On being a geek

11. September 2008 · Write a comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: ,

Tim Burke writes about his personal experience of growing up as an intellectual, interested in reading and knowledge over other “mainstream” interests. I’ve been thinking about this a lot myself, and writing about it elsewhere. My life took a kind of weird turn late in middle school into high school where I abandoned much of my geekdom (except reading a lot) and opted to attempt to hang with the popular crowd. By my senior year, I’d become much more jaded about what it meant to be popular and tried to be my own person. Honestly, I think I didn’t really become comfortable with who I am until about 10 years ago.

I was struck by a story Tim related in his post, not about my own experience as a geek, but about my experience as a staff member. He talks about hearing a story from an uncle who served in the military about the way soldiers were treated by officers. Ten-year-old Tim offers up the suggestion that this has always been the case, back to Sargon the Great (I had to look it up myself). Tim was trying to make a connection, trying to show he knew something about the topic and that he could relate to the story in some way. The uncle, of course, didn’t see it that way. And Tim recognizes what may have been the key issue:

Still, there’s a fundamental asymmetry. I could take what he said and add it to my knowledge, make use of it. He couldn’t take what I said unless he followed me into formal knowledge, or trusted me so much that what I said was in the books was as good as truth.

Had I been there, had I even been the uncle, I would have said, “Really? I didn’t know that. Who’s Sargon the Great?” But I am always hungry for more knowledge and never afraid to admit that I don’t know something. To me, that’s not a sign of weakness. But what that made me think of was the way that a lot of staff would respond the way I might. I’m not talking just the “academic” staff (librarians and the like), but also administrative assistants, housekeepers, and others. After being around faculty and students, they often take a genuine interest in their work and see that as being a benefit, getting to talk to people about intellectual things, learning something new.

The asymmetry I often see goes the other way. Faculty often take no genuine interest in the thoughts or ideas of the staff. We have among our staff talented musicians, artists, woodworkers, writers, amateur historians, athletes, and more. We have people who’ve done interesting things in their lives and who’ve been to interesting places. And while I’ve seen some faculty take real interest in what staff have to offer, I’ve seen that when staff speak at discussion groups about these issues, fewer faculty attend than when it’s a faculty member speaking about their research. I’ve seen one-sided conversations where staff ask about research or classes and the faculty member asks nothing about what someone might have done over the summer or what books they’ve read or movies they’ve seen. I tend to have the confidence to assert myself in such conversations, but many staff may not, may not see that what they know is of value.

I’m not saying this to say, “Hey you faculty jerks, take some interest.” I don’t think the lack of interest is intentional or malicious. Many faculty must and do spend a lot of time focused on their subject matter and that’s certain to affect what they talk about and how. But it might be another explanation for the distaste “regular” people have toward intellectuals. It may not be just insecurities, but also a feeling of being slighted.

Please consider donating to my efforts in the Susan G. Komen 3-Day Walk for the Cure

Administrative work is intellectual work

12. December 2007 · Write a comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,
I’ve had this post brewing for a while, but New Kid’s recent post where she contemplates leaving academe prompted me to actually write it. The dilemma faced by many faculty thinking of leaving is wondering whether work outside of academe will offer intellectual challenges and rewards or if it will turn them into mindless corporate or administrative drones. While I’m sure there are jobs that would not be intellectually fulfilling, a lot of jobs become what you make them. Academic administration, to me, offers the best possibility of having intellectual fulfillment. Anyone who reads Dean Dad regularly should see that there’s a lot of intellectual work going into making decisions related to running an institution. I’ve been thinking about what makes these jobs hard brain work as opposed to simply pencil pushing.*

  • First, some administrators, perhaps not at the highest levels, are able to maintain a research agenda in their area of research. I still do research and write papers and give presentations. And I’m able to pursue whatever interests I have since I’m not bound to covering certain areas. I feel that I can pursue research related to my work while I’m at work. If I veered too far from that, I’d probably pursue that outside of work.
  • There are always problems to solve. They may not be the same kind of problems a researcher works on, but they still require a lot of thought–and often some research. These often require critical thinking skills from a very different perspective than when doing academic research, but it’s still quite challenging.
  • Textual analysis. In its simplest form, this can be reading between the lines of memos and emails. But it can also be about analyzing legal documents and contracts or proposals for grants or projects.
  • Writing. My god, the writing. I write more now than I ever did, and the writing needs to be carefully crafted and thought out. I have to attend to audience in a way I never did before–multiple audiences at once! I’ve written all kinds of documents since I’ve been on the administrative side: daily email, proposals, evaluations (both of me and others), documentation, web content, pr material. I like the variety. Because academe is a very text-driven environment, good writing skills are not only appreciated, they’re crucial to getting real work done.
  • Teaching. In my line of work, there’s a lot of teaching. I work with both faculty and students. I’ve done individual tutorials and workshops. I’ve created materials for workshops and I’ve created materials for the “self-taught.” I’ve also had the opportunity to teach courses in the college curriculum. Many places will offer this as an opportunity if you have the experience and the desire (and time!) to teach. So teaching can be a part of an administrative job. But also, there’s a lot of teaching that goes on in trying to articulate institutional goals, in showing how decisions were made and how they affect individuals, really in almost every conversation you have.

