Georgia abolishes tenure.

[dismalist]

I am in two minds about tenure, so I haven't posted about it, on account it's complicated.

But if we get to judging instructors' quality by the results of teaching evaluations, on average we are judging the effectiveness of mental asyla by the opinions of the inmates.

[marshwiggle]

I am in two minds about tenure, so I haven't posted about it, on account it's complicated.

But if we get to judging instructors' quality by the results of teaching evaluations, on average we are judging the effectiveness of mental asyla by the opinions of the inmates.

If half of the inmates in an asylum identify the same staff member as the worst one in the place, I'd be inclined to look into it.

[dismalist]

I am in two minds about tenure, so I haven't posted about it, on account it's complicated.

But if we get to judging instructors' quality by the results of teaching evaluations, on average we are judging the effectiveness of mental asyla by the opinions of the inmates.

If half of the inmates in an asylum identify the same staff member as the worst one in the place, I'd be inclined to look into it.

Reminds me of an exchange in The Times [of London] ages ago. Someone had admonished the head of Broadmoor that half the patients didn't belong there. The head replied that he agreed, but that he didn't know which half. :-)

[Look into it, of course. But into the good one's, too.]

[marshwiggle]

I am in two minds about tenure, so I haven't posted about it, on account it's complicated.

But if we get to judging instructors' quality by the results of teaching evaluations, on average we are judging the effectiveness of mental asyla by the opinions of the inmates.

If half of the inmates in an asylum identify the same staff member as the worst one in the place, I'd be inclined to look into it.

Reminds me of an exchange in The Times [of London] ages ago. Someone had admonished the head of Broadmoor that half the patients didn't belong there. The head replied that he agreed, but that he didn't know which half. :-)

[Look into it, of course. But into the good one's, too.]

Sure.  Student evaluations would be terrible for ranking all instructors. But they'd probably be quite useful to identify the exceptionally good and bad ones.

[mahagonny]

Considering all the feminists we have around it might be surprising that student evaluations are still used.  I mean they have been claimed to be biased against women and I'm not aware of any rebuttal....(?)
Or maybe not. Somebody really likes them though.
Our state university liked to use them as a threat (trying to negotiate for always increasing minimum approval numbers from students) after they outed themselves as being quite grumpy about our unionizing, several years ago.

[mahagonny]

I am in two minds about tenure, so I haven't posted about it, on account it's complicated.

There's no word limit for posting here.

[dismalist]

I am in two minds about tenure, so I haven't posted about it, on account it's complicated.

There's no word limit for posting here.

Trade-offs wherever one looks. The constraint is not on the board, it's in my head! :-)

[mahagonny]

As Naomi Shaefer Riley, a republican who fell in love with and married a black man in order to be able to claim she's not a racist, wrote, it's a mystery why any adjunct faculty member would be in favor of tenure whereas they're never going to have it.

[mleok]

As Naomi Shaefer Riley, a republican who fell in love with and married a black man in order to be able to claim she's not a racist, wrote, it's a mystery why any adjunct faculty member would be in favor of tenure whereas they're never going to have it.

It's no different from poor republicans being against high taxes on the rich, because they hope to become that someday. Aren't the majority of adjuncts who adjunct exclusively for their income doing it in the hopes of eventually getting a tenure track position?

[mahagonny]

As Naomi Shaefer Riley, a republican who fell in love with and married a black man in order to be able to claim she's not a racist, wrote, it's a mystery why any adjunct faculty member would be in favor of tenure whereas they're never going to have it.

It's no different from poor republicans being against high taxes on the rich, because they hope to become that someday. Aren't the majority of adjuncts who adjunct exclusively for their income doing it in the hopes of eventually getting a tenure track position?

I don't think so. If so, more than likely they are mistaken.

[histchick]

The BOR isn't abolishing tenure, though it's definitely a slippery slope.  Added to the mix is the tension over adding "student success" as a component to faculty evaluations, where previously they were evaluated on teaching, research/scholarship, and service. 

If we're honest, without having to fall back to the "evil administration" trope, we know there's something legitimate that is part of what's being called "student success".

Apologies for getting back to this discussion a week later, but I should clarify that the "student success" component is actually written as involvement in "student success activities."  Not sure how the individual institutions will interpret this, but ours will likely look more at advising and other areas in that vein.  This will also open a discussion about our NTT full-time faculty and their responsibilities (which are inconsistent even among the various schools within my university).  I'm actually looking forward to these conversations as we move forward. 

[Durchlässigkeitsbeiwert]

A fresh CHE article talks about an issue previously mentioned in this thread:
"... only 12 percent of all medical-school faculty members have tenure (an additional 13 percent are on the tenure-track)."

Some medical schools, particularly where you have to pay most of your salary with grants, already have no tenure, you just get renewable contracts.

[bio-nonymous]

A fresh CHE article talks about an issue previously mentioned in this thread:
"... only 12 percent of all medical-school faculty members have tenure (an additional 13 percent are on the tenure-track)."

Some medical schools, particularly where you have to pay most of your salary with grants, already have no tenure, you just get renewable contracts.

Thanks for posting that! In my original post I was referring to some universities who don't have med school tenure at all. At many schools basic science researchers who must bring in grants to pay themselves (essentially mostly soft money salary) are naturally at risk always, but physician/educators are also in the same boat. I am not advocating for this, but this is a great extension of the corporate model of education--this eliminates the possibility of deadwood professors, since if you don't have tenure, and stop bringing in grants, they can simply not renew your contract. Great economics for the administration, but pretty bad for academic freedom, as the article in CHE expounds on.

[mleok]

A fresh CHE article talks about an issue previously mentioned in this thread:
"... only 12 percent of all medical-school faculty members have tenure (an additional 13 percent are on the tenure-track)."

Some medical schools, particularly where you have to pay most of your salary with grants, already have no tenure, you just get renewable contracts.

Thanks for posting that! In my original post I was referring to some universities who don't have med school tenure at all. At many schools basic science researchers who must bring in grants to pay themselves (essentially mostly soft money salary) are naturally at risk always, but physician/educators are also in the same boat. I am not advocating for this, but this is a great extension of the corporate model of education--this eliminates the possibility of deadwood professors, since if you don't have tenure, and stop bringing in grants, they can simply not renew your contract. Great economics for the administration, but pretty bad for academic freedom, as the article in CHE expounds on.

Even in medical schools with "tenure," in many cases, all it guarantees is your institutional affiliation, and only covers a small fraction of the salary.

[marshwiggle]

Even in medical schools with "tenure," in many cases, all it guarantees is your institutional affiliation, and only covers a small fraction of the salary.

This is what I'm not clear on. In professional schools, where faculty are practising their professions, how much of their income is professional fees and how much is faculty salary? I would imagine in many (most?) cases, the professional fees would be the larger of the two.