The ivory tower within the ivory tower

It is lovely when elite academics speak for all academics, isn't it?

Today in the Chronicle's blog section, Mark Bauerlein writes about the idea (quoted from a Wall Street Journal piece) that academics work 60+ hours a week. Titling his post "Stop Pushing Yourself," Bauerlein questions whether the 60+ hour work week is remotely necessary, or if it's just something academics do to themselves.

Can this be true, 60+ hours? 

Maybe for some segments, such as teachers with a 4-4 load that includes heavy writing assignments on the syllabus. And maybe for assistant professors struggling to get the book finished before tenure time, or researchers in the sciences working on a timetable because of funding.

But if we look at tenured professors in the humanities and in many other disciplines, it seems to me that much of the work they do is entirely self-generated. The conference papers that have to be written, the scholarly articles they want to complete, the book projects that hang over them . . . these are not required. They are elective. Yes, they can enhance a career, extend a CV, or even contribute to the historical record—sometimes. But the fact is that the degree to which the vast majority of conference papers and articles in the humanities effectively change the working conditions of professors doesn’t come close to justifying the number of hours they spend on the projects. These projects fill their afternoons and evenings, and in my experience inside academia and out I have never heard any groups speak as loudly about how “busy” they are as professors do. Plainly, the situation makes many of them unhappy. So why do they do it? Is it really worth sweating all those months getting that manuscript in order—which upon publication will sell only a few hundred copies—just to boost your annual raise a few hundred dollars?

Now, Bauerlein may not have meant to do this, but it reads to me as though he's throwing everyone who doesn't work at an R1 on a 2-2 load under the bus. It doesn't sound like he's saying, "The 60+ hour work week may be true for many, but there is a small group of faculty who, if they work that much, are creating that work for themselves." It sounds like he's saying, "There may be some people who have to work that much. But most of us only do so because we choose." I think there's a big difference in these two statements.

I'd also question his use of the word "elective." Publishing is elective, huh? That's news to me, when from every other corner you hear complaints about "deadwood" faculty who don't do what they're supposed to, which is often described as teaching well, but is also clearly understood as doing research and publishing it. How many of you know tenured faculty who have not published a page since they got tenure (at institutions with research expectations, that is)? And how many of them are celebrated for that? How many of them are considered to have flourishing careers?

I have more to say, but the first comment over at the Chronicle, by Julie Brannon, says pretty much everything I'd want to say, so I'll just quote her:

It might be useful to remember that many, many professors work at smaller schools with a heavy service requirement in addition to 4-4 teaching loads and scholarship requirements for advancement in their careers. It seems to me that a disproportionate number of those faculty are in the kind of programs where they are teaching lower division courses for the majority of their teaching loads, and that they get to teach maybe one or two upper division courses in their fields per year. In addition, the heavy service requirements generate their own intrusions into the time needed for grading during the day, and therefore much of our work is taken home to be done well into the night. Couple that with the need to participate even minimally in the kind of “self generated” work Bauerlain describes in order to be considered for that “few hundred dollars” (which is a substantial issue if one isn’t pulling in the big bucks offered to professors at larger institutions), and we get an overworked and undervalued professoriate. I won’t even include family demands outside of the job that many (primarily female) professors juggle. So that 60+ workweek seems about right to me. In discussions about the workload of professors, it appears that too many hasty generalizations are made on both sides of the issue, and that any kind of meaningful dialogue would include consideration for those thousands of us who work at smaller institutions with radically different expectations for faculty than the 2-2 fantasy life Bauerlain describes.

Comments

[arbitrista]

The reality of the 60 hr week was what persuaded me to get out of academia. It just wasn't worth it. I see what Brazen Hussy has to do and I'm like "no thanks, I'd like a life please."

[servetus]

Maybe he teaches in a country without inflation, or at an institution that gives cost of living raises. We don't get raises except for "merit," which means only publications, not teaching or service, and you need more than one to crack $1k, so anyone who is not publishing is really taking a hit.

I do wish that professors were a bit more positive about their busyness when it does result from research activity. We are, after all, ostensibly doing what we want to be doing when we do that, at least. I think, though, that more busyiness comes from teaching, service, and just plain stupid bureacracy.

[Matt Gabriele]

I work at a R1 (2-2 teaching load). I don't even think that I do too much service, though others have disagreed. Regardless, 50-60 hours/ week seems about right.

Also, as you say, if he thinks that publishing and presenting are "elective" can he please, please, please tell every T&P committee in this country that. Apparently, academia's been "doing it wrong" for a long time now.

[pace]

Some of these hardworking people might have simply developed their work habits during graduate school and have found it difficult to shut off. After all, if putting in that many hours every week helped to get one's thesis done or resulted in an additional conference or other publication, then the lesson is that the extra effort results in true rewards. If it worked in grad school, then why should the person work less in their "real" job?

