First Post
If you’ve found this page, you might be a burned out academic like me and thousands of other professionals around the country. Welcome - you’re not alone.
A little bit about me, just a little bit as I’m going to be sharing more than my institution of higher learning would likely prefer. I’ve been teaching humanities for nearly twenty years at both two and four year institution. The last several years have been at a small liberal arts religiously based institution. I’ve also served at various levels of administrational duties and staff positions throughout the years at various institutions.
I took out a stupid amount of student loans - without understanding what I was signing - because I assumed I would be a professor forever. I mean, isn’t that what we were all sold? Not that the sellers really knew any better, but my dream was to spend my life in the classroom, educating young minds, until I could no longer shuffle my way across the threshold. And, sure, being in the humanities, we’d have to fight the sciences for funding and have to convince students that you COULD get jobs in these fields after graduation. But there was no reason to believe that OUR jobs would be in jeopardy, right? They’d always need teachers. Except, it’s becoming increasingly clear they don’t. Or at least, they think they don’t.
With each year, pay for new faculty is lower than it was the year before. Benefits are a joke. Faculty at my institution haven’t gotten a cost of living increase in a decade. The staff, who knows how long, not that anyone cares about the staff who keep the institution running. Entire programs are online - which is perfectly fine - but not if those online courses are not being held to the same standards as the face to face courses. I’ll save my particular whining about one course for another post.
Over the last year, I’ve come to the realization that I need to get out. I feel like a steel worker in the 1980s who is seeing the decline of the steel industry. But rather than go down with the Higher Ed sinking ship, I’m getting out. I’m taking the preverbal computer classes (steel workers in the 80s were told to learn new skills like computer programming) and moving into another field.
Oh! And we haven’t even begun to talk about the caliber of students yet….but that’s for another post.
