Faculty Pushing Back on Mandatory On-Campus Rules

[clean]

I'm reporting Clean to the Title IX gods  for that joke!

As I was a teen when my grandfather told me that, I m sure that the joke is 'Grandfathered' for at least 2 reasons!! 

And it is agricultural, unless you have some other understanding of how things grow in the shade! 

(But it did bring a happy memory of my grandfather, who rarely told jokes!!) 

[mahagonny]

We want to know what your "different moral" from the story above is. Do share, Mahagonny.

I have been asked to post a trollish view. If anyone doesn't like it, take it up with rural guy.

Moral: Some tenured people will intentionally damage a department to show you how important it is to get along with those faculty who are eminently dedicated to the health of the department long term.

2) Some Chairs did their assigned work ONLY on that day, and productivity plummeted.

4) Some Chairs resigned.  When the fall rolled around, several re-upped.  At full Chair pay (a quirk of the budgeting system).  Several others did not, and NO Chair work was completed for those departments.

I bet'cha mahagonny knows about this.  Hey mahag, how hairy are you?  ;)

Not hairy, but harried.

Would those with  Dolly Parton-like physiques  be more likely to be conservative or liberals? 

Depends. Did the physique come into existence naturally?

[Wahoo Redux]

I bet'cha mahagonny knows about this.  Hey mahag, how hairy are you?  ;)

Not hairy, but harried.

Would those with  Dolly Parton-like physiques  be more likely to be conservative or liberals? 

Depends. Did the physique come into existence naturally?

Good answer.

Good question.

I'd say the 'I-can't-believe-I'm-40-and-things-are-sagging' physique adjustments occur in Republican households in the south and southwest, and the 'I-live-in-L.A.-and-must-be-beautiful' physique adjustments are more popular in liberal households on the west coast.  Everywhere else just lets it all slide.

[mahagonny]

I bet'cha mahagonny knows about this.  Hey mahag, how hairy are you?  ;)

Not hairy, but harried.

Would those with  Dolly Parton-like physiques  be more likely to be conservative or liberals? 

Depends. Did the physique come into existence naturally?

Good answer.

Good question.

I'd say the 'I-can't-believe-I'm-40-and-things-are-sagging' physique adjustments occur in Republican households in the south and southwest, and the 'I-live-in-L.A.-and-must-be-beautiful' physique adjustments are more popular in liberal households on the west coast.  Everywhere else just lets it all slide.

Not to mention, these days a person could be a transgender female, with, I suppose, girly parts picked from a catalog.

Re: Ruralguy's request.
I guess what I posted was not quite a moral. More like an observation containing what I consider to be irony from the adjunct perspective.

As far this policy helping the students, it seems to me that, if it mattered that much to have the profs on campus most all the time, this could been tried before all the online courses began. But the ship has sailed. Looks like they are trying for retention improvement. I expect to see more schemes as the situation of falling birth rate takes effect.

[marshwiggle]

I bet'cha mahagonny knows about this.  Hey mahag, how hairy are you?  ;)

Not hairy, but harried.

Would those with  Dolly Parton-like physiques  be more likely to be conservative or liberals? 

Depends. Did the physique come into existence naturally?

Good answer.

Good question.

I'd say the 'I-can't-believe-I'm-40-and-things-are-sagging' physique adjustments occur in Republican households in the south and southwest, and the 'I-live-in-L.A.-and-must-be-beautiful' physique adjustments are more popular in liberal households on the west coast.  Everywhere else just lets it all slide.

Or sag?

[marshwiggle]

One problem, Resaecrh_prof, is that different schools and departments define "stuff" in very different ways. A school like mine really needs to have faculty present much of the time (no, not 9-5 , 5 days a week at a particular desk, but available). Committees are another issue, and I agree, much of that can be Zoomed, and is more efficient that way anyhow. I think the problems arise when students at an R1 (and their parents) want faculty to be available. Yet these faculty are mostly hired for other reasons, so those faculty work on the things that will get them tenure. Being at a desk so that students may or may not make use of them does not seem like a good use of time when they are primarily judged on scholarship. Of course, that source of conflict could arise at any sort of school.

