Faculty Pushing Back on Mandatory On-Campus Rules

[apl68]

I'm probably missing an older thread where this would have been a good fit....

Northwest Arkansas Community College has been requiring full-time faculty to spend at least 32 hours a week on campus, and they're not happy about it:

New on-campus attendance rule rankles Northwest Arkansas Community College faculty
by Dave Perozek | Today at 4:18 a.m.


BENTONVILLE -- Some full-time faculty members are unhappy about a new rule implemented this semester at Northwest Arkansas Community College that requires them to spend at least 32 hours per week working on campus, diminishing the flexibility they say is essential to their jobs.

Numerous faculty members complained about the rule in an anonymous survey done by the faculty senate earlier this month. Some also criticized the way the rule was imposed without faculty input. The Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette obtained the survey results through a Freedom of Information Act request.

The survey asked faculty members to rate their morale on a scale of 1-10. A total of 142 faculty members -- 102 full time and 40 part time -- responded with an average morale rating of 5.3. The full-time faculty members rated their morale at an average of 4.9.

The survey also invited faculty members to provide comments on the ratings.

Those comments varied, but 40 full-time faculty members referenced the 32-hour rule in their comments, with 37 of those expressing a negative opinion.

One person -- echoing the sentiments of several others -- wrote the hours requirement "completely disregards the amount of time I spend on nights and weekends working for the college, it's a slap in the face. I spend well over forty hours a week working for the college, not all of those hours are on campus, and now these new rules make me feel like my hard work and dedication are not appreciated at all."

Another said there's no reason for them to be in their office 32 hours a week, because most of their classes are online with students who ask the faculty member to meet with them online on evenings or weekends.

"I have been in my office every week since this has been mandated, and I have seen one student two times," the full-time faculty member wrote.

About 30% of the college's courses are being taught fully online this fall semester, according to Grant Hodges, director of communications, government relations and marketing.

More at https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2022/oct/24/new-on-campus-attendance-rule-rankles-northwest/

[Mobius]

It's one of those measures they think will help with retention (e.g. - "If only professors could be seen anytime during the week when they need help, we'd be able to keep them paying tuition.") I could have 30 office hours per week and I'd still see the same amount of students I do now.

[Parasaurolophus]

I could have 30 office hours per week and I'd still see the same amount of students I do now.

I'm required to have 1.5 office hours per section per week. So... this semester, that's 7.5 office hours every week. I have seen zero students so far.


Since I can have these hours online, it's not a big deal. But if I had to commute in for it... man, that would tank my morale, too. And I'd still have to spend an additional 9.5 hours a week on campus, after all was said and done. Ugh.

[FishProf]

My second to last year as Chair, the Provost decided to require Chairs to be on campus one day each week, every week.  At least one of each of these things happened:
1) The Chairs didn't comply b/c they were away during part of the summer.  Permission was occasionally sought.
2) Some Chairs did their assigned work ONLY on that day, and productivity plummeted.
3) Some Chairs scheduled in-person meetings with the Provost each week, thereby forcing the Provost to be on campus, as she was not wont to do. (Any rumors that they coordinated things so they met on different days to maximize the pain are unverified)
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.

This was the 1st Summer of COVID.  No one was around anyway.

A Moral (?): What some people will willingly do voluntarily, they will absolutely refuse to do when required.

[kaysixteen]

Am I the only one who noticed that this particular Arkansan cc is located in Walmartville, USA?

[Caracal]

It's just classic bad management. If there's a problem with some faculty members not being available to students, that needs to be addressed on a case by case basis. Imposing requirements that aren't really relevant to the actual job that people are doing is just going to irritate everyone and accomplish nothing.

[AmLitHist]

Our contract talks open in Spring; I'm just waiting for The Nimrods In Charge to try to push this BS here.  Right now, all FT faculty have to do 10 hours per week on campus, plus one additional hour for every OL section; English have a lower load (4/4, rather than 5/5), so we have to do 13 hours.  Thank goodness my dean screwed up on my ADA accommodation and agreed I'd only have to do 6 on-campus hours during my 2 day/week on campus schedule.

I love your colleagues, FishProf!  What I always find so insulting about stuff like this is that Admin forgets they're dealing with people way more educated and just plain brighter than they are, plus, we have years of seeing students play the system.  I (and many of my colleagues) know our union contract inside and out, and if they want to put ridiculous crap in writing, that's just a signal for us to put our heads together and figure out how to use "the letter of the law" to get around it.