[Dr. Crazy]

What annoys me is that I think the underlying argument is that we're not supposed to "count" research, conferences, etc. as "work." Even though our jobs depend on doing those things. Indeed, we should just be following our bliss or something. Unless of course we're in a sweat-shop sort of situation with an impossible to comprehend 4/4 load in a writing-intensive discipline.

You know, I hate his book Literary Criticism: An Autopsy, so I probably should have known better than to read his stupid blog. This joker certainly doesn't speak for most of the English professors I know - not even ones at elite institutions.

[Feminist Avatar]

Also, in the UK at least, you usually spend 5+ (and I know lots of people nearer 10) years on temporary contracts post PhD. What makes you employable and likely to get a permanent contracts? Publications. Effectively, the fact you did lots of teaching and admin means nothing to the future employer who only looks at how much writing you did. So 60+ hours a week beomes a necessity if you want to stay in academia.

[Chuck]

I'll hold back on the heavy-duty rant here. Suffice it to say that I'd love to scale back to a 60-hour work week about right now.

I think Dr. Crazy's point is a good one. I really love my book project, but there's no question that it's work, as are conference presentations, and other research activities.

[Janice]

You know why professors make such a fuss about working? It's because everyone likes to believe they're only putting in 8-9 hours a week, spending most of that time indoctrinating the youth of today with their evil ways.

I might understand an argument for presenting fewer conference papers and working, instead, on publications. But to suggest that all of our research and writing is make-work? Bah! Tell that to the Personnel Committees.

[Cheeky Prof]

RAmen to what Janice said. And I agree that it's so incredibly easy to work 50-60 hours per week. Once has to work really hard to not do that (something I've been struggling with for the last couple of years). And as for the tasks mentioned in the article being "elective," are you kidding me? Gee, and I thought they were necessary for tenure and promotion.

[michelle]

I've stopped reading CHE. It has too much crap in it that pisses me off.

[michelle]

PS The excerpt you provided is very smug. I'm not sure I disagree with some of the created work (not in your world but in mine - I definitely know people who create work and I teach a lot, and I still have free time), but overall, it's way too big of a topic to approach carte blanche.

[Susan]

No one has mentioned *reading* all the things that other people write. One of the negative consequences of all the "make work" publishing that people do voluntarily (because they don't need to get tenure or a raise) is that there is that much more to read.
Have I mentioned that I'm way way way behind on my reading?

Sorry for the sarcasm, but where does he live? So many people teach 3-3, or 4-4, and usually you have to prepare your classes. Most people have to grade the papers. Maybe he doesn't?

Listen, you have no idea what kind of prof MB is. He teaches the same classes every year. Tells his TAs to lecture for him when he can. Doesn't actually work with any graduate students. And he's made his academic career more lucrative by, basically, making a career out of whining about the academy.

He doesn't read other people's manuscripts or things like. He won't give a talk or write something unless there's a dollar in it. He's the darling now of conservative think tanks, and they have him on their payroll.

This column is the biggest fucking joke in the world, and it's only funnier if you knew what a phony he is.

[Laura]

I've only read through half the comments, but wanted to throw in my 2 cents anyway. At my school, I see the entire spectrum--the 3-3 load t-t folks slaving away to write enough to get tenure and not make their classes unhappy; the 2-2 load tenured faculty who never serve on committees, attend every lecture in order to complain or heckle; and who almost never publish, and the tenured faculty member who doesn't need to publish anymore, but still does, and volunteers for the hardest committees and serves as senior thesis adviser, etc. I do wish that the academy would create a better structure so that 60 hour weeks weren't necessary. There'd still be people who'd do that anyway, but it'd be nice for those who'd like to have a life to be able to.

For the record, the same is true on the administrative side. Those who work over 40 hours a week tend to be reward with prime assignments (we have no merit pay). The talk is, go home at 5, don't think about work, but the reality is, if you don't put in the extra hours, you won't get noticed.

[New Kid on the Hallway]

Hey, folks, if we can keep this focused on the post that's quoted above, and not on MB personally, that would be great - I have no problem with making fun of a silly published bit till the cows come home, but would like to avoid the ad hominem arguments.

And yes, I think it's important to note that academics (generally) love their research, but that doesn't make it any less work. I do agree there are people out there - at all levels - who create work for themselves, or even better, the ones who, when you ask, how are you?, tell you HOW busy they are because they have THIS article that's due in a week and THAT paper to write for the conference they're going to in two weeks, and then yet ANOTHER paper for the end of the semester, and oh, they just have so much work to do! My response to such people (internally) has always been, I get it, you're important, you do important research and attend important conferences, give it a rest already!

But honestly, those people? A small percentage of the academics I know. I completely agree with Janice that the bigger problem is not that academics work so much (people in other fields do, too), but that no one thinks it's work. Including, I guess, Mark Bauerlein.