I'll step in here, since Dismalist hasn't, but I hope I can do justice to the idea.

The simple solution is to pay a certain premium for in-person activities. So classes taught in-person get a 10% (or whatever) premium; same for meetings, etc. Faculty who want to work remotely can do so, but those who do it in-person get rewarded. If the premium is granular, then it is most useful. Profs could have some remote "office hours" in a week, and some "in-person". Some lectures could be remote, and some in-person.

The point is, use the carrot, rather than the stick, to encourage in-person activities. Among other things, this encourages people to figure out what the actual value is to a specific activity in-person. For office hours, it's probably higher than for meetings, (especially for those meetings which basically involve a lot of one-way presentations).

[research_prof]

One problem, Resaecrh_prof, is that different schools and departments define "stuff" in very different ways. A school like mine really needs to have faculty present much of the time (no, not 9-5 , 5 days a week at a particular desk, but available). Committees are another issue, and I agree, much of that can be Zoomed, and is more efficient that way anyhow. I think the problems arise when students at an R1 (and their parents) want faculty to be available. Yet these faculty are mostly hired for other reasons, so those faculty work on the things that will get them tenure. Being at a desk so that students may or may not make use of them does not seem like a good use of time when they are primarily judged on scholarship. Of course, that source of conflict could arise at any sort of school.

I'll step in here, since Dismalist hasn't, but I hope I can do justice to the idea.

The simple solution is to pay a certain premium for in-person activities. So classes taught in-person get a 10% (or whatever) premium; same for meetings, etc. Faculty who want to work remotely can do so, but those who do it in-person get rewarded. If the premium is granular, then it is most useful. Profs could have some remote "office hours" in a week, and some "in-person". Some lectures could be remote, and some in-person.

The point is, use the carrot, rather than the stick, to encourage in-person activities. Among other things, this encourages people to figure out what the actual value is to a specific activity in-person. For office hours, it's probably higher than for meetings, (especially for those meetings which basically involve a lot of one-way presentations).

I agree with the carrot rather than the stick approach, however, I feel even this approach will make academia weaker overall. Competent faculty will simply leave and go to industry, which allows them to work from anywhere they like and they get paid 2-3x more than their salaries in academia (yes, I know this is field specific--this is especially true though for technology-related fields). Personally, if my institution would tell me "you need to be physically here X days per week", I would probably quit and go to industry, especially now that I can see through my consulting gigs how much others are willing to pay for my skills.

In other words, competent faculty are likely to leave. Incompetent faculty will probably hang around forever. I will repeat what I have been saying for quite a while now: universities are employers as all other employers. If they want to retain talent, they need to be able to compete with other employers. At the end of the day, academia is just another job.

[bio-nonymous]

[/quote]

I agree with the carrot rather than the stick approach, however, I feel even this approach will make academia weaker overall. Competent faculty will simply leave and go to industry, which allows them to work from anywhere they like and they get paid 2-3x more than their salaries in academia (yes, I know this is field specific--this is especially true though for technology-related fields). Personally, if my institution would tell me "you need to be physically here X days per week", I would probably quit and go to industry, especially now that I can see through my consulting gigs how much others are willing to pay for my skills.

In other words, competent faculty are likely to leave. Incompetent faculty will probably hang around forever. I will repeat what I have been saying for quite a while now: universities are employers as all other employers. If they want to retain talent, they need to be able to compete with other employers. At the end of the day, academia is just another job.
[/quote]

This ---> "At the end of the day, academia is just another job." :

That is, as I see it, essentially one of the main problems with academic employment (in my perspective looking at medicine/bioscience). In many cases we are expected to sacrifice our families, "work/life balance" (whatever that is), our physical and mental health, and finances because: "This is your passion! You are doing what you love! Stop complaining AND BE GLAD YOU CAN PURSUE YOUR PASSION!!!". This I find to be a bit ridiculous, yet a pervasive outlook.

