Rolling higher education into the shitbin thread

Faculty governance has been all but erased at my school. We have been fighting (hard! with many negative consequences!) for what seems like forever (almost a decade?). We are a young mission-based teaching institution and research/publishing has never been expected.

Is lecturing 4/4 or 5/5 for peanuts and without security really the best use of your talent? Why are you doing this? Serious question.

^^^ that hit home but the answer is "because there is no other outlet for my talent that will pay me." Teaching as a skill/talent is so chronically undervalued in this country (USA) and sadly I don't see that changing anytime soon. I will hang on as long as I can.

Ding ding ding! Like it's not like I ever expected to make a ton of money as a prof, but who else is going to pay me for my talent and knowledge base?

I started my own online workshops that are going well, but without scaling up significantly, one workshop is about 2 mortgage payments with nothing left over.

Yeah I’ve tossed around the idea of workshops but my parallel issue is a lifelong repulsion at branding, including (especially?) branding myself.

I’m working on getting a website together and I’m getting over it but all I really want in my perfect world is an institution to lend my skill to + the chance to reach students who benefit from my teaching + a life outside of work where I can be social and creative.

Instead I’m going to have to hustle to sell myself 😢 at least I can accept that now.

I definitely thrive in cooperative environments much more than competitive ones. That’s why my institution was such a good fit for me for so many years.

a lifelong repulsion at branding, including (especially?) branding myself

You and me both. Just thinking about it makes me want to retch, it's utterly visceral.

Higher ed: the sunk cost fallacy.

(holy shit)

Unless yours is the winning ticket.

every time i get an email from the administration about plans for the fall i have a panic attack. really excited to be at the top of my pedagogical game in seven weeks.

have they told you what game you'll be playing yet

omg maura super otm
i have not been told anything either

honestly i am sort of glad i taught over the summer bc it has given me time to better acclimate to the online environment and prepare at least one course that i can teach again in the fall without sweating the living shit out of it

seeing an email from our university president describing protocols for the return of students to campus in fall. re dorms, "beds in shared rooms will be separated by at least 6 feet" LOL GET THE FUCK OUT

Unbelievable. These people are living in a fantasy world

i don’t know what it’ll be like. i always have a hybrid class anyway but i do not feel good about going to campus. but if i don’t teach how can i afford my $500/month insurance premium, lol

meanwhile at purdue:

I feel safer already. This will most definitely be fine. pic.twitter.com/Ay99KyEvzH

— David Atkinson (@drdaveatkinson) July 9, 2020

Jeez Louise.

what the f

https://movie-fanatic-res.cloudinary.com/iu/s--qMWTMzeD--/t_full/cs_srgb,f_auto,fl_strip_profile.lossy,q_auto:420/v1408553550/naked-gun-full-body-condom.png

lol

i'm gonna miss all the radical left indoctrination training and meetings :(

Too many Universities and School Systems are about Radical Left Indoctrination, not Education. Therefore, I am telling the Treasury Department to re-examine their Tax-Exempt Status...

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 10, 2020

xpost - it's a good thing air stops circulating completely about 7 feet above the floor level. that's a foolproof plan!

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/12/opinion/liberal-arts-college-covid.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

Ctrl+F = "tuition" 0/0

ohio state had a meeting today. here are some notes. notable: if a student tests positive their classes have to quarantine for two weeks.

I took some notes. pic.twitter.com/sZGTfzCAtT

— Elena Cruz-López (@elenacruz_lopez) July 13, 2020

not even reading that, it will give me a panic attack
esp if the first sentences are "we don't really know..."

aggggghhhhhhhhh

Cool time today dealing with a Canvas issue that others have had in the past, and which hasn't been solved by Canvas. I go to the support chat, and am placed at the back of the queue. Fine. I leave the computer to do work and walk the dog, checking the queue all the while, etc.

Eventually, I am working and realize the laptop has gone to sleep. I log back on and lo and behold, my session has timed out, and I'm now at the back of the queue again...for a problem that shouldn't be a problem in the first place.

If this is the future, then fuck the future, let it all burn.

ugh fuck canvas

this week sucks so much

i hate everything

Also, a query: anyone here quit an adjunct job a few days into the semester?

These fucks have increased course caps due to some fuckery and I'm now at 45 students.....and getting paid $4500 for the semester. So my question is: do I make things easy on myself and just give everyone A's, collect the check, and never work for this school again? Or should I just quit? While it would be hard to take the hit, I am ready to take one suffering over another at this juncture.

ha ha I submitted my expression of interest in a voluntary redundancy last week

and table that is unacceptable, negotiate or quit!

