Andrew Norton beat me to the punch on the latest op/ed emanating from the home of torture supporting academics, the Deakin Law School. The article in question, by prolific op/edder James McConvill, in effect claims that public responses to controversial ideas by academics will discourage them from doing research. As Andrew noted, after Jeff Sparrow spotted the inconsistency, it’s significant that the Fairfax version of the article left out the defence of Bagaric and Clarke present in the Online Opinion piece.
McConvill has published, in the space of two weeks, this piece, an article supporting a return of Paul Keating, and some reactionary musings on the role of women. None of the articles appear to be based on his own research, nor particularly on “a genuine love of learning, knowledge on a wide range of matters and a concern for public issues”. It seems a little precious under the circumstances for McConvill to claim that “fresh and challenging ideas” are being denigrated in the media because the public doesn’t take the time to “understand them”. One thing that definitely doesn’t work in the public sphere is a claim to privilege on the basis of academic status alone.
I’m writing a reply to McConvill commissioned by Online Opinion, so keep an eye out for a longer discussion of this and the previous Bagaric/Clarke torture furore next week. In the meantime, I’d be grateful for any comments.
Elsewhere: More at News from Nowhere.
McConvill made many points in his op-ed. Everyone has picked up on ‘academics get no respect’. This is not true - the op-ed editor for the SMH would never have published such a long rambling piece by just anybody! Anyway, respect is earned. I suspect he was complaining about not getting any respect amongst other academics (i.e. the other law academics at Deaking don’t rate him). Surely that’s his problem and not worthy of op-ed space in the SMH. Mind you they barely publish my letters and have never published an op-ed by myself. Anyway, a good point related to academics not doing any research and not even pretending to be ‘intellectual’. While he may have had a romantised view of academic life before he began, nonetheless that is something worth debating and thinking about. But as Andrew said, ‘half baked’.
Sinclair, I plan to look at the other issues he raises in my longer response. I suspect he may have a bit of a romanticised view of academic life - a lot of it isn’t particularly intellectual in my experience.
I’ve heard quite a few academics say they’d love to publish more and do more research, but the workload of teaching and administrivia is quite punishing and the need to push through the students, keep up-to-date with marking and the ever-present academic politics make it hard to find the time to do quality work. I don’t know how true this is, not being much in academia anymore, but it seems to be something I’ve heard from quite a few of my fellow students who have now moved into the hallowed halls.
That’s on the money, Kate.
Yes, in fact its often just not the teaching load, but the time-consuming compliance with adminstrative regimes. A good part of it occasioned by Nelson - for our sins no doubt.
But there’s been quiet revolution in unviersities the last 15 years - the rise of the manager / adminstrator. They now outnumber academics in most universities, and, their role consists of:
a. constructing new and increasingly pointless regimes for us to comply with,
b. sacking/ casualising academics, and otherwise streamlining the productive part of the unis, in order to
c. hire more adminstrators.
The more of us they sack, the more they grow. AT McConvill’s university, eg, I happen to know on good authority, they outnumber academic staff 3:2.
Mind you - the op-ed problem is different. Many academics simply cant write. Journals will put up with any turgid prose, but not newspapers.
I think we need to distinguish between on one hand, School and Departmental administrators who often hold a chaotic show together with amazing good grace, and on the other, the supernumary teams closeted away in Chancelleries, Lefty Elitist.
A few years ago, I was involved with a “research concentration” at QUT - a fiction in effect as every “research-active” (always reminds me of radioactive) academic had to apportion a certain % of their workload to either a research centre (real) or a research concentration (fictional for the most part) and we got a letter from the University’s “Internationalisation Officer” asking what we were doing to internationalise ourselves. It seems that the University Council had adopted a policy on Internationalisation and the way of implementing its vague parenthood statements was to hire a bureaucrat who occupied themselves by sending out forms to fill out. Buggered if I know what they did for the rest of the year apart from the “reporting periods”. Went to meetings, I imagine.
Also had a chat to a consultant for an unnamed university who was paid 20k to design a “corporate look” for the website. He told me it took him a day and the people who let the tender had no idea what work was actually involved. But somehow money for stuff like tutors and marking can never be found!
You’re right Mark - but I wasnt blaming our deeply oppressed general staff friends - rather, the new central management class with their crazed, empty-mottoed banzai charges into new form-filling futures: Quality! (read: quantity) Internationalise! (read: sell semi-English speaking International students a degree they cant fail) Commercialise!(read: whoredom) Online! (read: write the course, then we own it, then we sack you)
Friend of mine got into a screaming match about how we couldn’t “internationalise” the “content” in Australian Industrial Relations once with one of the said management class, but you know what, I think she was wrong and Howard has done it!
