To think academics are seriously entitled??

[Bananavibez]

Met a bunch of lecturers at party last night. Dont think ive ever met such an entitled bunch. Nice pay for minimal hours but complaining about how they have to answer loads of emails (??). One of them in their 60s actually admitted they would't meet the qualification requirements for their role if they were applying for it today.
So much bitching and whining and all i could think was "so how come you've stuck with this job for decades then, you could have gone out to work in industry if its so awful"...

Well is it any different to a teacher complaining about their admin load ? Lecturers are teachers after all

and many people in their 60s won’t meet today’s entry requirements - but that doesn’t mean they can’t do the job which has evolved over time as like as not.

minimal hours? I really have to question that because my dad lecturered for a number of years and the hours were anything but minimal. 9 till 5 as a minimum working with students either lectures or tutorials or one one one work , and lecture prepping evening and weekends was quite difficult to accept at times how much time he was working and all that evenings and weekend was unpaid

I’m surprised you were invited to whatever event this was tbh!

Don’t all people moan about their workload? I know I do….

everyone likes a bloody good moan. It helps us all keep going. No matter how fab or not work conditions are.

Why? Is it not usual to invite plebs?

Having done both jobs definitely not alike.

University is a walk in the park compared to teaching secondary school.

They wouldn't use double question marks though

But it is unusual to invite judgy critical people that aren’t well liked

Friday drinks with colleagues - totally normal to have a whinge

It doesn’t sound like you have any idea what the job entails.

If someone in their 60s wouldn’t get a job today that’s because the publication threshold is so ridiculously high. We now routinely interview people for entry level roles who not only have a PhD but two books, a raft of articles and a lot of teaching and public engagement experience. The salary is not high for people who are that qualified. There are also a lot of staff on precarious or hourly paid contracts which don’t reflect the volume of work delivered. This doesn’t mean the person in their 60s is useless, it reflects a crazy threshold for getting an academic job now.

The hours are not minimal either. I’ve worked nearly every weekend this year, and most evenings. I took two weeks holiday this summer and two days in April. When I was a junior lecturer, I was earning less per hour than the department secretary because of the unpaid overtime.

As for emails, I got 200 yesterday but my day was back to back with meetings and teaching which meant that the emails could only be dealt with after the working day ended. That is pretty much the norm for me.

I don't think it's particularly good pay, and a lot of the job after a certain level is just chasing funding.
Dh considered it, glad he didn't. Lots of reasons, but the first thing was the department he was considering joining, lost all the funding the next year, and they had to relocate to a different university and their research subtly changed on the outside, but to those who were in there said it was a massive change.

Most lecturers are not going into it because they love teaching. They teach because they love their subject and are doing research in that area. The teaching is a necessary evil to get paid. What they'd like to do is just research.

And when any group of any career get together, they'll moan about the aspects of the job they don't like. Good way of bonding.

YABU, you don’t know what you’re talking about. The pay is far from great for the level of qualification and often experience that’s required. Universities are in crisis and lecturers are kind of the front for a failing system and have to deal with all kinds of shit you can’t even imagine from the students. They have to cover for the university management which is often a shitshow. They face immense pressure to advance their careers by bringing in money for the university from an ever decreasing source. The research and teaching they wanted to do when they got into the whole schtick ends up compromised to the point that it feels out of reach.

Okay, I am taking your points on board and fair enough. I suppose what would turn me off it is the lack of scope for moving around. Eg if you lecture in X at Y university, and you want to move city/don't like your team, you're pretty much screwed because how often do jobs come up in your field realistically, and the competition must be insane.

Professional whinges at a party about their job and how different it was when they started 40 years ago. In other news bears shit in the woods.

FFS. Substitute lecturer for teacher, police officer, nurse, accountant, tv producer, surveyor, care assistant, bus driver. Everyone has those exact same conversations. Have you never spoken to anyone at a party before OP?

I'd rather be a lecturer than any of the jobs you list.
One of them was complaining about how she had to be on campus for 3 days rather than 2 this year 😳

Do you work @Bananavibez ? If so, what as?

Every academic I know works a minimum of 50 hours a week, and that includes summer travels with the exception of the typical British annual leave. In term time it is more like 60 hours.

Might this person have been moaning about students who expect instant, personal replies to questions that are in fact answered carefully on the syllabus for the course unit or similar? Our policy is to reply to all emails within two business days. Oddly, it is the students who can’t be bothered to read carefully written course materials - or or turn up to, or even watch, the lectures where these are discussed - who are most insistent that their emails be answered instantly.

Naturally people moan about this. It doesn’t mean we dislike students.

IME academics, like teachers, do an awful lot of work outside of college/uni; marking, admin etc, and not often for extra pay. They also want time to do their own research, attend conferences, write books etc, not to mention in the arts pursue their own artistic practice. There’s precious little time for it all.

SOME academics are entitled yes. There's a few profs in my department who do fuck all and whinge because they have to answer their emails. But they are a dying breed, the vast majority of us are working long hours and still can't keep up with the workload. So YABU to think we're all like the bores you met.

But surely anyone who was used to working 3/5 days at home and whose hours changed to having to work only 2/5 days at home would whinge to colleagues?

Strong disagree about pay as well - it’s very poor compared with what other countries pay, and the pensions which used to make up for it have been slashed in recent years.

Do yoi think a PhD should actually be required to be a lecturer? Because for some of the more hands-on courses that seems like total overkill. It also strikes me as a bit weird because PhDs are really expensive these days, so it means realistically the only people who will be able to become professional academics going forward will have a certain degree (😜) of privilege.

Where did you get the idea the hours are minimal?

A lecturer isn’t just a teaching role. Teaching only comprises 40% of the role. If you are going to be a researcher, bringing in funding that pays for the facilities and subject knowledge that underpins teaching at undergraduate and postgraduate level, then, yes, you need a PhD.

And there is funding for PhDs. Most people who are in academic roles will have been funded for their PhDs.

I’ve been made to go into the office 3 days rather than 2 this year and I’ve whinged like hell about it. I’m not a lecturer!