So .. do it yourself, and keep the difference?

“Students not only love this course, they need it,” he said.

This obstinate drain on tax rolls is probably costing taxpayers around $300,000.00/year, with salary, benefits, office space, etc. So, 400 students @ $1,000/class brings back $400,000.00 as a gross revenue amount.

Given his rosy scenario, why doesn’t Dr. Whine prove his statements on student popularity and go private? In a bigger classroom? Or, in another vein, ask his former students make donations to support his teaching?

Well, for starters, consider the numerous cases of professors who try to become self-employed — and who fail miserably.

As usual, this isn’t about students. It’s about money. So much for truth, justice, and the American way.

A.D., at 5:20 am EDT on May 4, 2006

Why doesn’t the Administration allow freshmen to take the course? Thus making both sides happy...

EEDTG, at 9:00 am EDT on May 4, 2006

Be reasonable

The prof in Maryland has clearly made a huge contribution to the university and the sympathy of its alumni. The university would be foolish to force this guy out as long as he still is performing well and the course quality isn’t slipping.

I see two possible solutions. The university could cut a deal to make him an emeritus professor and pay him something to continue teaching the one course he so dearly loves and at which he obviously accels. Alternatively he could take retirement, with or without emeritus status, and take his course with him somewhere else. He wouldn’t have to go “private,” but surely if the course is really that popular some other university would want to pick it up.

Jo, Assistant prof at In Wisconsin, at 11:25 am EDT on May 4, 2006

Choices

I’m 57. I’ve contemplated the Letting Go issues. It’s not impossible for me to imagine teaching at 75, if I could imagine being 75, that is.

But I notice that one choice some faculty make is to retire, go emeritus, and teach as an adjunct. That frees a line for some new blood, relieves the search for adjuncts a bit, and allows a dedicated teacher to continue to serve without clogging the system.

An extraordinary English prof at our university pursued such a course over the last few years. I still see him around all the time. He teaches and is still excellent in the classroom. He has an office and is still valued and respected. I suspect even more so as his department was able to hire a new person to sustain its overall performance and add energy.

I wonder if this impasse would be susceptible to such a solution — if the University would appreciate the course being taught and bringing some positive experiences to several hundred students each year. And if the teaching would sustain the prof’s sense of efficacy and value? I wonder if an office could be found or if he could maintain his current office still??

I suppose it’s possible there are impediments. But I know faculty who do that at the late stages of career at many institutions. If I were a department head or dean, I’d probably be annoyed at this colleague — not grateful as I would be for the prof I mentioned above. But maybe both sides are intransigent here and issues of face limit the plausible options.

I think about the summing up sometimes nowadays. I’ve worked hard to create some good will — well, in part, at least — among colleagues, students and across the institution. God, I don’t want to throw that away by clinging on too long or becoming selfish or stagnating the department by clutching to a needed line ... but that’s what I’m saying today. Talk with me in a few years and see where I am. Sad story, nonetheless.

Mike SackenEd Prof, TCU

Mike Sacken, prof of educ at tcu, at 11:25 am EDT on May 4, 2006

Not an “employee”

No, no. Professors are not “employees” in the same way as someone who works at Home Depot. A professor’s “boss” is knowledge, not the administration (which merely works on BEHALF of the faculty and students, keeping things running smoothly). Study the history of the western university: it arises from guilds of teachers and learners. The professor in question, however, also ought to consider that teaching freshman is also a good and noble pursuit and that somebody has to do it.

It looks like greed meets arrogance to me.

Cicero, Professor of English, at 11:30 am EDT on May 4, 2006

The State IS getting their money’s worth...

“The senior level course packs in about 200 students a semester — with the cutoff usually determined by the size of the auditorium in which the class meets”

Why are they trying to cancel this obviously popular class? One that “alumni who consider it to have been one of the high points of their education” and that has provided them with “skills for life”?

Why is it so important that HE teach these freshman classes?

There is something here that someone isn’t talking about...

k, at 12:00 pm EDT on May 4, 2006

Yes, not an employee

Hey, don’t lecture me about greed: I make $33,000.

It seems to be a fundamental mistep in logic to assume that the production of knowledge is analogous to the production of, say, tires. Tuitition is up, but who, exactly, do you think is getting rich off of that? Not me. Not any educator I know.

Any college worth anything is run by the faculty; thus, there are no “bosses.” Colleges are non-profit collaboratives of scholars: it makes no sense to treat them as anything other.

Cicero, at 3:05 pm EDT on May 4, 2006