Faculty Spread Sheet - do you measure up? - USM Forum -- Message Board

stinky cheese man · Status: Offline

RE: Faculty Spread Sheet - do you measure up?

oldtimer · Status: Offline

stinky cheese man wrote:

and as to oldtimer's assessment of the tenure and promotion and annual review process, from my perspective in my college, it wasn't as pristine and pure as one might imagine. very political--particularly when it came to elections to the college committee.

SCM, I served on the University Advisory Committee, so I don't have any illusions that all colleges were 'equally transparent' and unbiased, with respect to promotion and tenure recommendations. One more casualty of the Thames administration is the loss of 'institutional memory'; during the Lucas and Fleming administrations, we had sufficient 'senior faculty' to recognize certain cultural and/or departmental biases among our peers. Some of the most challenging discussions we had were about specific cases with no consistent recommendations from department to college to dean to UAC.

Then again, you can look at my 'handle' here, and see that my experience is not that of the current conditions in Hattiesburg.

Curmudgeon · Status: Offline

stinky cheese man wrote:

curmudgeon--it's the assumption you mention in your last line i haven't seen any evidence of. since i probably don't generate a profit, has my teaching load increased? no. more grants. i don't think so. i suspect many chairs will simply ignore the data.

The spread sheet is very new. Many faculty have yet to see it. I would not expect to see an immediate effect.

Incredulous · Status: Offline

There is more to this story which will come out soon. The spread sheet is only part of the story. Faculty will be required to meet profitability standards in a number of ways, and this will be reflected in annual evaluations if nothing changes.

qwerty · Status: Offline

Sounds like an effort to clear the way for higher teaching loads. Forget research achievement unless its contract work for some chemical company. This administration has complete contempt for education and scholarship? Why are these losers even working in higher education?

LeftASAP · Status: Offline

Excerpts of an email from a professor still at USM:

"Yesterday someone showed me the infamous spreadsheet. Our dean has not discussed the spreadsheet. However, deans are commanded to make the negative people positive. Another directive from on high: Each faculty member is expected to write one proposal per year. Talk about micromanagement!

If the people in our department knew they were negative despite teaching their asses off and getting lower than average pay, do you think it would improve morale?

This is definitely my last year! I have been put in charge of the undergraduate program, scheduling, and running the external program review. These are the things that I thought would be done by someone else. Instead I have been given a reduced teaching load to do these service chores."

From what I hear this "service work" is doesn't contribute to "faculty worth" and a reduced teaching load will really make someone NEGATIVE, in more ways than one.

Incredulous · Status: Offline

qwerty wrote:

Sounds like an effort to clear the way for higher teaching loads. Forget research achievement unless its contract work for some chemical company. This administration has complete contempt for education and scholarship? Why are these losers even working in higher education?

Money?

Interested onlooker · Status: Offline

Why are they doing this when they (supposedly? hopefully) won't be around? Is it just one last way to punish the faculty who first voted overwhelmingly against this presidency and second who continues to call its hand.

Cossack · Status: Offline

This use of a spread sheet to compute the contribution of faculty members is another silly effort to use "business tools" to evaluate a university. It is silly because it is not at all the way that businesses are evaluated. Businesses and universities have inputs and outputs. Inputs consist of various "things" and activities. Teaching requires a classroom which requires there be building. A building must be maintained, heated, cooled, lighted, etc. However, many buildings and rooms are not directly related to teaching or research. The dome is such a building and many classroom building have offices occupied by folks who do not teach or research. By the yardstick being used (a spreadsheet) all administrators, secretaries, maintenance people and the campus police are a dead weight loss on the university because they occupy space in building and receive salaries. This obviously is not true and a university could not operate without these "dead weight loss" employees. Business owners (managers) evaluate employees and other inputs on their marginal contribution to the overall product not to a specific task.

Using this spreadsheet is as silly as evaluating all military personnel on the basis of how many of the enemy they killed. Fortunately, military folks know that it takes many people hours of work and effort to support one soldier in combat. Mississippi State has an advantage over USM in this regard in they have a general in command. I have no idea how much he knows about higher education since he is a rookie in that job. However, I am fairly sure that he would have the sense to not rely on such a spreadsheet currently being used at USM.

Having taught in business schools my entire academic career, I am very weary of university administrators claiming they are using business models of governance. It shows their lack of understanding of educational institutions, particularly state supported institutions. Universities can never be set up as a business. Granted, in some areas they can use some business practices because those practices provide the best outcomes. Ironically, college administrators (and many faculty) prefer more socialist mechanisms rather than business mechanisms and there is some logic in that approach since much of the activity in a university is collective in nature.