[Ari]

Why is Bauerlein himself off limits? He's written a highly personal column, totally bereft of any data. This is your (wonderful, by the way) blog, of course. I'm not quibbling, in other words. But I do wonder why you think it's not okay to say that he's become a fraud who makes his bones by snarking about intellectual welfare -- all the while, of course, fattening his bank account with wingnut welfare?

[New Kid on the Hallway]

Honestly? Because I've had a Chronicle author write me privately to berate me for the fact that an anonymous commenter wrote "inaccurate" things about them on a post I made about that person's column, telling me that I needed to engage in fact-checking, and it was kind of annoying. I highly doubt Bauerlein is even aware of my existence, or that if he were, he'd respond in the same way; he's written enough controversial stuff that I don't see him getting bent out of shape at the piddly comments of a pseudonymous nobody. But nonetheless, it left a bad taste in my mouth.

I think what I really mean is, stick to the stuff we have written evidence for - his Chronicle blog as a whole, his other written work - you know, the published stuff. While the comments about his attitudes to teaching and service to the profession, well, they don't ring false? but I can't go verify that stuff.

So, Berube talking about the sad Hogarthian slide of Bauerlein's Decline - which is awesome - is one thing, because it's about his professional writing. But it seems a little off to talk about how he treats his TAs - unless someone is willing to say, I was his TA, and this is what he did, I guess.

The sad thing is that such practices definitely fit with what he's written and probably shouldn't be separated out from his other stuff, when he's writing about all the responsibilities of a professor. But while I have no problems with saying X or Y thing that Bauerlein wrote is idiotic, I kind of want to avoid saying Bauerlein kicks kittens in his spare time.

[Ari]

That's fair. I just want to make sure that it's okay to talk about the facts we have, including the fact that Bauerlein has become a fraud.

If an Emory graduate student (or, for that matter, I guess, a faculty member) were to email you to verify some of this stuff, would you post it for us anonymously? None of us are going to use our names here.

The reason I think it's relevant is that MB is talking about the work habits of the department. His own work habits therefore become valid as evidence of the kind of workplace he'd like the academy to be.

[New Kid on the Hallway]

Yes, I'll post something from an anonymous Emory person, if they want to send it (and I completely do NOT blame such a person for not wanting to post names!). I agree that his work habits are relevant - in the post I quote, for instance, he entirely ignores service, or even teaching, which is REALLY telling - but they can be hard to address in the same manner as published writing. But yes, I'll post something.

[Ari]

Huh, an earlier comment seems to have been gobbled. So here we go again: will you direct me to a post that will explain what happened at your old job? I'd like to be able to follow what's going on around here, but I'm too lazy (or maybe too busy with voluntary work) to really comb through the archives.

Thanks.

[Amy]

Aaah, what I wouldn't give for a 4-4 load. I'm required to teach a 5-5 and have been known to teach a 6-6.

Yes, we generate work for ourselves... I assign essays that I know will take me longer to grade than my colleagues multiple choice exams. I rework my classes each semester to make them better and better. I even *try* to squeeze in research, although at my CC it's not required. Do I *have* to do any of this? Nope. Do I want to be the best teacher I can be and give the students the best experience in my classroom I can give them? Yes.

[New Kid on the Hallway]

Ari - the debacle begins here, with dissections in the next few following posts. Enjoy. :-P

[Professor de Breeze]

blah, blah, blah community colleges blah, blah, blah 5-5 load blah, blah, blah 135 students blah, blah, blah 3000 pages of grading blah, blah, blah.

So says Community College Man. Now my duty is done. :)

In short, I second what Amy says above. There are a lot of levels to that ivory tower.

[dhawhee]

Thanks for posting this, NK. I didn't have time to read all the comments, so maybe someone said this already, but it also sounds to me like it is very much written by a man at a r-1. For my part, a 50 hour week at my r-1 is an easy week. This is not because of the "elective" articles and books (though for crying out loud these are what our pay raises are based on), but because of reviewing all the other scholarship--article reviews, tenure reviews, colleague reviews--that is supposed to receive a stamp of approval before going on. Oh, and the letters of recommendation. These parts of the job do not seem to me elective. Someone has to do them, and with very many important exceptions, it is all too often the tenured women.

[PhilosopherP]

I think what is missed and important to all of this is that the higher your level of education, the more 'professional' demands you are able to place on yourself... that doesn't make them any less demanding, but it does mean that we have the ability to decide what we will do and how/when we do it. That isn't all bad...

and, for de Breeze -- a 5/5 with 135 students sounds pretty good... in my department 5/5 usually means 230-250 students, with writing assignments etc.

I still don't think it is all that bad, of course, I was a McDonalds manager and an undergrad at an R-1 at the same time... so maybe my perspective is a bit off.