Honestly, a lot of these jobs are what you make them. If you want to treat it like a mindless job, then it will be. But if you bring all your intellectual skills to bear, that approach will be appreciated and will make the job more fulfilling. There are a lot of differences between these jobs that are worth noting.

  • Institutional perspective. I’m still surprised by how many faculty, despite the fact that they run the place don’t have an institutional perspective. They still think only of their little corner of the world, their own pet peeves. As an administrator, you have to think more broadly, even at the lowest levels sometimes, you have to do this. You have to think about what’s best for the institution and not about what’s best for a particular department or particular faculty member. Balancing individual and institutional needs is a real challenge, one that requires a lot of thought.
  • Working in groups. Unless you’re in the sciences where collaboration is common, most faculty moving out of academe will struggle with the idea of relying on others to do parts of their work for them. Also, you have to think about forming appropriate teams to get work done and to participate in teams in an effective way. This requires a great deal of cooperation and diplomacy. It can get frustrating when you’re used to just doing everything yourself, but in the end, it’s important to include a lot of people.
  • Lack of prestige and respect. The upper administration is almost universally reviled by faculty and there’s very little love for the support staff either. That’s something to get used to. I still struggle with it a little, but I’ve also learned that your actions can earn you a lot of respect. It just takes a very long time.

I’m sure I’ve left things out on both lists. Maybe other administrators out there will chime in.

*I’ve always thought it was funny to call administrators in academe pencil pushers, when the real pencil pushers are the faculty. Outside the classroom, there’s all that grading and writing, not a lot of action.




Powered by ScribeFire.

Please consider donating to my efforts in the Susan G. Komen 3-Day Walk for the Cure

Life-long employment

02. December 2007 · Write a comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,
Dean Dad has written a couple of posts recently that take on the sacred cow of tenure. It’s a theme that comes up again and again in the academic blogosphere. I think Dean Dad, New Kid, Dr. Crazy, and others have done an excellent job of covering several different perspectives on the issue. I have two perspectives to offer: faculty spouse and non-administrative staff.

First, I want make a few random comments. A few commenters at Dean Dad’s have said directly or indirectly that “tenure is all we have.” I find that both wrong and sad. I know faculty salaries are often lower than they should be, given the amount of schooling and other preparation the job takes. But there are plenty of other benefits besides tenure that are important: health insurance, child care benefits, tuition remission and benefits for children, generous vacation time (winter and spring breaks, summer) etc. These vary, of course, by institution. Tenure may be an excuse for institutions to not offer better salary and benefits. Instead of saying, “tenure is all we have,” maybe faculty should ask themselves what they really want and then ask their administrators for it. Anyone who’s been in a job outside of academe (with a few exceptions) knows that the benefits at many academic institutions are much better than you can get in the “real world.”

Second random thought. I keep thinking how gendered much of the discussion is. Not only is tenure a “pre-modern” concept, as DD describes it, it relies to a large extent on the “pre-modern” family structure as well, which includes having a wife at home.

Speaking of wives, as a faculty spouse myself, I’ve been through the tenure ringer, not once, but twice. I’ve moved to two different places for my husband’s job. Moving might still be required even without a tenure system, but it might be possible to imagine treating the job as just a job without the tenure system. There were many days over the 10 years that Mr. Geeky was pursuing tenure when he came home for dinner, then went right back to work. I know many other faculty who didn’t even come home for dinner. Besides the physical absence, there was emotional absence as well. Mr. Geeky was pretty good about this, but many aren’t. Although I’m not unhappy with the choices we made as a family, the whole tenure process is extraordinarily hard on families, including living separately to forcing much of the household upkeep to the spouse to not even being able to pursue a family in the first place. The problems of work-life balance are not unique to academe, of course, but it presents problems that are often not found in the “regular” workforce, many tolerated in pursuit of the reward of tenure.

From the perspective of a staff member, tenure can create tensions between faculty and staff. Tenure often gives faculty a sense of entitlement that causes them to behave badly toward the staff. Staff often don’t understand the tenure process and the pressure faculty feel which they may project onto the staff. Most staff think of their jobs as just jobs so they don’t get someone who pursues their job as their life. In turn, faculty can’t understand why someone would leave or not be available on weekends. Staff don’t know how to react to requests that come in at all hours with too little notice. They don’t understand the frustration of faculty when they don’t respond pronto. Interestingly, there’s often not a huge disparity in salary or benefits between faculty and staff, but in privilege. I don’t know that getting rid of the tenure system would alleviate these problems, but it might be a step in the right direction.

I think DD is right. We need to move on.


Powered by ScribeFire.

Please consider donating to my efforts in the Susan G. Komen 3-Day Walk for the Cure