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Fire Shelby Thames -> Fire Shelby Thames -> Fire Shelby Thames -> S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing faculty
Post Info TOPIC: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing faculty
Fire Shelby


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S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing faculty
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USM faculty has now set a dangerous precedent


Since the hearings at USM involving President Thames and certain faculty members, the winners and losers have become apparent. The winners are the majority of the USM faculty who have gotten what they wanted since Day 1. Consequently, USM students will be the losers.


After all that has transpired, nobody would give President Thames a contract extension. So what will USM have in about two more years? It will have its third president in less than a decade. The message sent out then will be that the faculty is responsible to no one. They can do what they want, when they want; they alone know what is best for USM.


These are the same people who have used students as pawns in their personal politics. These are the same people who cry foul to the local media. Some do not research; some do not write; some do not keep current with trends in academia. Some are still learning how to use a mouse. Yet they know what is best for USM?


Many of these faculty members make $70,000 to $80,000 per year - a few make much more - to teach three, two or just one class per semester. A few do not teach at all, but they still receive a professorial salary. Curiously, they have the audacity to complain about low salaries and the most trivial of working conditions.


Veiled threats to the university newspaper, a possible padding of student enrollment, removal of authority to make hiring and promotion decisions and the monolithic retirement of faculty - these are earsplitting criticisms.


But the enrollment problem was corrected; the promotion decisions help keep best buddies from being hired instead of better qualified people; the faculty who are retiring are eligible to do so, so why would they not? And how many Thames supporters have sent to the university paper articles that have gone unpublished?


One would think that such highly educated people would behave more responsibly and professionally. The continuing consequences of this crybaby mentality will be that the students - and quite possibly their degrees - will be devalued. That, too, is a dangerous precedent.


PATRICK FAGAN
USM doctoral student
Hattiesburg
******************


Here is a link to his letter to the Hattiesburg American, dated March 18:


http://www.hattiesburgamerican.com/news/stories/20040318/opinion/103603.html


************


FS say, "I can't wait to see the responses to this one."


In which department is this guy?



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Fire Shelby


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It appears he is in political science.



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elliott

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No, I believe this is the guy from CISE.

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Fire Shelby


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quote:
Originally posted by: elliott
"No, I believe this is the guy from CISE."
Thanks for the clarification.

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foot soldier

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FACULTY! Today is your last chance. Explain to your classes what you do so there will be less idiots like our friend Patrick here. For example, my students are always astounded to learn (yes, astounded!) that when I publish in the scholarly journal . . . . I DO NOT GET PAID.

So tell them how many hours you spend researching. Tell them how many hours it take to prepare before you ever walk into the classroom. Tell them how much of your salary you spend on supplies, research materials, travel (since we are so underfunded). Tell them how long it takes from initial idea to published material.

And if you are a political science professor, PLEASE take Patrick out to lunch and give him an earful.

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Flash Gordon

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RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing facul
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Patrick IS out to lunch.

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Fire Shelby


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quote:
Originally posted by: Flash Gordon
"Patrick IS out to lunch."
zzzziing! 

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flyonthewall

Date:
RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing faculty
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try 30,000 to 40,000

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present professor

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RE: RE: RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing facul
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quote:
Originally posted by:
"zzzziing!  "

Yep -- if I were on Patrick's doctoral committee I sure would be concerned if he were talking about me like that.  


If he isn't I'd sure want to find out from him who those other profs are so I can figure out how they manage to pull off what I can't . . . .


Wonder if those who do not research and do not write MIGHT be teaching 6 classes a semester? What a concept.


 



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educator

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RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing faculty
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Is he in PS or CISE, anyone know for sure?



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bluegrass professor

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RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing facul
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I just received an interesting AAUP report on faculty salaries in the region. Among Category I institutions (based on granting doctoral degrees and the diversity of doctoral programs), we are the lowest paid faculty in the state, and in the region. Mississippi is in terrible shape. The average salary for full professors for 2003-2004 academic year at USM is 71,000. For Associate Professors it is 54,300. Assistant professor salaries average 47,400. Compare this to the region. Full professors make 85,600; Associate 62,700; Assistant 52,400.

All this is eveidently available in the latest issue of Academe published by AAUP.

Incidently, this same report shows University of Kentucky, where Angie Dvorak was never tenured have the following salaries: full 89,100; associate 62,300; assistant 55,900. Personally, I think I had better head home to Kentucky!

