<p>Is there a good source for what percentage of a university's courses are really being taught by professors, not TAs or lecturers? </p>
<p>I was on the website of one of the schools my S applied to, looking for information on an honors program when I stumbled on a memo talking about some of the problems they were having in his chosen major. It turns out that by their figures only 23% of their instructional hours were taught by tenure track faculty! The memo acknowledged it was possible for someone to get a degree without ever having a class taught by a tenure-track person. While they protested that their lecturers could be tenure track at other schools, the provost wouldn't let them add more faculty until they got that number much higher, a more credible 60%. What was most surprising was that the memo proposed to reach that number by limiting overall enrollment and increasing class sizes (i.e., put more students in the classes professors were teaching rather than putting more professors to actually teaching classes). It was an amazing read. Oh, I confess it was marked "draft".</p>
<p>Fortunately, my S decided to go to a different school, but this was his second choice. They're nationally ranked school in this program. That's got to be frightening.</p>
<p>"Taught by profs" or "taught by TAs" can be ambiguous. For example, if a class has lectures twice a week by a prof and one weekly section led by a TA, is that class taught by a prof? or 66% by a prof and 33% by a TA? There are some classes in which the prof lectures once a week, and there are 2-hour discussion sessions led by a TA. Is that taught by a prof? or 33% by the prof and 66% by TAs?
There are some college introductory classes that are indeed taught by TAs (I'm thinking about multivariable calculus and linear algebra, for instance); some language classes may also be taught by preceptors. But many others are taught by profs with the help of TAs as I described above. The prof sets the syllabus and holds weekly meetings of TAs to prepare for the sections, tries to ensure uniformity of expectations across sections, etc...
I'd be very interested in learning more about how the school provided only 23% of instructional hours by faculty.</p>
<p>Strick, care to share the name of the school since your son won't be going there?</p>
<p>I have found that it is very important to really dig into a school's information if you have any hope of uncovering this type of thing. In some cases, I've been able to look at the class schedules for several semesters (online) for a particular department and then compare the names of the teachers to the actual faculty list - I have also found that you can sometimes track down very interesting "memo's" and reports like you did online with a few searches. Of course, you can always ask the department themselves but sometimes they are pretty cagey about replying --- students can be a better source.</p>
<p>Can't really say, Marite, but I understand your point. They used the figure without explaining what it means. I could be mis-interpreting things a little. The phrase they used was "student credit hours" not instructional hours. And they were supposed to get from 23% to 60%.</p>
<p>If they are talking of credit hours, I would assume they mean classes rather than hours taught by profs. vs. hours taught (or led) by TAs. For example, a class would carry 3 credit hours.</p>
<p>My brother is a non-tenure-track professor in journalism at a major mid-western university. I expect his 40 years of working for a major east coast daily newspaper are a real asset for his students, though, which might be why they keep him around.</p>
<p>So, let's clarify. Are these qualified professors who don't happen to be tenure-track? Or are they inexperienced TAs? Or early-professor PhDs who are being used as low-cost labor?</p>
<p>A good proxy is to look at US News or the Common Data set for the percent of classes over 50. TAs generally don't teach courses on their own, they supplement in huge classes. Generally elite schools have 75% of their courses under 50 while big state schools have only 50% under 50 students. Class size is a fair proxy.</p>
<p>one of my daughters favorite profs is non tenure track and will be leaving after this year. He has been there at least 4 years, but apparently has to be moving on.
Totally qualified prof however.</p>
<p>her school doesn't have TAs ( well officially anyway) I think they do have students who assist the prof in labs and such.</p>
<p>That still means that over 75% of their classes are taught by TAs? </p>
<p>Somehow the number of students in a class is a factor, too, or their proposal wouldn't make any sense. Perhaps the the number of students times the number of semester hours is the base number and they track the total by tenure and non-tenure track teaching? That would take class size into account better. </p>
<p>Regardless, they want the number of students in a tenure track class to go up by 50% over the next 5 years. That would still only get them to 43% "student credit hours" taught by tenure-track people.</p>
<p>Carolyn, I'm nervous about the amount of information I've already shared.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I have found that it is very important to really dig into a school's information if you have any hope of uncovering this type of thing.
[/quote]
Carolyn, do you have any suggestions for 'uncovering' this kind of thing, or even interpreting or extrapolating from their schedule of courses.
