constraints and bad policies from above.

As I always say, my standard is to do my job well enough, which I suspect is a lower standard than well. Occasionally, I do a great job, but more by accident than by intention.

I would also argue that if you are one of the research-intensive faculty that brings indirect cost equal to their salary (or even more) every year to the university, then you basically work for free (the university saves your entire salary every year). Thus, the university should at the very least let you pick the modality you like for your courses. Otherwise, they can go hire an instructor with all the indirect cost that you have brought.

I'm at an R1 and bring in my salary in IDC, and if I made the argument you made my place would tell me to go pound sand. And rightly so, frankly. Those dollars are part of my job description, and help bring my standard teaching load to three classes a year (down from six with no research). If I made your argument, my place would not use my IDC contribution to hire an instructor. They would tell me to either teach the class or buy out, and they would use that buyout to hire an instructor. That's the way it is at most R1s. I hope you actually made your argument, and I hope somebody laughed.

Dismalist is absolutely correct. Why not just go off the tenure track, set up your own shop, and eat what you kill?

Bringing in money is part of my job. If it's not part of yours, then you need to make some changes.

[Caracal]

Besides, its really depressing to not try to do your job well..

Citation?

My point is that anecdotal evidence and everyday observation speak against this. Indeed, it might be more depressing to try to do your job well and then be defeated by external constraints and bad policies from above.

As I always say, my standard is to do my job well enough, which I suspect is a lower standard than well. Occasionally, I do a great job, but more by accident than by intention.

Ok...

Its my experience. I don't know if I do a great job. I'm not claiming I always do everything I can to make my teaching optimal, or something either. That way lies madness. However, I actually like teaching, which is why I do it. I don't get paid particularly well for it, so if I took the attitude you describe, the sensible thing to do would be to quit yesterday and go do something else.

Of course I don't know your circumstances. Maybe you are closer to retirement, or there are other circumstances that make walking away unfeasible. Even so, personally in that situation, I'd find it more rewarding to try teach well.

I'm really not sure we really disagree that much. I suspect that you don't really have good classes "by accident." Presumably, you try to come into class with some level of enthusiasm and you do enjoy teaching students about your subject. That's probably the most important thing. Preparation for teaching is mostly about doing just enough-you get diminishing returns pretty quickly after that. Modeling excitement and engagement is pretty essential, however. You won't always have a good class because you do, but it gives you a chance.

I can't really get there if I start off thinking "ok, let's just get through this in a minimally acceptable way." Sometimes I end up there 15 minutes before the end of a class that doesn't go well, and that's fine, but if I start that way, the students don't respond and we get in a feedback loop and I get increasingly grumpy. When a class isn't going great, I want to try to figure out ways to improve things. Can I always fix the problem? No, of course not, but it feels better to try instead of just sitting around and saying "what can I do, the system is screwed up!"

[Ruralguy]

ResearchProf,

By your reasoning all policy should be transactional, tailor made to the individual, but proportionate to the IDC they bring. Presumably, someone who brings in nothing, or anyway, the least of everybody, gets little say, essentially no vote. To me that makes little sense, though obviously there should be policies regarding t and p and how much money you bring in, if that's important to your dept. and school.

If you care about policy, get on the decision making bodies or committees that do that or at least communicate with individuals on those committees or in the Fac Senate or what have you.

But asking them to bend general policy because you bring in cash will make you seem arrogant and unaware of how policy making works.

[Caracal]

... if you are one of the research-intensive faculty that brings indirect cost equal to their salary (or even more) every year to the university, then you basically work for free (the university saves your entire salary every year).

This is illusory.

Suppose the researcher got the full grant monies. S/he would keep some to live on, maybe called a salary, and spend some on lab rental, equipment purchases, office space, RA's, and so on. Instead of the university signing the checks, the researcher would be signing. No difference to pulling in grants the university administers.

No one who is drawing a salary is working for free.

And you need the affiliation, both to get the grants, but also to hire postdocs, or have students working in your lab. There are presumably good reasons why nobody would give you grant money if you set up a lab in your garage. The people who give you grants want to scrutinize your research project, but they don't want to be involved in making sure you are following proper safety procedures, or not violating the rights of the people who work for you.