There is a crisis brewing for the future because young (career-wise not age) scientists in many cases do not want to get involved in the postdoc trap anymore and would prefer to go directly to industry after their PhD. Professor jobs are hard to come by, and for many reasons are not attractive (longer hours, crazy pressure to publish and get grants, lower salaries, etc.) when compared to working for a company. While academic employment can be very rewarding (after all there are reasons why we are all doing it!), in reality, "At the end of the day, academia is just another job."--You can always quit if you are unhappy and do something else if you have the skills to do so...

[Ruralguy]

It boils down to seeing if there really is a problem, and then trying to solve that particular problem. Blanket policies, especially if implemented without representation or even consultation, are not usually effective and meet with a great deal of resistance. First, you would want to establish how much, on average, students really need to consult, in person, with a particular faculty member and how much faculty really need to be around to meet with other faculty. Also, you need to take into account differences is pedagogy and fields in general, because something like chemistry probably just requires more of a physical presence, at least for certain tasks, then some other fields. See if current office hour policies, at least on the surface, seem to be meeting those goals. Without too much intrusion, try to see if significant number of faculty are neglecting office hours. If this small amount of research indicates that there is a problem worth solving, then propose some sort of policy (which could include financial incentives or course equivalencies/releases).

Ultimately, of course Research_prof is correct. If people find that the policies are too restrictive and that they'd find conditions to be better elsewhere, they'd go elsewhere. I have observed at my school that people are even more likely to do this in *non-tech* fields. If I had to guess why, I think they probably thought they could do their job very remotely, do a lot of scholarship on the side, and just show up to teach and do minimal office hours. A higher percentage of the tech./sci people were probably used to being on site more anyway, but I have the feeling that will also reduce with time as more tasks get automated, and students want to consult more over email, text, Zoom, etc.. That's probably too simplistic, in that there may be many factors, some related to location and institution's "unique" (quirky?) mission, that might drive away people (though we aren't bleeding out faculty--just 1 TT person per year, usually of less than 100).

[research_prof]

I agree with the carrot rather than the stick approach, however, I feel even this approach will make academia weaker overall. Competent faculty will simply leave and go to industry, which allows them to work from anywhere they like and they get paid 2-3x more than their salaries in academia (yes, I know this is field specific--this is especially true though for technology-related fields). Personally, if my institution would tell me "you need to be physically here X days per week", I would probably quit and go to industry, especially now that I can see through my consulting gigs how much others are willing to pay for my skills.

In other words, competent faculty are likely to leave. Incompetent faculty will probably hang around forever. I will repeat what I have been saying for quite a while now: universities are employers as all other employers. If they want to retain talent, they need to be able to compete with other employers. At the end of the day, academia is just another job.

This ---> "At the end of the day, academia is just another job." :

That is, as I see it, essentially one of the main problems with academic employment (in my perspective looking at medicine/bioscience). In many cases we are expected to sacrifice our families, "work/life balance" (whatever that is), our physical and mental health, and finances because: "This is your passion! You are doing what you love! Stop complaining AND BE GLAD YOU CAN PURSUE YOUR PASSION!!!". This I find to be a bit ridiculous, yet a pervasive outlook.

There is a crisis brewing for the future because young (career-wise not age) scientists in many cases do not want to get involved in the postdoc trap anymore and would prefer to go directly to industry after their PhD. Professor jobs are hard to come by, and for many reasons are not attractive (longer hours, crazy pressure to publish and get grants, lower salaries, etc.) when compared to working for a company. While academic employment can be very rewarding (after all there are reasons why we are all doing it!), in reality, "At the end of the day, academia is just another job."--You can always quit if you are unhappy and do something else if you have the skills to do so...

@Bio-nonymous, I agree there are folks who cannot imagine themselves doing a different job. However, there are several folks (including myself) that can very well imagine themselves doing other jobs not related to academia. For example, having a 9-5 job that pays $200-300K per year with the prospects of moving up to $400-500K per year after a few years can definitely become my new passion and I am sure I will forget my academic passion relatively quickly.

[waterboy]

For those who keep stating something like "we can always quit and go to industry...", that might work well in some fields, but it's not a solution for everyone. Not by a long shot, I would imagine.

