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[cc prof]

i agree.  too expensive a trip to bet on.  however, with regards to certain stereotypes re: cc jobs.  i'm leaving a cc job and taking a $7,000 pay cut (~9%) to teach at a 4-yr liberal arts college.... and, my cc is part of a larger university system where the 4-year colleges receive smaller salaries.   my recent job search told me just how much many cc's pay.  the issue relates both to issues of unions and that cc's are boosting registration numbers, while 4-years are decreasing tuition revenue.  

the hiring practices for cc's may stink, but the pay is often what attracts so many.

[stinker]

"the hiring practices for cc's may stink, but the pay is often what attracts so many."

And the 5/5 teaching load of labor intensive developmental courses is what burns them all out so that they thank their lucky stars if they can leave for a $7,000 pay cut to a 4-yr. with a 3/3 load and a grad seminar or two or even a couple of TAs or graders for the highly enrolled lectures.

At one cc job interview in Pittsburgh, CA (maybe the same cc as the role playing poster, because I had to do a role play thing, too. Oy ve! I asked the sc to profile the avg. student. "What will my first day of class be like? What wil the class be like by the middle of the semester?" One of the sc members looked at me incredulously and said, "Are you asking which classes you'll be teaching?" as if I were some presumptuous a-hole. "No," I responded politely. "That's not my concern at this stage." Another sc member laid it out. "Well, you''ll likely have  over-enrolled classes the first day because some of the students will have decided that morning that they wanted to go to college. The most common attitude you'll encounter in our department is apathy. So, really, it's fallen to our department [english] to have to teach these students how to be students." Wonderful, I thought. Will I be teaching them how to eat with silverware as well? Will I have to remind them to brush their teeth after meals? When can I assume that they are responsible, accountable adults? When can I get the hell out of this hellhole because the last thing I'll be doing is teaching ten sections a year for this place. I received my form letter rejection a couple of weeks ago. It couldn't have meant less to me.

I spent a few years myself as a cc student and I have nothing but fond memories of my time there. Maybe I've just matured beyond that mind set, because after that interview and meeting those faculty, I lost a lot of respect for cc work. I mean, it was made to seem like mind numbing labor, as bad, if not worse, than public high school teaching. I certainly don't remember it that way. I had some of the most committed, personable, well-rounded instructors ever at cc--moreso than many profs from my doctoral granting inst. Hell, maybe my time as a cc student was exceptional. I just don't know how anyone can stay positive teaching so many classes. The money might be good, but when parceled out on a per class basis, it isn't much more. I can make as much as an adjunct doing peicemeal teaching at various places.

[Visiting in History]

In CC interviews I've had, they first did a round of phone interviews.  One place actually asked me to do a teaching demonstration by phone!  The very large committee then went through a list of prepared questions and I was allowed to re-answer questions at the end if I wasn't happy with my original response.  It was a horrible process and I did not even consider paying my own way for an on-campus after that.

The CC where I taught in an affluent suburban community tries to be more humane about the process.  Although they favor internal candidates, they conduct national searches and bring highly competitive candidates to campus splitting expenses.  The successful candidate is fully reimbursed.  They recently conducted a search in history with a great internal person but hired an outside person (most likely for diversity issues since all the full-time dept. people were white men).  So, there's no guarantee that the inside people have it locked up.

At the SLAC where I now teach and will be t-t in fall, they told me they did not have money to fly people in for the interview for a one-year position.  I said thanks very much but I simply don't have the $ and will apply for the tenure-track position when you open it.  They came up with the money for the interview and it worked out great!

[%sig%]

[anon]

     CC's that set up their interviews so that candidates have to return to campus two or three times, over a period of weeks or months--- for a series of stepford-like mini-interviews, must have some agenda.  Certainly, it is a hymn to inefficiency.  Whatever their declared intent, this is certainly an effective way to weed out out-of-towners.  

      It can also be a way to head off lawsuits, since multiple interviews, on paper, makes the process appear so "thorough," while, in reality, it is just the same hour-and-a-half slot of interviewing time (interview one:  45 minutes of canned questions /interview two:  20 min. teaching demo/ interview 3:  15 min. meet with Pres), but inexplicably spread out over weeks---  

     Again, why waste people's time advertising nationally, if they are so intent on discouraging outsiders?

[Hong Kong expat]

My university does 45-minute interviews, and for overseas candidates they are by phone or video.