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Angeline

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RE: RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing faculty
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quote:
Originally posted by: educator
"Is he in PS or CISE, anyone know for sure?"
Patrick is a Criminal Justice graduate student, or at least he was when he took my class in another department.  Better watch out all you faculty slackers: Patrick is coming to get you once armed with that CJ degree!

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truth4usm/AH

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I know, I know...DON'T FEED THE TROLLS!  Sorry, FS.

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Fire Shelby


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quote:
Originally posted by: truth4usm/AH
"I know, I know...DON'T FEED THE TROLLS!  Sorry, FS."
I was going to let it go for awhile--but his last comment to you crossed the line, so I just mopped it all up.  It wasn't you or USM Symp. 

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truth4usm/AH

Date:
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quote:
Originally posted by:
"I was going to let it go for awhile--but his last comment to you crossed the line, so I just mopped it all up.  It wasn't you or USM Symp.  "
Thank goodness I missed that one!  Buh-bye, troll!

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Adam Sencenbaugh

Date:
RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing facul
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quote:
Originally posted by:
"
And how many Thames supporters have sent to the university paper articles that have gone unpublished?
"


Absolutley ZERO...When I was opinions editor ('02-'03), we ran EVERYTHING that was submitted that was pro-Thames. Needless to say, the quality was lower becuase the submissions were virtually nonexistent. Yet we REFUSED to practice content discrimination, even if we did have to dip our quality standards a bit to pick up some of the luminaries that support Shelby.

Newsflash: The reason you don't see an outpouring of pro-Thames letters in ANY newspaper is because it DOESN'T EXIST!





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USM Sympathizer

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RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing faculty
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The normal desire of faculty is to teach, do research, perform service duties, and not be bullied.  I suspect that once you get a president who realizes this fact, life will return to normal at USM and USM can return to being the university so many of us outsiders had respected so much for so many years.


I really do have to run, now, however; my wife is getting impatient with me and we've got to hit the road.



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Cossack

Date:
RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing facul
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Whatever college this Ph.D. student is in, one thing is apparent. Either the faculty teaching and mentoring in his program are slugs and do slack as he says, or he has learned nothing about what being a Ph.D. is about. If he has written research papers for his doctoral seminars, he would not be talking about how little time is expended in academic pursuits. He is being poorly served if he does not realize that publications are the coin of the realm in academica. If he has served as a graduate student instructor and graded tests, he would not have this attitude. I suspect the real story is he is a rookie graduate student and does not realize the realities of being a successful academic, or he is the slug and not much of a graduate student. If it is the latter, I have news for him. He will never have one of the jobs that he thinks are so easy, he will be asking if you want fries with your burger.

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Jameela Lares

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S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing faculty
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Just sent to the Sun Herald:


Dear Sun Herald,


I write this letter in response to that of USM doctoral student Patrick Fagan, who complains that faculty members here are lazy malcontents.


In my experience, even doctoral students do not understand how hard university professors work. We tell our own English Ph.D. candidates to enjoy their already harried lives now, because their work load will only increase, and they don’t believe us. I didn’t believe my professors in graduate school either.


In actual fact, most quality professors-–including the vast majority of the professors I know at USM–-work 60 to 80 hours a week. The time we spend in the classroom is not even the tip of the iceberg. We have many duties beyond teaching, which is only 40% of a standard academic contract, but even in that area our lives are consumed with rereading textbooks and ancillary materials, lesson preparation, paper marking, designing or redesigning courses, and of course conferencing. Many’s the time I’ve been ready to leave my office-–with a bulging book bag full of further work to do at home–-when a student has appeared asking for help. And of course I go back to the office and turn the lights back on. I can easily spend an hour with a single student on a single paper, and I frequently do. Our master’s and Ph.D. students take even more time.


Another 40% of the standard academic contract is research, by which I don’t mean looking up a few encyclopedia articles. No, it means discovering new knowledge, blazing a trail through a dense forest of new facts. It is our job to make independent contributions to knowledge. In that area our lives are consumed with pouring through databases, tracking down original materials at home or abroad, reading hundreds or even thousands of books and articles, conferring with experts in our fields by e-mail or in national or international conferences, and delivering our findings in papers, articles, and books to a critical audience far beyond the borders of this state. We all scramble to find time enough to do this, and there is never enough time to research and publish all we would like.


The last 20% of the standard academic contract is service, which comprises all the immense labor of serving on duly constituted departmental and university-wide committees to which-–it should be noted-–the administration has turned a deaf ear.


We’re not on the clock, or it would be obvious that we put in far more than "a day’s work." In fact, I’ve heard it said that if we were being paid by the hour, we’d be making less than minimum wage. I personally work nights, weekends, and the entire summer. I will admit that I try to take Saturdays off as a sabbath, but one does need a rest. It doesn’t really help, when one is working at this intensity, to hear folk complain that we’re being "lazy."