[dismalist]

One problem, Resaecrh_prof, is that different schools and departments define "stuff" in very different ways. A school like mine really needs to have faculty present much of the time (no, not 9-5 , 5 days a week at a particular desk, but available). Committees are another issue, and I agree, much of that can be Zoomed, and is more efficient that way anyhow. I think the problems arise when students at an R1 (and their parents) want faculty to be available. Yet these faculty are mostly hired for other reasons, so those faculty work on the things that will get them tenure. Being at a desk so that students may or may not make use of them does not seem like a good use of time when they are primarily judged on scholarship. Of course, that source of conflict could arise at any sort of school.

I'll step in here, since Dismalist hasn't, but I hope I can do justice to the idea.

The simple solution is to pay a certain premium for in-person activities. So classes taught in-person get a 10% (or whatever) premium; same for meetings, etc. Faculty who want to work remotely can do so, but those who do it in-person get rewarded. If the premium is granular, then it is most useful. Profs could have some remote "office hours" in a week, and some "in-person". Some lectures could be remote, and some in-person.

The point is, use the carrot, rather than the stick, to encourage in-person activities. Among other things, this encourages people to figure out what the actual value is to a specific activity in-person. For office hours, it's probably higher than for meetings, (especially for those meetings which basically involve a lot of one-way presentations).

Ruralguy has the incentives right, and Marsh has a way of dealing with the problem.

What is the problem? We had a Covid shock which led to a learning-new-technology shock, so we don't have to show up at work anymore, we think! Before the shock, everything was regulated by tradition or well understood written rules. After the shock, we need new rules. What we get is the usual jousting for advantage among the workforce, trying to negotiate or force changes in their own favor.

[Reminds me of a strike for higher wages called by one union in a British tire producing firm [pre-Thatcher] in response to a technological innovation: Management was renumbering the offices!]

How about Marsh's solution, unbundling the professor's job and paying each component separately, with a bump up in pay for on-site teaching? Where's the money gonna come from? One answer is from the on-line instructors. They're getting the cushier job, so their pay can be cut to give the cash to the on-siters. There'd be rioting in the hallways! Tenured faculty bearing arms!

It's not easy to deal with such unrest.

I have no way of predicting the new "equilibrium". It will be reached by a combination of voice [bitching and moaning], managerial ukase and exit [quitting for greener pastures]. My own feeling, and it's just a feeling, is that there's a tad too much bluster here. Working in academia is pretty cushy. Most exit threats are not credible.

[marshwiggle]

Also, you need to take into account differences is pedagogy and fields in general, because something like chemistry probably just requires more of a physical presence, at least for certain tasks, then some other fields.

Somewhat tangential, but I've thought for years (i.e. long before COVID) about having courses with an in-person lab component delivered remotely, but with a "residential" requirement that would cram all of the labs into a couple of days. This would allow people who lived far away to do the course and only need to come to campus for a few days. Not good for international students, but workable for people who live up to a few hours' drive away from campus.

I forsee more ideas like this in the future.

[FishProf]

Somewhat tangential, but I've thought for years (i.e. long before COVID) about having courses with an in-person lab component delivered remotely, but with a "residential" requirement that would cram all of the labs into a couple of days.

I've done this before for a field course taught at night in the Spring semester.  Can't be in the field 6-9pm in February.

So, we did some online simulations, and the last 4 Saturdays (2 in April, 2 in May) were all day in-the-field labs.  It worked.  But it also kinda sucked.

[marshwiggle]

Somewhat tangential, but I've thought for years (i.e. long before COVID) about having courses with an in-person lab component delivered remotely, but with a "residential" requirement that would cram all of the labs into a couple of days.

I've done this before for a field course taught at night in the Spring semester.  Can't be in the field 6-9pm in February.

So, we did some online simulations, and the last 4 Saturdays (2 in April, 2 in May) were all day in-the-field labs.  It worked.  But it also kinda sucked.

Its effectiveness would definitely differ by subject. But in some cases, the longer continuous time period would allow for something more like a project than isolated labs, and could be good for some things. (Obviously, in a case where students need to write reports after each lab, it's not a good fit, but on the other hand, where tasks are intended to follow a sequence, doing them without breaks in-between could be a bonus.)