Workload Measurements and Searches

I will preface this comment by telling you that my university is a great place to work.  In that light, I think it can also be a national model for how quantifying faculty productivity should be done.

Every year we have our yearly evaluation with the chair and are expected to write a complete report of everything we did in the prior 12 months.  This includes every class taught, every paper reviewed, every publication, every grant submitted, every extra service thing (conference organization, workshops, search committees etc) and everything else that a faculty member does.  These reports are often between 20-40 pages long since they include abstracts and thank you letters.  While this sounds awful, we are all trained to keep running lists of what we do throughout the year (this is the first thing told to new faculty hires as well), so assembling this takes a couple of hours per year.  This document is used both as a guide for workload planning for the following year as well as our proportion of the “merit pool” for yearly faculty raises. 

Similarly, promotion dossiers essentially are an organized compendium of this information from one’s last promotion (my full professor dossier was two, ten inch binders full of information).

Once you are used to it (ie keep the necessary information as it comes across your desk in one spot), none of this is a real burden to put together and it helps make both merit and promotion evaluation much more fair.  I would personally have no problem with any of this being posted on a public web site, these type of documents would absolutely make it clear how busy we all are  (not that I can imagine anyone wanting to actually read this for hundreds or thousands of faculty members)

So, if legislatures want to quantify faculty productivity, let them and then flood them with information…..

One of the best jobs out there is “a tenured faculty member at a teaching institution!!!” As long as some faculty members do not uphold their commitment to academic professional integrity, the workload will always be an issue. I doubt that good applicants will be dissuaded by mandated workload assessments.

Good questions.  I think job descriptions that limit responsibilities should come before workload assessments.

Unfortunately, the “big thinkers” in college sports aren’t people who think there are any moral, ethical, or academic problems in them. College sports’ “big thinkers” are cable TV execs, advertisers, and mobile app designers who–while the people recommended by the commenters, the op-ed’ers, institute heads, chin-stroking professors, et al. are bloviating, attending conferences, tsk-tsking to each other–are designing more ways to put big-time college sports in the public’s paying face 24/7/365. The unfortunate exception in commenters’ recommendations is Larry Scott, who’s more of a corrupter than the aggregate of drivers who park in a certain corporate lot in Bristol, CT. He is to solving college sports’ “problems” what Larry Flynt was to feminism.

Some realities.  A branch campus is subject to the local laws including student admissions and local hiring. Are you prepared to accept that reality? Are the faculty and admins and university governors and activists prepared to accept that things will be done on the branch campus that are unacceptable or not even legal in the USA?  It appears that many phantasise that they have some control over what goes on at the branch campus.  Is a university even capable of handling the reality that its by-laws run on one campus but not another because it is in another country?
There are several countries that have race, sex, religious and political activity laws that would be illegal under US law but nevertheless are usually considerd liberal democrcies.  Some even have imprisonment without trial for indefinite periods. Singapore and Malaysia are examples. If that is too exotic what if someone got the bright idea of setting up a branch campus in Northern Ireland or Basque Spain? How is the University President or Chancellor supposed to react if a student, staff member or faculty member runs foul of such laws on a branch campus in a foreign country?
Most people think about overseas branch campuses in a franky colonial model.  It goes both ways. “Extraterritoriality” is a favourite topic of rabble-rousing “Nationalists” and other radicals against european and american institutions abroad through much of modern history.   They also think about them in terms of the interests of faculty holding american passports sent off to them on secondment.  There are plenty of other sources of trouble because of their perception as a foreign implant..
* The home university has no control over standards at a foreign campus short of refusing to recognise the qualifications gained on their “own” branch campus.  It seems that Yale is trying to have the temerity to try and get away with not crediting courses done at its branch campus in Singapore.  I doubt if any other university (maybe Harvard?) would even dream of trying to get away with such a scam. 
* If an american on secondment runs foul of local laws they will most likely get bundled up and thrown out of the host country, rather than face legal action.  That is OK for the US citizen but what about the fate of their locally-hired accomplices and any local students involved?  Consistent reaction by University President?
* There is also a severe local political fallout. Such instances mentioned above provide ammunition for all the local political nutters that the nasty US Impirialists are exercising “Extraterritorial Rights”.  Most radicals are paranoid delusional.  It goes without saying that the local universities resent the presence of foreign branch campuses and are full of people that would love to see the foreign branch campus fail.
* There are lots of countries where western universities have set up hare-brained branch campuses where an Israeli stamp in their passport is enough for them to be refused admission into the country – reaction by University President?
* I have brought this up in other criticisms of branch campuses but I will again.  What about the case of staff on the branch campus who hold dual citizenship? Consider not only US/Israeli passport holders but also US/host country passport holders which one would expect to be common on a foreign branch campus. Nothing but trouble, trouble and trouble whether they are staff there on secondment and for locally appointed staff.
* Americans often have a bad case of GOD.  As an atheist I have no sympathy for them but I do know that the poor deluded fools have an evangelical urge that is bound to get them in trouble in some countries. Trying to tell an evangelical to keep quiet is futile. They also often take official statements about religious tolerance at face value and ignore the realities on the ground. What is understood as “tolerance” is vastly different in different societies. Reaction by the University President to someone caught with a bible or accused of evangelical or missionary activity in the wrong country?  Evangelical activity (define?) by foreigners is banned in many countries eg Malaysia.  Do not forget that an American Shiite can get themselves into severe trouble in a Sunni moslem country (There is a recent Australian Shiite example, who had dual citizenship into the bargain). It just goes on and on. 
* If branch campuses set up by Australian Universities are any guide if you look at their staff lists you find that nearly all their faculty were appointed by the branch campus.  There are a few Australians but they were appointed by the branch campus and are not there on secondment from the home campus in Australia.  I happen to know that an Australian employed by a branch campus overseas cannot even apply for a transfer to a campus of the same university in Australia. How can that be fair? Are they an “internal candidate” if they apply for a job on the Australian campus? Apparently not.  Notice I have not even mentioned the case of someone appointed as faculty on a branch campus in a foreign country but holding citizenship in a third country who applies for a job at the Australian campus of the university.