As far as being malcontents, I think the faculty has been remarkably reserved during these last two years of the Thames administration. We’ve sought to communicate our concerns to the president, but he has turned a deaf ear. He has ignored ordinary, accepted university procedures and acted on whim, whitewashing his actions with smooth but misleading press releases while he racks up increasing financial burdens for the taxpayer. He has driven off good, experienced people and elevated cronies. He has-–in despite of all good managerial principles–-gone outside of the organization to solve disputes rather than keeping matters in-house. He has even taken out full page ads against us, and our own duly elected Faculty Senate has had to take out ads to communicate with him. Were USM the business corporation that Dr. Thames seems to assume it is–-I understand we’re actually by law a non-profit organization–-the stockholders would have fired him long ago, but the governing body in our case, the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning, continues to dither.


If Mr. Fagan’s own complaints against professors-–i.e., "Some do not research; some do not write; some do not keep current with trends in academia"–-are based in fact rather than hearsay, then he has uncovered a grave problem that needs to be addressed. As a graduate student, he could only witness such abuses first-hand in his own department. He should go to the departmental chair to complain. If that avenue is blocked, he should speak to his dean, and then to the provost. On the other hand, since no one in the Thames administration appears to be listening to these duly constituted authorities, Mr. Fagan then might perhaps wish to redirect his anger in the proper direction.


Jameela Lares, Ph.D.


Associate Professor of English


The University of Southern Mississippi



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Fire Shelby


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quote:
Originally posted by: Jameela Lares
"Just sent to the Sun Herald: Dear Sun Herald, I write this letter in response to that of USM doctoral student Patrick Fagan, who complains that faculty members here are lazy malcontents. In my experience, even doctoral students do not understand how hard university professors work. We tell our own English Ph.D. candidates to enjoy their already harried lives now, because their work load will only increase, and they don’t believe us. I didn’t believe my professors in graduate school either. In actual fact, most quality professors-–including the vast majority of the professors I know at USM–-work 60 to 80 hours a week. The time we spend in the classroom is not even the tip of the iceberg. We have many duties beyond teaching, which is only 40% of a standard academic contract, but even in that area our lives are consumed with rereading textbooks and ancillary materials, lesson preparation, paper marking, designing or redesigning courses, and of course conferencing. Many’s the time I’ve been ready to leave my office-–with a bulging book bag full of further work to do at home–-when a student has appeared asking for help. And of course I go back to the office and turn the lights back on. I can easily spend an hour with a single student on a single paper, and I frequently do. Our master’s and Ph.D. students take even more time. Another 40% of the standard academic contract is research, by which I don’t mean looking up a few encyclopedia articles. No, it means discovering new knowledge, blazing a trail through a dense forest of new facts. It is our job to make independent contributions to knowledge. In that area our lives are consumed with pouring through databases, tracking down original materials at home or abroad, reading hundreds or even thousands of books and articles, conferring with experts in our fields by e-mail or in national or international conferences, and delivering our findings in papers, articles, and books to a critical audience far beyond the borders of this state. We all scramble to find time enough to do this, and there is never enough time to research and publish all we would like. The last 20% of the standard academic contract is service, which comprises all the immense labor of serving on duly constituted departmental and university-wide committees to which-–it should be noted-–the administration has turned a deaf ear. We’re not on the clock, or it would be obvious that we put in far more than "a day’s work." In fact, I’ve heard it said that if we were being paid by the hour, we’d be making less than minimum wage. I personally work nights, weekends, and the entire summer. I will admit that I try to take Saturdays off as a sabbath, but one does need a rest. It doesn’t really help, when one is working at this intensity, to hear folk complain that we’re being "lazy." As far as being malcontents, I think the faculty has been remarkably reserved during these last two years of the Thames administration. We’ve sought to communicate our concerns to the president, but he has turned a deaf ear. He has ignored ordinary, accepted university procedures and acted on whim, whitewashing his actions with smooth but misleading press releases while he racks up increasing financial burdens for the taxpayer. He has driven off good, experienced people and elevated cronies. He has-–in despite of all good managerial principles–-gone outside of the organization to solve disputes rather than keeping matters in-house. He has even taken out full page ads against us, and our own duly elected Faculty Senate has had to take out ads to communicate with him. Were USM the business corporation that Dr. Thames seems to assume it is–-I understand we’re actually by law a non-profit organization–-the stockholders would have fired him long ago, but the governing body in our case, the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning, continues to dither. If Mr. Fagan’s own complaints against professors-–i.e., "Some do not research; some do not write; some do not keep current with trends in academia"–-are based in fact rather than hearsay, then he has uncovered a grave problem that needs to be addressed. As a graduate student, he could only witness such abuses first-hand in his own department. He should go to the departmental chair to complain. If that avenue is blocked, he should speak to his dean, and then to the provost. On the other hand, since no one in the Thames administration appears to be listening to these duly constituted authorities, Mr. Fagan then might perhaps wish to redirect his anger in the proper direction. Jameela Lares, Ph.D. Associate Professor of English The University of Southern Mississippi"