So my question is: do I make things easy on myself and just give everyone A's, collect the check, and never work for this school again?

seems to me to be a win (you)/win (students)/lose (the school) which sounds cool

Yeah, talked with a number of people, including one of my childhood friends who is a union leader at the school, and I'm going to go with the making things easy on myself option. Also seems like some more major labor action might be in the works, so I'd like to stick around for that.

this roundup of covid reactions at universities made me feel both despondent and less alone


https://annehelen.substack.com/p/between-fked-and-a-hard-place

I’ve got 34 students in a comp 2 writing class which amounts to 8.5 hrs of grading (at a modest 15 min per paper) per draft per assignment. Adjuncts are paid $2,000 for this class.

This thread stresses me out in the absolute worst way.

I agree w the “giving everyone A” option provided that the material in the class is not going to be essential to their future jobs or classes. I feel differently about shorting developmental writing students than I do about music appreciation students. They’ll live without remembering what the elements of music are but it’s hard to make it when you can’t write a coherent paragraph.

It is a class on short fiction. Like can you read and talk about a New Yorker story? Okay? Cool.

(though only 30% of the stories I used were in the NYer, but the basic thrust of it is that)

Oh ok! A’s for everyone!! The lit class I’ve been assigned this semester is basically that only it’s called “American Literature and Culture”

Still total bullshit that 45 students are crammed in there.

I saw a post on a fb group I’m in with a woman who is teaching a class with 232 students enrolled. No wonder people think college is a waste of time and a ripoff. 232!

Has to be automated and with multiple TAs at that point.

But yeah, that's not learning.

Definitely not, or not the place for me at least!

https://www.ajc.com/news/university-of-alabama-orders-faculty-to-keep-quiet-about-outbreak/7ZAHSQPNDRBINBEF3A6YAVMPRE/

“During that time, we encountered many students who have been exposed since returning to campus, particularly in the Greek system,” said Dr. Ricky Friend, dean of college of community health sciences

what a surprise!

As I mentioned on a other thread, my institution is 20% of the cases in our metro right now. So they've pivoted to online classes for the next two weeks...

Basically, the administration is avoiding making the safe and ethical call to cancel in-person classes for the whole semester because after a certain date, parents can't get back their room and board deposits. As long as the idea of in-person classes returning is put forward and the school can blame students for spread, which has already happened, then they're covering their asses.

To say that I am ready for this semester to be over and to never work for this corrupt institution ever again is an understatement.

Student posted incendiary, offensive, unfounded, and racist things on discussion board. In my haste, I simply deleted the posts without screen-shotting them— there is a policy in my syllabus that dehumanizing language will not be tolerated, and this was certainly that. Now incredibly nervous about potential blowback, though doubting there will be any...if there is, will simply bring up anything that happens to administrators.

I did note everything that was written in a separate email to myself, but then it is student's word against mine.

I'm not getting paid enough to babysit racists.

Well. I've been offered a redundancy and hope it will be a pretty solid deal. Now to think about life after academia at age 50.

Are you a full-time tenured faculty member or the equivalent wherever you are?

It's that time of the year when the student emails begging for grade adjustments start piling up.

Anyone feeling more amenable to give students the benefit of the doubt this semester due to the circumstances?

For example, I have a student who has done...D-level work all semester when it has been turned in, but she also lost one of her best friends to Covid and has been working full time. She needs a passing grade to graduate on time. I mean, fuck, I'm almost out of the academy at this point, should I just give everyone an 'A'?

Sorry Euler, missed your question, but yes I am and no I didn't take the redundancy. God knows what's coming though, the Australian sector is f-u-c-k-e-d.
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2020/12/australia-universities-education-job-ready-scott-morrison-covid

and table are you able to offer some kind of supplementary task to let the student demonstrate that she actually does reach the standard? because otherwise a grade bump is an insult to the folks who did the work and reached the standard. Unless the standard itself is arbitrary or poorly assessed.

should I just give everyone an 'A'?

Does this fit your philosophy of the role of grading in education? It's a surprisingly complicated question.

My personal sense is that during classes letter grades are mainly an incentive/reward to do the work of learning. imo, the real controlling question for the educator as classes end is pass/fail. But if at the start of classes you set specific expectations about how final grades would be determined, then it seems like you need to honor your own announced structure.

pass em all imo

just make sure your own ass is covered