My D is in the process of narrowing her school list, and that is certainly one criterion that she may use.</p>
<p>I honestly can't speak to who's teaching by sides normal professors in this case. The school is pretty well known for large classes.</p>
<p>emeraldkity4, at least when I was graduate student, a professor with a Phd was generally considered tenure track, at least until he or she learned they weren't going to be offered tenure, at which point they usually moved to another school. I was young then and wouldn't be surprised if there was more to it than that or to learn it's all changed.</p>
<p>Ah, I see by my google it has. A new class of professors, adjuncts has arisen. What I read portrays adjuncts as the migrant workers of higher education. If that's what we're talking about, it probably bothers me less than the thought of TA, particularly after having been such a bad one myself.</p>
<p>our large state U also has a class called "lecturers" which are FT, non-tenure track positions. Many have PhDs, but they don't have to do research. Since they are evaluated on teaching almost exclusively, most are very good teachers. (Not all Nobel Laureates have a good personality to relate to 18 year olds.)</p>
<p>There is no good way to find out short of attending the classes. The numbers in USN&WR are not helpful at all because they include course where the professor walks in after everyone is seated, gives his canned lecture, leaves and then the grad students give their announcements and questions and discussion occurs at the recitations with the grad students. Sometimes the grad students do not attend the lecture which is even more frightening. Sometimes the departmental exam does not mesh with the lecture or the info given in the recitation sessions. That is why those student ratings of courses and profs are so valuable, because you can catch the offenders, avoid their courses, get out of such majors filled with these situations and if you find out soon enough avoid such schools. They are the most powerful weapon against these departments, profs and grad students. Sometimes I think that they schloff all of this off on the freshman because the upperclassmen who generally get the smaller classes and the profs actually teaching and discussing will take not and avoid those departments and profs which would lead to some adverse consequences. That is what it takes for change. No one asks how the required calc or english course is taught since the students are looking more for offerings in their anticipated majors. Visiting that British novelists class open to upperclass majors only is not a good view of what you are going to be experiencing.</p>
<p>There are some TAs in particular schools that I would rather have than some professors in some other schools in the same subject. This is one of those "it all depends" issues.</p>
<p>emeraldkity4, at least when I was graduate student, a professor with a Phd was generally considered tenure track, at least until he or she learned they weren't going to be offered tenure, at which point they usually moved to another school. I was young then and wouldn't be surprised if there was more to it than that or to learn it's all changed.</p>
<p>Well hes Canadian and recieved his Ph.d from Carelton University in Ottawa & Queen's Univ Bio Station, and did post doc with Queen's Univ in Kingston, but maybe they don't think he has gotten enough big awards lately?
Some of her other profs have recently gotten big grants from NIH et al to continue their research but I don't think she had asked him why he was leaving. It is unfortunate because he was her advisor for three years and was going to be her thesis advisor but since she took what was supposed to be her senior year off, she will be returning after he leaves.</p>
<p>It may well be that the issue is not profs vs. graduate TAs but ladder faculty vs. adjuncts. More and more schools are cutting costs by hiring adjuncts who are paid by the course. Most of these do have Ph.D.s, many of them from as prestigious universities as the ladder faculty. Some are adjuncts by choice, others try remain in academia despite the absence of tenure opportunities and try to piece together a career by teaching at several different schools.</p>
<p>And some adjunct professors have only a Bachelor's degree and years of professional experience. After all, if Bill Gates offered a course in business management at UW after retiring from Microsoft, wouldn't his knowledge be a wonderful enhancement to the business program there? even though he doesn't even have a college diploma?</p>
<p>The adjunct profs can be good, bad or indifferent. Generally they are part-timers with other commitments teaching either to make ends meet or more likely because they actually enjoy it.</p>
<p>It is not necessarily a bad thing that universities use so many of them but when you are picking a top whatever national research university try to bear in mind that it makes its reputation based on the research it cranks out not the teaching it does. The theory is if you get smart enough kids you don't need to teach them that much so you can spend more time on your research and writting.</p>
<p>Isn't the issue of teaching experience or ability important? I think that is dangerous to equate knowledge and non-academic experience with the ability to teach. The example of Bill Gates illustrates that point. While his professional success is unequaled, no ones knows if he would be able to share his knowledge with great success. Not to mention that the business cycles might be rather fickle: at one point in time Enron's Ken Lay, Worldcom's Ebbers, and Tyco's Koslowski would have been the darlings at any business school. </p>
<p>There are lots of brilliant people who have rudimentary social social skills and are not good candidates for teaching positions. Isn't one of the recurrent comments in many schools that TAs' who cover math and sciences do not seem to master spoken English and see teaching as a nuisance? </p>
<p>Viewing it from different angle, it seems pretty degrading to the tenured professors to hear that some might even prefer lectures by inexperienced and poorly trained TAs over the "real" thing. So much for the art of teaching!</p>
<p>I would rather have someone who is experienced in his or her area , with little background in coursework geared toward the classroom, than the reverse.
My oldest daughter attended a private prep school as did Gates and some of her best teachers did not have an undergrad or a graduate teaching degree.
Perhaps the tenured profs may be disappointed that students prefer someone without a string of letters after their name, but a string of letters does not make a good instructor.
My younger daughter had teachers who had been teaching for 20 years ( "and never changed a thing" they said with pride) does that make them more valuable in the classroom?
My mother also has told stories of profs who should have been emeritus years ago, but they shuffled to the classroom long past their ability to discern that it wasn't 1920 any longer.</p>