Take THAT, Patrick Fagan!


Great letter, Dr. Lares.  I hope the Hat-Am prints it in its entirity.  John and Jane Q Public need to read this.



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Jim Hollandsworth

Date:
RE: RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing f
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Jameela-

YOU ROCK!

Jim


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foot soldier

Date:
RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing faculty
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Thank you, thank you Jameela! I was so mad at Patrick Fagan yesterday, I was stomping around telling my students how I had never seen West Wing or ER in my entire life, or the Lord of the Rings movies, etc. . . .because I cam always WORKING. Thanks for articulating my feelings in a thoughtful manner.

(P.S. Don't worry, at least once or twice a year I see a movie. On my birthday, or at Christmas.)

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truth4usm/AH

Date:
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Great letter, Jameela!  Can't wait to read it in the newspapers!  Send it to all of them, please.

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Robert Campbell

Date:
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Jameela,


Your letter needs to be in all of the newspapers!


Robert Campbell



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Jameela Lares

Date:
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quote:
Originally posted by: Robert Campbell
"Jameela, Your letter needs to be in all of the newspapers! Robert Campbell"

Thanks to all of you for your encouragement.  I've sent a more general version of the letter to the HA and the CL.  If there are other places I should send it, please advise.


By the way, I join Foot Soldier in virtually never watching TV sitcoms, but I have found The Lord of the Rings to be tremendously encouraging these days.  As I told someone who posts on this message board, I've got a big framed movie poster over my desk at home of a resolute Aragorn holding a sword, and I start each day watching the great battle victories in The Two Towers or the scene in Fellowship of the Ring where Gandalf withstands the balrog.  And back in March, when I was e-mailing everyone I could think of about the mess here, I would listen--and still do--to the part of the soundtrack from the third movie when the signal fires are lit.


NO QUARTER.



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Otherside

Date:
RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing facul
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quote:
Originally posted by: Jameela Lares
"
Thanks to all of you for your encouragement.  I've sent a more general version of the letter to the HA and the CL....  "


I would love to see the letter published. However, all the papers have limits to the number of words, which your letter exceeds. Maybe they would publish it as a guest column.

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foot soldier

Date:
RE: S-H Letter to Editor: Crybaby do-nothing faculty
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quote:
Originally posted by: Jameela Lares
"
And back in March, when I was e-mailing everyone I could think of about the mess here, I would listen--and still do--to the part of the soundtrack from the third movie when the signal fires are lit.
NO QUARTER."


May I also suggest Beethoven? Symphonies 3, 5, 7 and 9 in particular.

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LVN

Date:
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quote:
Originally posted by: Jameela Lares
" Thanks to all of you for your encouragement.  I've sent a more general version of the letter to the HA and the CL.  If there are other places I should send it, please advise. By the way, I join Foot Soldier in virtually never watching TV sitcoms, but I have found The Lord of the Rings to be tremendously encouraging these days.  As I told someone who posts on this message board, I've got a big framed movie poster over my desk at home of a resolute Aragorn holding a sword, and I start each day watching the great battle victories in The Two Towers or the scene in Fellowship of the Ring where Gandalf withstands the balrog.  And back in March, when I was e-mailing everyone I could think of about the mess here, I would listen--and still do--to the part of the soundtrack from the third movie when the signal fires are lit. NO QUARTER."

I have read LOTR at least thirty times in nearly forty years.  As wonderful as the movies were, fans must, must, must read the books.  It is the great novel of the 20th century (apologies to someone who thinks it's Sons and Lovers instead.)


Here is a link to a recording of Tolkien reading "the Ride of the Rohirrim" which ought to be encouraging for all of you brave people, especially when things look bleak.


http://www.jrrtolkien.org.uk/Sounds/


You may have to copy the url and paste it into you address bar.  I thought of posting this when Fire Shelby was so despondent a few days ago.  It's very inspiring.  You may also need to turn your volume up a bit, and listen carefully.



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