[Ruralguy]

Although I think overly restrictive rules like this one are unproductive, I don't mind, say holding to rules we have about office hours (and, yes, I realize that office hours needn't really be in an official "office", but a certain amount really should be on campus, especially if its a residential campus). I actually have a more lax view about meetings these days: Almost all of them can be electronic, and thus people can catch it from 100 miles a way, on the way to their kid's soccer practice, etc.   

[FishProf]

Although I think overly restrictive rules like this one are unproductive, I don't mind, say holding to rules we have about office hours (and, yes, I realize that office hours needn't really be in an official "office", but a certain amount really should be on campus, especially if its a residential campus). I actually have a more lax view about meetings these days: Almost all of them can be electronic, and thus people can catch it from 100 miles a way, on the way to their kid's soccer practice, etc.

It's the heavy-handed, one-size-fits-all approach to fixing a few, perceived bad actors that rankles.

[apl68]

Am I the only one who noticed that this particular Arkansan cc is located in Walmartville, USA?

Not sure about the relevance of this observation to the thread, but yes.  I actually passed through Bentonville only a couple of weeks ago (They have a wonderful taco place that's great for lunches).    Bentonville is a small town that has been turned into a boomtown by the presence of Wal-Mart's headquarters.  Every time I go there, it's like a whole section of town has been turned upside down by the latest development project.  Roads you drove down to get somewhere last time are suddenly no longer passable due to a massive construction site that has appeared. 

It has a pleasant downtown area, and various amenities like museums and bicycle trails.  But I can't imagine living in a place that's in such a constant state of upheaval.  The population mostly gives the impression of being transitory.  I actually felt self-conscious about my Arkansas accent, even though I was technically still in the state!  And the cost of living there is rapidly getting out of reach for ordinary people.  It's like a miniature San Francisco or NYC--there's so much money sluicing through the place that everything has gotten hopelessly distorted.

[secundem_artem]

Artem Uni has not done anything quite this stupid, but apparently some idiots in the past abused the policy that a moderate purchase of alcohol was acceptable when entertaining faculty candidates or other guests.  A couple too many bottles of Chateau Thames Embankment were purchased and now, it's just easier to open a separate ticket and buy alcohol out of my own pocket rather than dealing with accounting the next day.  If I want a bottle of decent wine, I'm gonna order one.  Life is too short to buy the $7 Chilean House Wine on offer

[FishProf]

I had one of my faculty denied museum grade ethanol for preserving specimens on a field research trip because we were "a dry campus".

Oddly, when he bought Vodka in the field, they paid, as the receipt said "beverages".  I didn't say anything, because the ETOH would've come out of the department budget, but meal reimbursement was a different fund.

[Mobius]

Even prior to Covid, we have had faculty who taught online and lived outside the state/country. I don't think this particular CC has that issue. My institution does have an issue with campus presence. I'd guess I'm above the mean, but I don't think I'm on campus a lot.

[Hibush]

I'm probably missing an older thread where this would have been a good fit....

Northwest Arkansas Community College has been requiring full-time faculty to spend at least 32 hours a week on campus, and they're not happy about it:

This has more than a whiff of the new push toward monitoring worker productivity (and which is diametrically opposed to worker flexibility and autonomy.)
The NYTimes recently ran a piece with the teaser "Now digital productivity monitoring is also spreading among white-collar jobs and roles that require graduate degrees"

Walmart has been a leader in using such monitoring to make sure they don't pay anyone for a wasted breath. Some of the (management-perceived) benefits of such monitoring must be driving the thinking of administration at the local CC.

My environment is quite different, in that talking shop with other faculty on a regular basis and overseeing research labs that run >40h per week is essential to productivity. So faculty need to be around a lot. But the resulting sense of community has been hard to reestablish as people do more work tasks remotely. The weaker engagement with each other is hurting us. What is the value of the corresponding sense of community among the faculty at a community college that might be achieve if faculty were around most of the time?

[ciao_yall]

Although I think overly restrictive rules like this one are unproductive, I don't mind, say holding to rules we have about office hours (and, yes, I realize that office hours needn't really be in an official "office", but a certain amount really should be on campus, especially if its a residential campus). I actually have a more lax view about meetings these days: Almost all of them can be electronic, and thus people can catch it from 100 miles a way, on the way to their kid's soccer practice, etc.

It's the heavy-handed, one-size-fits-all approach to fixing a few, perceived bad actors that rankles.

Exactly. Why not just address the profs who set up robo-classes with 100% of grading based on automatic quizzes and never respond to student emails? Oh, because then you have to argue with that prof who claims they are being unfairly targeted.