I just can't be fucking arsed any more.

[SmashedPumpkings]

It's a rainy Monday at the beginning of assessment and marking season, and I'm at a point in my life where flouncing off forever for an early retired filled with an absence of academic bullshit feels within reach.
No longer being fucking arsed with academic life seems like a perfectly natural reaction to this context.
But, still I need to be a little bit fucking arsed because I do actually need to do my job, if only with minimal effort and if only for a decade-ish.

My lack of arsed-ness is manifesting in several ways including, but not limited to:
> Not pursuing any new research avenues unless they are genuinely innovative, fascinating and/or disruptive. I have no fucks left to give for research which is safe and intending only incremental shifts.
> Not attending conferences or workshops unless there is a clear and direct benefit to me. I have no fucks left to give for hearing about other people's safe research which inevitably results in hardly-discernible incremental shifts.
> Only writing academic articles that excite me even if they are completely left-field from my core research area and not guaranteed 3/4*. I I have no fucks left to give for spending weeks agonising over writing articles that are dull but strategic.
> Putting only minimal effort into teaching such that I ensure the basics and foundations are sound while giving no attention to the singing and dancing add-ons because, shock horror, academia is not one long Tik Tok video. I have no fucks left to give for pedagogical practice which ignores the fundamentals of sound scholarship and assessment and, instead, focuses on shiny things in the name of some bullshit strategy.
> No longer answering stupid student questions. I have no fucks left to give for students who email with questions that have been answered both in person, in lecture materials and on Ultra sites.
> Completing my citizenship role to the absolute minimal standards and at a time which is convenient for me (barring meetings of course). I have no fucks left to give for roles which have minimal kudos attached, from which I get zero satisfaction and which I believe would be more effectively, and cheaply, done by a colleague on an administrator contract.

In short, I'm working to contract whereby I'm doing my job to an adequate quality but no more than that.
Though I'm still a decade away from leaving academia, I'm already beginning the process of winding down. In six or seven years I'll dispense completely with anything which is absolutely non-essential.

Thank you for giving me the time to vent this. For obvious reasons, I've name changed.

I wonder whether anyone else just can't be fucking arsed any more? And if so, how does your not arsed-ness manifest?

I'm not being flippant or goady at all but can you point me in the direction of these jobs, please? I have never seen any jobs with a decent salary outside of academia for social scientists.
Not that I'm considering it though, TBH. I like the freedom and autonomy of academic life.

Thanks. And you know something we get excellent NSS, great module reviews and the students overall love the course. The 3rd years recently had their last session and were crying and hugging me, I had multiple flowers bought for me. Lots of students talking about how the support from the academic team has been mind blowing. So from a student pov I am getting what needs to be done, done. Not doing the bullshit makes it easier to do the actual job 😆

It’s a good idea to have boundaries, make the job work for you, and focus on what you enjoy and think has value.

You can certainly get through academic life doing the above. I have: I’ve never worked evenings or weekends, jumped through hoops or done things I think are pointless. I got to associate prof in 7 years, and like my job.

What’s not good is checking out of departmental life or teaching and leaving others to pick up the slack there. (I work in a post-92 as well where have serious issues with student wellbeing, ability, recruitment and retention - all things a lot of RG unis don’t have to think about, and I notice weren’t on your list!)

Not pursuing any new research avenues unless they are genuinely innovative, fascinating and/or disruptive. I have no fucks left to give for research which is safe and intending only incremental shifts.

It's not much better in the private sector. I'm a researcher but outside academia, I normally work independently but I've recently been working with a large research agency that's staffed by younger graduates on evaluating a government programme. I also also work on the ground with organisations and I feel that we've learnt absolutely nothing that we don't already know, and furthermore I work with organisations that are much further down the line in terms of their knowledge around the issue than the ones we are interviewing. Just because it's all new to them it doesn't mean it's actually new! I don't normally feel like this about my own research because I have the flexibility to go off in my own direction, even if that ends up being on my own time and at my own expense, I would still be learning.

I'm not an academic but I am a teacher and you sound amazing. Crack on. Im sure you are greatly valued by your colleagues and students and if you aren't then that's entirely their loss

I'm

@Marasme

"these roles may not be cool enough to interest ECRs, after all, they are rank and file R&T contracts, nothing special, up north, albeit in an "old" uni"

Haha...I would love to know what subject you are in where permanent 'rank and file R&T jobs' (what other kind of permanent jobs are there?!) don't have much competition because they are 'up north'. What are these 'cool' jobs that ECRs are interested in?!

@gyrt we re in STEM, in a specialised subfield with very specific skills (used to be that you could only apply if you got a certain vocational first degree, now a bit more democratised)

we are upfront that, in our faculty, these roles come with a substantial teaching load. They are not fancy lectureships that come with the expectation of a few lectures per year and a starter package. No money for conferences. Eat what you kill - no grants, no conference.

Typically you would have an UG teaching allocation, plus a substantial PGT one, and some PGR KPI to meet too. Research can fast become the side piece unless you bring in big grants - and when you do, well, the day is already filled by the teaching and everything else. Our weird little unit also loves teaching/our students especially the PGT which is 100% taught by us, and we are quite clear that we are not looking to recruit big egos to house them to spend their life doing what they fancy/just research and travel the world - we are looking for people who want to pass on the knowledge and educate.

last 3 lectureship advertised:
first: 7 applicants - appointee had a handful of nice papers, a couple of learnt society grants (£5k types), taught a couple of lectures before - quit after 1yr as could not bear the impact of teaching on their research

second and third - appointed on a field of about 10-15 applications each, neither had any funding experience and otherwise are "emerging researchers" with a good few postdoc papers and a few guest lectures tops.