The school also gives you a whole infrastructure. I'm sure working through it is often annoying, but it means that while your grants pay salary and benefits (hopefully) for people in your lab, they don't have to pay for administering all that stuff.

[downer]

Besides, its really depressing to not try to do your job well..

Citation?

My point is that anecdotal evidence and everyday observation speak against this. Indeed, it might be more depressing to try to do your job well and then be defeated by external constraints and bad policies from above.

As I always say, my standard is to do my job well enough, which I suspect is a lower standard than well. Occasionally, I do a great job, but more by accident than by intention.

Ok...

Its my experience. I don't know if I do a great job. I'm not claiming I always do everything I can to make my teaching optimal, or something either. That way lies madness. However, I actually like teaching, which is why I do it. I don't get paid particularly well for it, so if I took the attitude you describe, the sensible thing to do would be to quit yesterday and go do something else.

Of course I don't know your circumstances. Maybe you are closer to retirement, or there are other circumstances that make walking away unfeasible. Even so, personally in that situation, I'd find it more rewarding to try teach well.

I'm really not sure we really disagree that much. I suspect that you don't really have good classes "by accident." Presumably, you try to come into class with some level of enthusiasm and you do enjoy teaching students about your subject. That's probably the most important thing. Preparation for teaching is mostly about doing just enough-you get diminishing returns pretty quickly after that. Modeling excitement and engagement is pretty essential, however. You won't always have a good class because you do, but it gives you a chance.

I can't really get there if I start off thinking "ok, let's just get through this in a minimally acceptable way." Sometimes I end up there 15 minutes before the end of a class that doesn't go well, and that's fine, but if I start that way, the students don't respond and we get in a feedback loop and I get increasingly grumpy. When a class isn't going great, I want to try to figure out ways to improve things. Can I always fix the problem? No, of course not, but it feels better to try instead of just sitting around and saying "what can I do, the system is screwed up!"

I agree there probably isn't a lot of difference in our approaches really. I am always working on improving my classes and I enjoy that. I enjoy most teaching. An obvious big difference is that I like teaching online, asynchronously, while you have said you don't like teaching online. One of the things I like about online teaching is that it is more dramatically clear that it is up to the students how well they do. My responsibility is to give them the opportunity to learn.

I've had many students over the years who don't particularly want to be there, and I don't particularly want to teach them. My main motivation is the material and students who engage with it. It can be good to work to raise the energy level in a class sometimes, which benefits everyone. But I'm not focused on pleasing everyone all of the time.

Our jobs seem to get more difficult for all sorts of reasons, with students who have myriad problems, interfering administrators, ridiculous college policies, and now of course, a pandemic. My energy is limited. So whatever eats into my time from those sources takes away from the energy I put into actually teaching. So long as I've done enough to meet basic standards, I'm not going to feel bad about not going above and beyond to solve problems. I have seen a lot of other faculty who seem to go to heroic efforts to go to bat for their students, with no student left behind. Kudos to them, but I'm not motivated to do that.

[hungry_ghost]

Well, the point of these things is if you have a reason to be particularly concerned about the possibility of contracting Covid even though you are vaccinated and your university has failed to let you teach classes online. I wouldn't think about judging people in that category. As someone not in my category, I think I have a professional obligation to do a good job and create an engaging class. Besides, its really depressing to not try to do your job well..

To be clear, I love teaching very much and I agree about having a professional (and, to me, ethical) obligation to to a good job. BUT, I was responding to this:

For the fall semester, I'll be teaching 300 students in person in a large lecture hall.  Based on state vaccination percentages, thirty to forty percent of the students likely won't be vaccinated.  No mask requirement. 

I'm not worried about getting sick.  I'm worried about bringing home an asymptomatic infection to my terminally ill spouse.

Not all institutions are giving faculty the same level and kinds of support and protection. Feeling I'm not doing my job well is depressing. Feeling scared that I might get an asymptomatic breakthrough infection and unwittingly infect someone I love and with whom remaining time is very limited would also be depressing. I am glad I do not have to make this choice.
Good luck, OP.

[dismalist]

You are probably one of these admins that believe they do a favor to faculty for hiring them and paying them a salary.

I have been called an imbecile before [by my wife], but never an administrator.