The scam of selling courses to not really English speaking students is outrageous. Everybody loses. It used to be only dodgy fly by night outfits that did this. Seems even Melb Uni does it now. Masters of this that or the other. No worries. Just sign a cheque.
Well, that’s what I’m told.
Lest anybody miconstrue my concern as somehow based in xenophobia, my main worry is for the students themselves. They are the meat in the parent/institution sandwich. Watch this space is my tip.
I’m inclined to agree, wbb, having taught international students and seen the woeful support most academic institutions give them. They’re too often cynically exploited as cash cows.
Mind you, the new mangagerialism is a step up from the rank Thatcherism of tertiary teaching in the UK in the early 90s. At least a rhetoric of quality. The following events are real, and occurred in my workplace in London circa 94/5:
- We had a ‘manager’. Not a head of school or anything vaguely educationalist title. He used to prowl around, make sure we were teaching. I used to look at him mid-lecture, thinking “what the f*ck else would I be doing, mate, standing in front of these people?”
- The university had an ‘asset-mangemnet policy’ which involved the economically rational pose of paying all bills as late as possible, and keeping the interest. This resulted in non-payment of bills for the central exam for a UK wide subject. As such, our students were not permitted to sit it. They all failed.
- They took so long to pay for some computers that the old stock became redundant, the price went up, and they had to pay 50% more.
- They took so long to issue contracts to part time and casual staff that some weren’t paid till December, for the Septmeber term. This practice was widespread until a barrister and p-t law lecturer sued them. Yes, we had to sue our employer for wages.
Ahh, those were the days.
Conversely, when I was doing a Graduate Diploma, we had a p/t law lecturer (before the University took “part time” off the shared room and replaced it with “casual” in case anyone got any ideas that they had any employment rights) who was a Barrister who didn’t turn up for half the classes because he was off preparing a case.
Indeed wbb… and this is one of the most unworkable, daft things about VSU. The student unions are the only thing between international students and complete loneliness, alienation … and possibly going postal under the stress. They run everything the internatioanl students rely on: clubs, orientation, social events … It will truly ruin the income stream universities rely on.
Lefty elitist - I think there has been an increase in the number of senior administrators in universities over the years, all those deputy VCs etc. But the statistics don’t match the common impression of proliferating administrators and a shrinking academic staff. In fact the ratios are quite stable. I have a consistent time series going back to 1988, when non-academic staff were 58.24% of all staff. They are now 57.74%. Another series has the proportion at 57% non-academic in 1976. Given the new functions absorbed by non-academic staff over the years, such as IT support and marketing for overseas students, and the massive increase in government bureaucracy, it looks as if universities have applied efficiencies to general staff as well as to academic staff. Within the non-academic staff, the core administrative staff have slightly shrunk in % terms since 1990 - 56.72% then, 54.95% now, with ‘academic support’ and ’student service’ %s slightly up.
Disclosure of conflict of interest: I work p-t in uni admin, but the statistics are from DEST.
Are those stats FTE, Andrew? My recollection of looking at the same stats was that there were a lot more casual academics than in 1988 but most administrative staff are full time.
There is something funny going on (as always). I’ve seen Andrew’s stats, I’ve also seen the proliferation of administrator types - not the HEW 3 - 5 types who prevent most academic departments from falling apart, but the other types. Part of the problem, I suspect, is that many of the senior admin types carry academic titles and are on the books as academics even though they don’t teach or research. We need to see numbers for university staff who teach and research and those who do not teach and research (some debate here as to what ‘teach and research’ means would be good too - given seminars to teaching staff on how to teach should not count as teaching IMO).
Mark - They are FTE. I can’t recall exactly how they convert casuals to FTE, though I do remember one Dean complaining that it made his student:staff ratio look worse than it was, ie some casuals can be full or near full-time for a certain period but are not counted as such. On the other hand, there are casual tutors doing a few hours a week.
Sinclair - This is a good point. I will see if I can find data based on current function. I don’t think it will have a dramatic impact, but it would shift a few hundred people from academic to general.
Yes, Andrew, the point Sinclair makes about researching and teaching is a salient one. Presumably casualisation of the academic workforce produces more staff who aren’t paid to research (though obviously a lot are higher degree students - but it’s not the same in terms of expectations, I’d argue).
The other thing to take into account is people working with job titles like Senior Research Assistant or Research Associate who are in many universities appointed and paid on the general staff HEWA scale.
QUT, where casualisation is something of an artform has (from memory) about a third of the number of permanent academic staff (research and teaching) as UQ does, with about the same number of students.