I am in favor of increasing the number of instructional staff. The number of students in my lectures has more than doubled over my nineteen year career and has only stopped growing because there are no larger classrooms on campus to herd the students into.
Over the same nineteen years I have seen the concept of shared governance erode as faculty avoid committee work in favor of having administration and staff members run the day-to-day operations. Universities "professionalize" advising by hiring staff to take over for faculty. Likewise as universities have increasingly pushed externally funded research technical staff are needed to maintain increasingly sophisticated equipment. The push to on-line learning and paperless libraries make it necessary to have IT departments that did not previously exist. Students and their parents demand career councilors, and directors of study abroad programs, and expanded health facilities. All these are staff positions.
The problem with higher education funding is the same as the problem with funding the government. We want the latest technology and the best services, but we don't want to pay for them. Too many faculty think they are they only ones who count at the university and that everyone else is overpaid and under worked. In reality, the staff do the jobs faculty walked away from. If you want more faculty and less staff you need to go back to doing the work the staff do. And don't forget, you claimed to be able to do it better. So, back off!
Oops, slipped into a rant there. Better see if the pub is still open.
T.S. Hall
Yet another good post. The link does not seem to work so I used this one:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.centerforcollegeaffordability.org/uploads/Labor_Force.pdf
There is a large amount of staff and it creates problems for students, since the staff tend to migrate more quickly than professors. There are many administrative mishaps because of this. A move to online education can save time, money and eliminate staff since there is a degree of automation, but that is up for debate.
Other disconcerting news from this study is the amount of part-time instructors. This is another glaring problem when pursuing higher education, stable job opportunities. Part-timers are forced to teach at many campuses and sometimes don't have many benefits.
Private-for-profit institutions seem to be in better shape, even gaining in productivity. Maybe the business model is viable?
Felix,
ReplyDeletePrivate-for-Profit universities don't do science or engineering, or agriculture. If it cost money to teach, they don't do it! That's how they make a profit!
Before you embrace that business model your must define "productivity" and then look at the mission of higher education. Productivity as units (of degrees) sold says nothing about quality of those units. If the mission is to educate, productivity must be measured as a function of the education imparted. No one seems to know how to do this, so units sold become the standard.
Carried to an illogical extreme I could become the most productive university in the world by simply selling diplomas in a kiosk at the mall. One faculty member per thousands of diplomas granted.
T.S. Hall
Dr. Hall,
ReplyDeleteBut are the Private-for-profit institutions producing good quality students? Profit can be a good way to increase efficiency since accountability is rewarded.
A totally free market system, where student loans could be defaulted on if they could not be payed back, would quickly allow quality to be judged. Institutions that cannot produce quality students cannot produce students that are smart enough to pay those loans back. Lenders would not allow lending to students at those institutions.
Institutions that could actually produce high quality students would be greatly rewarded by being able to charge a higher rate, and still attract students!
The mall operation you mentioned would fail in a free market because the quality is low. Even if the price were $1, word of mouth (i.e. the internet and individual standards) would disregard its worth.
Basic research would still be viable at the best institutions, since research experience could greatly increase the quality and future profitability of its students. Industry would demand such people, not to mention other universities that need people with research experience.
The free market is the best way to increase efficiency since accountability is very high on lenders, students and the university. Though it is the cruelest way, it tends to be the most efficient.
The government can't count votes, but my private bank keeps track of my money down to the penny! And gives me interest on top of it too!
Felix
Felix,
ReplyDeletePerhaps I was not clear. For-profit institutions do not offer degrees in any area that the Delaware study identifies as having a high cost to provide an education. So, the answer to your question is that since they produce no graduates in the sciences, engineering, agriculture, etc., no one can judge the quality.
They are telling you by what they do offer that the free market would eliminate education in the STEM fields as too costly and with too small a profit margin. After all we are headed to outsourcing all science out of the country anyway.
The free market today operates on short term best interest. Thinking about tomorrows challenges and solving them does not make one rich today.
Very true, short term thinking seems to be what has driven the recent down turns in the economy and even in the scientific field, CombiChem/Genomics/etc.
ReplyDeleteI don't think the efficiency, quality and productivity can be defined effectively without input from a free market based on risks, rewards and accountability. They become far to abstract and subjective without those factors. Academia wants quality academics, industry wants practical skills.
Another way I see out of this problem is to find ways to reduce the amount of public money taken. Taking public money requires a lot of accounting, rules and people to manage all the strings attached. However, this would require using research to produce something profitable that could sustain a research program.
Just have money that doesn't have to constantly be renewed with NIH/NSF/DOD proposals. Makes being a professor easier, more time to do those other things.
Long shot, but it is one way to increase efficiency, as long as administrators don't control to much of it and make their own rules...