Sorry but you don’t sound awesome to me. You sound like one of the many staff at the University my kids pay a fortune to attend who clearly agree with you that not giving a stuff about their job or the students is a badge of honour.

@andyourpointiswhat - this is not AIBU, it s a board for academics to discuss aspects of their jobs.

and... most of us love our students. Teaching is one of the nicest parts of the job. The fortune your kid pays to attend certainely does not trickle into our pockets.

I agree with you that ideally this would not be how it is. But this is how the world is in reality. Postdocs are competing for rare academic posts and you can’t stop other people working hard.

I don’t ask my postdocs to work more than they’re contracted 35 hours, I give them 2 weeks a year for their own career development, I help them any way I can. But it can’t be avoided that if they want the two academoc
posts in the discipline they’d better have a stellar record and that only comes with writing lots and lots and lots

*their

i can spell honest

Tell me you and your kids know absolutely jack shit about academia as a work place without telling me you and your kids know jack shit about academia as a work place

@andyourpointiswhat quite the opposite, like most lecturers and teachers (if you read the school threads), I enjoy time with my students. In fact, my biggest problem is them not attending, not me! I have very high student ratings and spend hours of my (non-allocated) time encouraging them, writing references, applying for studentships, internships, all kinds of things. Students themselves are not the problem. A lot of students email the lecturer with silly questions as they have not attended the classes. I would estimate one third just don't show up at all. Most lecturers, like most teachers, hate the admin side but like the students themselves. If students are keen, then there's always staff to help them at our institution anyway.

That said, it's unrealistic to always 'love' the students, some years I just teach and mark in a very straightforward way, or I'm not into it. This doesn't affect my delivery, as my assessment ratings show.

In my experience, women are the most diligent teachers/engage most with students, there are a few male colleagues who are missing in action on the student front for sure.

@Marasme

“Research can fast become the side piece unless you bring in big grants - and when you do, well, the day is already filled by the teaching and everything else.”

Erm…this is half the point of grants. To pay someone else to do that stuff, freeing up the applicant for research

Not being arsed and stripping away all the bullshit actually leaves much more time and headspace for decent teaching. I don't mean hand-holding. I don't mean putting together singing and dancing lecture delivery. I don't mean devising innovative assessments. I don't mean diversifying reading lists away from the canon. No. I mean properly decent teaching where we go back to fundamental principles and work together to understand, analyse and apply them.

Only the decent students who actually show up and engage understand and appreciate the value of this compared with, say, a module delivered through Tik Tok videos and assessed via a podcast.

@andyourpointiswhat

this is why we need to stop calling the 10k of funding universities get per child - adult actually - ‘fees’ and call it what it is - a grad tax. Comments like this show people think students are customers, paying lecturers by the hour

I think that's unfair to the OP, and to academics more broadly. If there are problems, it's because we struggle with the countless pressures of the job and care deeply - not because we don't care.

There are idiots and shirkers in every role but academics and teachers get a particularly hard time - and most people have zero idea what an academic's job actually involves.

Most of my colleagues care hugely about the students, as do I. Not all, obviously, it's a big profession, but most do.

I do think there can be a difference in perspective in terms of what "caring for students" looks like though. For academics that often means challenging courses, assessments that allow the top students to stretch themselves, lots of reading so that students are familiar with the current thinking on a topic, preparation for the workplace and professional exams, fighting grade inflation so that the value of their qualifications isn't eroded.

For students and parents, it often seems to mean being "teacher" with the kind of pastoral care expected at school, spoon feeding in preparation for exams, awarding effort rather than output ("I worked really hard on this, why did I only get 55%?") etc.

@andyourpointiswhat This isn't a subforum for parents - sorry!

I do my job professionally. Picking up on some other comments - I broke into a different field after my PhD, via the small grants and then larger grants, and being a very good teacher.

But I'm not enjoying it as much now - and can't afford the commuting costs and childcare, or the stress levels, which are affecting my health - so I'm looking around. If I can't find something, then I'll carry on.

I take my pastoral role very seriously and student wellbeing is honestly our highest priority. A large (and increasing) portion of the student fee income has gone to wellbeing services. I spend a lot of time on complex cases - this is not visible to the average student.

not in STEM / in my discipline - with typically one PI and many coIs

PI/coI time goes in as a tiny fraction and the bulk of the research funding goes to postdocs who do the research, not people covering PI's teaching and service/admin work.

the directly allocated part of the grant and the overhead does not buy out any time in my institution - you d need to land something fairly asteonomical, at £5M+ to be able to start to negotiate backfill.

plus, for every research hour on a grant, a substantial number of hours is generated in HR and finance admin, project management, reviewing data and outputs, paper writing and dissemination. Throw in a couple of researchers long term sick leaves and a recruitment delay for mat leave cover, and it s the PI doing the research and the writing also. I blame our crappy HR a lot, things should be much better.

Meanwhile ECRs are killing themselves to one day, maybe, achieve the kind of job security that would let them choose what they can be arsed with

@joycewalk

very frustrating to hear how much time you and others are spending on welfare. I don’t think it’s even safe that academics do this unless they have proper training and qualifications. It shouldn’t even be on universities imo, it’s for the NHS

My child's dissertation supervisor must feel the same as you op...5 weeks not responding to email now.

My child's dissertation is due by the end of this week.