Tenure

Date: Mar 26, 2004

Tenure

Date: Mar 26, 2004

Do you work in academia? I suppose not, considering how little you know about the "job" professors do.

Teaching during the day(and often at night), preparing lecture, counseling students, performing research, reading to stay current on research--that takes more than a couple hours a day.

I can assure you that being a professor is an profession that demands more than 40 hours a week.

Date: Mar 26, 2004

That comment shows how little you know about universities and about the current situation. There are no lazy professors in this scenario. Most put in far more than 8 hours a day. There is in fact incredible pressure to be productive from within the academic community.

Remember also that tenure is something that is earned. Those professors did not get tenure by just getting by.

Furthermore, tenure in no way grants the right to be idle. Professors can and should be fired for falling down on the job with or without tenure. What it is supposed to offer is the right to due process should a person's job performance be questioned. It is supposed to protect academic freedom, not by making it impossible to fire tenured professors, but by ensuring a system of checks and balances so that people will not be fired over matters of petty and/or personal revenge.

Date: Mar 26, 2004

As an earlier respondent said, professors typically work far more hours than people who have 8-5 jobs. They work at night, they work on weekends, and their work is judged not simply by their local supervisors (including administrators and students) but by a national and international community of peers. I doubt that Columbus Eagle puts in as many hours at his job or is held to such strict standards. I often spend an entire hour marking and grading a single, relatively brief paper by a student who never learned to write correctly (partly because our society is full of people, like Columbus Eagle, who don't seem to truly value academic excellence). These kinds of papers (and these kinds of students) are unfortunately far more common than not. Yet most professors are willing to spend the time trying to help their students overcome such problems, because most professors never went in to teaching for the money or a predictable 8-5 schedule. They went into teaching because of a love of learning and because of a desire to make a positive difference in others' lives.

Date: Mar 26, 2004

Well said!! I put in a 12 hour day yesterday...there aren't too many faculty in my college who work only a 40 hour week

quote:
Originally posted by: Response to Columbus Eagle
"As an earlier respondent said, professors typically work far more hours than people who have 8-5 jobs. They work at night, they work on weekends, and their work is judged not simply by their local supervisors (including administrators and students) but by a national and international community of peers. I doubt that Columbus Eagle puts in as many hours at his job or is held to such strict standards. I often spend an entire hour marking and grading a single, relatively brief paper by a student who never learned to write correctly (partly because our society is full of people, like Columbus Eagle, who don't seem to truly value academic excellence). These kinds of papers (and these kinds of students) are unfortunately far more common than not. Yet most professors are willing to spend the time trying to help their students overcome such problems, because most professors never went in to teaching for the money or a predictable 8-5 schedule. They went into teaching because of a love of learning and because of a desire to make a positive difference in others' lives."