Oblomov wrote:
>
> Mark Glickman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
[...]
> >By the way, $5000 salary for a course is quite competitive
> >for teaching in the Boston area, so at least the market deems
> that our
> >salary is fair, even if Petr doesn't.
>
> In fact, the $5000 salary is good for such positions! In the NYC
> area, the going rate for "adjunct" or "part-time" faculty is
> $1600-$2000 per 3-credit course per semester, sans TA or grader,
> but without office hours requirement. [...]
This is an interesting situation, and it illustrates my main concern:
Of course it is possible to depress salaries of Lecturers in Statistics
(or any other discipline) even more, say to $995.00 or $99.95 per
semester. Why not, if the "market will bear it" and the people out
there are desperate enough?
But what about the "value" the students are getting? If there is no TA
and no grader, of course most instructors working at these kind of wages
wouldn't write homework assignments, or if they were forced to, they'd
write some single-page multiple choice parody. If there are no office
hours and no TA, where do the students go if they have questions? They
don't. Does anybody care??
Somebody said somewhere in this tread that as a matter of course,
part-time lecturers are underpaid everywhere, that the "going rate" is
$1,200 per semester, so what's the big deal, let's give Boston
University a break. Mark Glickman, the original poster, said that he is
"mystified" by my position that $5000 / semester is not adequate.
Well, I just happened to come across a stack of my old tax forms, so I
looked at the year I taught *one* large four-credit course at the U.W.
Madison (270 students, five TA's/graders). I see that I made more than
twice, from that source in that year, compared to what Mark is offering
at BU.
Of course that was five year ago, if I were doing the same thing this
year, it'd be more like $13,000 per semester. Now I know some people
who do this here on an ongoing basis. Those folks can make a living
wage by teaching *one* large class, or several small classes (30-50
students) throughout the year. I know (very closely) someone who made
$34,000 in 1999 by teaching *one* four credit class in a marathon
sequence Fall'98-Spring-Summer-Fall ($11,000 + $12,000 + $11,000 in
'99). There was more for the 8-week Summer session because the lectures
were Monday - Thursday, 90 minutes each, for 8 consecutive weeks, with
no graders (the Department eventually did hire a couple of them from
extra money).
Take a look here using your web browser, to see for yourself what it's
like on Planet Madison:
LIST OF "LECTURER" POSITIONS CURRENTLY OPEN AT U.W. MADISON
-----------------------------------------------------------
http://www.ohr.wisc.edu/pvl/OHRPV1009.html
People *can* get a decent wage by teaching in the Lecturer position.
Certainly they do here. It is not true that the situation is so grim
everywhere that University instructional staff can't make a living
wage. It depends, in part, whether you accept that kind of undesirable
situation as a permanent part of the academic landscape. I hope not.
Hope this helps,
-- Petr
_____________________________________________________________________
P e t r K u z m i c, Ph.D. mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
BioKin Ltd. * Software and Consulting http://www.biokin.com
P.O. Box 8336 Ph. 608.256.4790
Madison, WI 53708 Fax 608.256.1269
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