Schools are run by administrators with students as the target market. The teachers are given tenure and academic freedom, which is a pretty good deal. What more could we want?
The tenured professors are a miniscule portion of those who carry the teaching load. It would be interesting to know what percent of college teachers, or FTE, is tenured, and what the trendlines are. My rough guess would be 80% of the instructors at a state college would be tenured, and maybe 25% at a community college. In any event, given the amount of continuing and unaccredited ed going on in USA, I'd guess the majority of FTE in adult ed in USA is taught by not-tenured instructors.
The lucky few who have tenure are out of the debate, so a powerful voice in benefitting instructors is in effect bought off. Nobody minds a system at which they win.
There is no doubt that this group would like representation. We have the term "gypsy instructors" and there is a lovely website called http://www.adjunctnation.com which advocates for adjunct rights.
Now, what rights? It seems to me that is heading in the wrong direction. To try to struggle with administrators is to play their game, acknowledging the administrators as the source of instructors weal.
Now instructors are as varied in their needs as students. Why sign on to a group that will necessarily fight limited battles for limited gains? Why put any energy into fighting at all?
Why not an organization that is designed for the instructors, not the students? What teachers want essentially is steady work, academic freedom and just compensation. The definition thereof will be unique to each instructor. They also want as little administrative requirements as possible. Then the instructors need a means for promotion and enrolling students.
The Seattle Teachers' College provides precisely that. It is modeled on the ancient system of the student paying the instructor directly. Instructor quality is doubly assured by a combination of online feedback and reviews plus student payment of instructor directly upon performance.
We need to build up a cadre of instructors so we can get a critical mass of 300 instructors and 400 courses in order to have a solid launch of one working model from which to duplicate into as many markets as the world needs. That is the task at hand. let me know if you can join us either live in the Seattle area or online worldwide.
The tenured professors are a miniscule portion of those who carry the teaching load. It would be interesting to know what percent of college teachers, or FTE, is tenured, and what the trendlines are. My rough guess would be 80% of the instructors at a state college would be tenured, and maybe 25% at a community college. In any event, given the amount of continuing and unaccredited ed going on in USA, I'd guess the majority of FTE in adult ed in USA is taught by not-tenured instructors.
The lucky few who have tenure are out of the debate, so a powerful voice in benefitting instructors is in effect bought off. Nobody minds a system at which they win.
There is no doubt that this group would like representation. We have the term "gypsy instructors" and there is a lovely website called http://www.adjunctnation.com which advocates for adjunct rights.
Now, what rights? It seems to me that is heading in the wrong direction. To try to struggle with administrators is to play their game, acknowledging the administrators as the source of instructors weal.
Now instructors are as varied in their needs as students. Why sign on to a group that will necessarily fight limited battles for limited gains? Why put any energy into fighting at all?
Why not an organization that is designed for the instructors, not the students? What teachers want essentially is steady work, academic freedom and just compensation. The definition thereof will be unique to each instructor. They also want as little administrative requirements as possible. Then the instructors need a means for promotion and enrolling students.
The Seattle Teachers' College provides precisely that. It is modeled on the ancient system of the student paying the instructor directly. Instructor quality is doubly assured by a combination of online feedback and reviews plus student payment of instructor directly upon performance.
We need to build up a cadre of instructors so we can get a critical mass of 300 instructors and 400 courses in order to have a solid launch of one working model from which to duplicate into as many markets as the world needs. That is the task at hand. let me know if you can join us either live in the Seattle area or online worldwide.
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