![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Paying for college
Yesterday on the radio I heard Louise Richardson, the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford, defending her handsome salary, making the point that competition for vice-chancellors occurs in a global marketplace and she would be paid rather more in the US. This morning, somewhat in response, we had Jo Johnson MP, the Minister for Universities and Science, defending funding arrangements for universities. Now I receive an broadcast e-mail from the Vice-Chancellor here, the University of Dundee, expressing pleasure at our being shortlisted as University of the Year in the Times Higher Education Awards which I would guess helps to validate his salary.
I was lucky to be born early enough that my own university education in England was paid for rather more by grant than by student loans and what loan I did have had a low interest rate. Now England has moved to a system that is dominated by loans at a higher interest rate. Especially, as a student I had the sense that the taxpayer, not me, was paying for my education and that probably affected my attitude to it.
One concern I have is the idea of having to pay competitive market rates for university staff. I could easily be earning over $100k/yr in the US (in my last contracting job in Connecticut I cost $250/hr plus expenses) yet I am working in the public sector for under £50k/yr gross salary. A lot of university staff are not there for the money, they are there because they care about that kind of thing and prefer the kind of environment to be found in public sector education. Certainly they need to be paid a living wage, and my own income even up at grade 8 is borderline given that supporting my family requires careful budgeting, but to be trying to attract senior management with money instead of because they really care about wanting to lead their university well makes me wonder if a point is being missed. I am sure that I am not alone in that once I do have a handsome salary, for instance within a decade of graduating college I was being paid $60/hr plus benefits, I am not greatly incentivized by greater sums still.
Another concern I have is the change in mindset that comes from students feeling that they are paying for their own education. This forces universities to greatly weight customer satisfaction and what satisfies the customer may not correspond well with how universities can benefit society, in comparison with technical colleges and their kin. I want students to succeed at university only if they have interest and ability in their chosen field, if they have shown genuine curiosity and study skills and have truly gotten to grips with the material. This is in marked contrast to my experience of Midwestern public land-grant universities which appear to feel obliged to hand-hold even master's students through courses and other study which might get them through the material but I wonder how they will then cope in a workplace that expects them to make good progress somewhat independently on a project that on paper appears to be well within their field. Having employees who must be micromanaged by skilled practitioners is barely more useful than not hiring them in the first place.
I was lucky to be born early enough that my own university education in England was paid for rather more by grant than by student loans and what loan I did have had a low interest rate. Now England has moved to a system that is dominated by loans at a higher interest rate. Especially, as a student I had the sense that the taxpayer, not me, was paying for my education and that probably affected my attitude to it.
One concern I have is the idea of having to pay competitive market rates for university staff. I could easily be earning over $100k/yr in the US (in my last contracting job in Connecticut I cost $250/hr plus expenses) yet I am working in the public sector for under £50k/yr gross salary. A lot of university staff are not there for the money, they are there because they care about that kind of thing and prefer the kind of environment to be found in public sector education. Certainly they need to be paid a living wage, and my own income even up at grade 8 is borderline given that supporting my family requires careful budgeting, but to be trying to attract senior management with money instead of because they really care about wanting to lead their university well makes me wonder if a point is being missed. I am sure that I am not alone in that once I do have a handsome salary, for instance within a decade of graduating college I was being paid $60/hr plus benefits, I am not greatly incentivized by greater sums still.
Another concern I have is the change in mindset that comes from students feeling that they are paying for their own education. This forces universities to greatly weight customer satisfaction and what satisfies the customer may not correspond well with how universities can benefit society, in comparison with technical colleges and their kin. I want students to succeed at university only if they have interest and ability in their chosen field, if they have shown genuine curiosity and study skills and have truly gotten to grips with the material. This is in marked contrast to my experience of Midwestern public land-grant universities which appear to feel obliged to hand-hold even master's students through courses and other study which might get them through the material but I wonder how they will then cope in a workplace that expects them to make good progress somewhat independently on a project that on paper appears to be well within their field. Having employees who must be micromanaged by skilled practitioners is barely more useful than not hiring them in the first place.