In a recent post, David Evans described the growing burdens that have been placed on faculty members in recent years. According to Tenured Radical, however, many service burdens are unfairly distributed, falling mainly on academic do-gooders, “who work hardest for the institution” yet “reap the fewest material benefits because they publish at a slower pace.”
She goes on to note that …
Ironically, they often acquire tremendous respect from those other colleagues who are working equally hard, are viewed as really good citizens, capable people, and the sort who you really want to have around when solving a problem, running a tenure case, or starting up a new project. … The rewards inherent to being respected by others, and the feeling of being truly valuable to an enterprise, is seductive, and for good reason. Colleges and universities could not get the work done without people like you — particularly since they are unwilling to set expectations for those who do less than their share of the teaching and advising, or who are indifferent to how others inside the university perceive them. …
Her advice to academic do-gooders? Wise up, she writes …
and realize that your choices are not really the issue here, and that the work load in your institution is not distributed in any kind of an equitable, thoughtful or even well-managed way. In fact you have more students and advisees because other faculty have fewer; you serve on more committees because other people serve on fewer; you chair things because other people don’t know how and/or don’t wish to learn. Here’s a news flash: when the active hand of management (something we academics deplore universally on the theory that the freer we are the better off everyone is) fails to organize our workplace equitably, committees, students, and advising have a tendency to distribute themselves, much as free radicals find a place to settle down and cause cancer after roaming the body for a spell. Some people do a ton of work — others, not so much.
The “brutal truth that administrators and faculty colleagues know but cannot, for a variety of reasons, publicly acknowledge” isn’t that academic do-gooders need to learn to just say no (a refrain she’s tired of hearing, she says), but that …
those of us who overwork are covering up for and enabling those who under perform. Most universities have no mechanism for forcing tenured people teach better, teach more, show up at office hours, give students responsible advice about their program of study, or do the committee work they have been assigned. Certainly they have no mechanism that is not going to make the entire faculty, especially those who are already overworked and fear the loss of the choices they do not yet exercise, from rising up and rending their garments.
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5 Responses to Bearing the Burden
ansleyv - September 18, 2009 at 3:39 am
If you have a good heart and you care about the institution, it is hard to say NO to work you know won’t be done by anyone else. However, as you move more and more away from your research passion, you start to lose yourself in the identity of the institution. Before long, you might find yourself doing little of the work that actually brought you to academia in the first place, and more of the work that must happen to help the institution survive. I know the blogger says we should just say NO. However, if you are a decent person who believes in doing the tough things, and sharing the burden, and doing what is right, it can be difficult to watch a committee, project, or program sink and drown when you know you could save it. But, on the other hand, you have to feed your passion so you have something to give back to the students, and model the way they should pursue learning. So many hard choices to make!
ksledge - September 18, 2009 at 7:40 am
Universities need to reward service more, period. Especially innovative or leadership-based service that not just everyone could or would do. That way these special do-gooders can stand out and their service can actually contribute to their tenure/promotion files. Some people are better at administrative/service work than others. Some people like it more than others. I don’t think the imbalance of workload with regard to service is so bad in light of these facts. What’s bad is that this work is not rewarded, even though it contributes enormously to the college/university.
mmullins - September 18, 2009 at 11:03 am
I would bet that most of the lower level service work (of the unglamorous sort) is being done by female faculty. And the upper level administrative posts (the glamor jobs) continue to go to males. What’s wrong with this picture? Is it time for women to step away from performing the drudge work that keeps the cogs of the university turning?
koufax33 - September 18, 2009 at 11:22 am
I STRONGLY agree with the first two posts. Service is rarely rewarded in promotion and tenure. Mmullins: Actually, the faculty who often get put on committees or have more advisees, etc are minority faculty (race/religion/sexual orientation, etc), especially faculy of color. Students purposefully seek them out and administrators put them committees to “have a diverse” group. Also, women dominate our campuses top leadership positions (Major Research 1)…
madamesmartypants - September 18, 2009 at 12:15 pm
koufax33- I just read an article in the Chronicle (by Mary Ann Mason) that said there were fewer female university presidents than male, and that women are generally shut out of leadership positions. Why do you think there are more women in “top” leadership positions…? I completely agree with you about service work being dumped on minorities, though. I think your diversity argument re: minorities is also true of women, though–gotta have the one woman in the physics department show how “diverse” we are! And if she’s a black woman, forget it, it’s like an administrative dream come true!ksledge- YES, service absolutely needs to be rewarded! As this article shows, faculty who do the service work are the people who keep the university running. They care about the school, they like working with students, and they take the burden off of our less-people-inclined faculty– in short, universities should do everything in their power to keep them. Administrators should note that they are single-handedly making the college experience worth it for our tuition-paying students who may one day donate to our schools. Service is work just like teaching and research, and should be rewarded just as equally.