Billionaire's gift eliminates student loan debt for 396 students.

[donner]

Y'all that think professors have a tough job should try to match the hours that Oklahomabassin, myself and others in the real world have to work in adverse conditions.

I don't need to pontificate, we know where the real work in this world goes on, and it's not in an airconditioned office with some snowflake papers in front of us to grade.

I know a guy who is a professor of chemistry. Teaches some 'snow flakes' from time to time, but also spends his days in his air conditioned lab working to create drugs that battle cancer. Does that qualify as 'real work'?

 

[donner]

I don’t have a chip on my shoulder but I, like many, think that colleges and local public schools have too many highly paid Professors and Administrators in positions that could be and should be consolidated. I also think it’s stupid to loan thousands of dollars, sometimes hundreds of thousands, to kids that have no clue what they want to be when they grow up. When and if they do graduate they have huge loans to repay and in many cases, the education they received is worth no where near the cost they paid.
I’m sure there are a lot of hard working people in these schools as well and a lot of students that apply themselves in classes that will enable them to get a good job when they graduate. The system is in dire need of revamping. Whether that will ever happen or not remains to be seen.
I don’t have the apparent vast knowledge of the system you claim to have acquired. I went to 1 semester at UCO back in the day where I majored in cutting my English class to go play golf. I joined USMC after that semester, served 4 years, then worked at USPS for 35 years where I worked my way up from carrier to District Operations Manager. I did take several college classes along the way which required me to attend class and write a paper once in a while. I supervised a lot of college graduates over the years that decided the pay and benefits beat what they could get with their degrees. I’m retired now with a pension of just under 3 figures that will last until I die. I spend most of my time playing golf and voicing my opinion on some forums, Twitter etc. I had you on my ignored list but you bring up some good points. I’m sure glad we have you to enlighten us. Just curious, what do you do for a living now?


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Let's see if we can't tackle these in order.

1) consolidation is political in many places. Take Mississippi. We have far too many colleges for our population, but many are historical black schools from the segregation era. It's hard to talk about closing them since they still serve a majority minority population. And few legislators want to close the school they attended, so you have too many schools competing for a shrinking piece of the pie.

2) Why are schools to blame for the loans that students choose to take out, exactly? Seems like what the students really need is a parent or better education about the risks and such. Or perhaps a better understanding of their financial prospects coming out of college. (i don't think it's the schools that are telling them to expect a starting pay of high five-figures with just a bachelors. Managed expectations should fall to many people.

3) (regarding earlier discussions), how many classes a person teaches has a number of moving parts (as was noted, several times). Are they an instructor, tenure track, full professor? What field are they in and where are they teaching? What are the tenure standards they are working to meet (again, many places don't 'reward' you for being a good teacher.'). What kind of contract did the person negotiate when hired. What kind of 'deal' might they have worked out with the boss. Etc, etc.

Running a lab can get someone out of a class. Same for service jobs like being the director of graduate studies for the department or other such things. And some of the work is, my it's nature, not something that lends itself to having a lot to show at the end of any given day. My wife might spend all of her work time gathering, creating and fixing a data set before she even has a chance to start writing her paper. Not a lot to point to and say 'this is what i did today' there. And while it might not happen between 9 and 5, there have been many many days where she opens her laptop at 8 pm and closes it at midnight (or on vacation, or while we are driving somewhere). Just because it doesn't happen in a classroom, or even in her office, doesn't mean she isn't working.

And i'm guessing my GP or dentist doesn't work as hard compared to a laborer, burger flipper, or many others, but then again, they put the time in a while ago to get to that spot. Same for a lot of professors i've met.

 

[Oklahomabassin]

Y'all that think professors have a tough job should try to match the hours that Oklahomabassin, myself and others in the real world have to work in adverse conditions.

I don't need to pontificate, we know where the real work in this world goes on, and it's not in an airconditioned office with some snowflake papers in front of us to grade.

Yes, we all in every job throughout the spectrum of society contribute to the success of this country in our own way, which is why we are the great society that we are now, but I went to college too and saw a lot of folks getting a quality education and a whole lot that were there to have the "college experience".
One of my HS classmates is a professional college student. He has been going to college since 1969 and has yet to get beyond the bachelor's degree. He was on Grenada when US troops had to go in and rescue the American Citizens there. He may still be a student, I don't know. All he was in for was smoking dope and having good times. His Doctor dad financanced his endeavors.
Yeah, that's an outlier example, but just had to put it out there.

I work my tail off some days, other days go good and I don't have to work as hard. Either way, I didn't jump in this argument. Let's not throw me in.

 

[Ethan N]

I don't need to pontificate, we know where the real work in this world goes on, and it's not in an airconditioned office with some snowflake papers in front of us to grade.

Are you saying you’ve got to work in adverse conditions or do manual labor for it to be “real work?” Because the years I spent busting my butt 60-80 hours a week on salary (i.e. no overtime) building the technologies most companies use to sell their products and services sure felt like real work. And the mental strain of trying to solve problems so difficult that all of our competitors just shied away from them and sold an inferior product sure felt like real work when I collapsed at the end of most days from exhaustion without having the energy to even undress myself. Man I shudder at the thought of what real work is if that wasn’t.

 

[DavidMcmillan]

The last time I was paid overtime was when working at a Holiday Inn while I was in college. That was 1969. Now having said that, I want to say that over my years I have had the privilege of knowing folks in a great many careers, from bus drivers, company presidents, professors, lawyers, doctors, and yes, teachers. The great majority of them have been very hard workers, with very little complaints.

This thread has turned into an assault on one profession while praising other professions. We need all of you, no matter what profession you have chosen. We think Some may be over paid while others are underpaid, depending on our experiences and perceptions, but that really doesn't matter. Our job should be to do our best to meet the requirements of our position, every day, and trust others to make that same decision for themselves.

 

[druryj]

Hear! Hear!