In reality, whatever the model university administrators claim to use, large numbers of them use the Chicago City Hall approach of cronyism. They give favors and money to those who support them and stiff anyone who does not agree with them. While there are some talented administrators who do not follow the Chicago model, they are in the minority. From my experience, deans resort to the Chicago City Hall approach because they cannot command the respect of faculty. Therefore, they have to buy faculty support with raises, travel money and cushy teaching schedules. The lack of respect of faculty for administrators usually is the result of the administrator having a weak research record. This is why you find many faculty who are relatively young scrambling to be chairs and deans. They either cannot do research or chose not to work at the process. Consequently they “follow the money” and seek administrative jobs. I realize there are many instances in academics where department chairs rotate and tenured full professors take their turn at assuming the administrative duties. They usually do not fit the model I outlined and these temporary chairs are glad to get back to their normal faculty duties.

Obviousman · Status: Offline

Cossack wrote:

This use of a spread sheet to compute the contribution of faculty members is another silly effort to use "business tools" to evaluate a university. It is silly because it is not at all the way that businesses are evaluated. Businesses and universities have inputs and outputs. Inputs consist of various "things" and activities...

Right on Cossack, to call the simple minded spreadsheet I saw as a "business tool" and use it to anchor an evaluation process is a farce. It doesn't measure anything meaningful and is ripe for abuse. As many have noted the flaws are glaring and cross all aspects of what it means to be a professor:

1. SERVICE: Lack of credit for service offered

2. TEACHING: Lack of differentiation between lowel level and upper level classes making it better for ones pocket book to teach service freshman classes.

3. RESEARCH: Scholarly contributions don't count. Pork (the real white meat) counts the same as competitive funding leading to situtations like there is in 1) Education, where daddy's pork pours into Dana's sty and no research or papers come out and 2) the polymer department (50% run on pork or set asides) where the pork is used to reward the sycophants, punishing desenters and keeping the fence sitters on the fence.

4. ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT: Aiding in the economic development of Mississippi does not count unless the cash flows through the University. One would probably get a large number of bonus points for having the economic development funds benefit shelby's operations.

Rating systems in major successful corporations are characterized by meaningful measurements, consistency of implementation and rigerous policed. At Miss Southern these clowns make up rules on the fly, and our own internal checks - The College Advisory Boards and the University Advisory Board rubber stamp all actions.

Obvious man

We all missed the real change at the university, the place has not become Polymer U but rather a theater program with every day bringing a new comedy, drama, tragedy or farce to center stage.

qwerty · Status: Offline

This crew has about nine months left to spin their webs and fantasies. Eighteen months from now we'll have a new president, new provost, new deans. Maybe I'm naive, but I think the nuttier the proposal, the better. Let the poisons leech out of the mud.

LeftASAP · Status: Offline

We all know university faculty engage in teaching, research and service. It is job of the president to obtain funding for the institution. If SFT could do his job correctly, the faculty wouldn't have to put up with this spreadsheet nonsense. The existence of such a management technique is a monument to the failure of this administration to accomplish their job description goals.

Silver Surfer · Status: Offline

The spreadsheet , while predictably unpopular on the AAUP board, is not without its merits. Such a tool can be used as a starting point for evaluation of contribution to the university. Those who pay their own salaries and contribute "profits" to the university are contributing, even if they do no research and no service, although one would assume that every individual contributes some service, great or small.

Individuals who are "in the negative" can and do contribute in ways both large and small, and those contributions (such as the hypothetical theater professor from upthread) must be considered. Research contributions, artistic contributions, and al other intellectual contributions must be considered. If we think of a screening process, the spreadsheet is the widest screen, retaining the most easily quantifiable facet of an academic's job. The more intangible portions of the job **must** be considered. However, every screening process needs a starting point, and this is a logical place to start.

As has been pointed out, this type of analysis is commonplace, and I know for a fact that such analyses are employed at Tier I and Tier II universities...as a part of a larger, more all-inclusive plan. So, it is a knee-jerk reaction to get bent out of shape over such a spreadsheet when there is no evidence that the spreadsheet is any more potent than SFT's original threats regarding efficiency.

I think quite a bit of the resistance to this type of analysis is that those who are "in the negative" may be forced to justify their existence at the university, which is how it should be. A faculty member who teaches small sections and/or light loads can and should be expected to generate more scholarship and/or do more service. If the faculty member is fulfilling these obligations, then all is well. However, as consider a tenured full professor whose spreadsheet "value" is -$17,335. Now consider that in Fall of 2005 the individual had 3 sections (2 preparations) with 62 total students and that in Spring of 2006 the individual had 1 section of 76 students. Also consider that the individual has produced only three very marginal (by his college's own standards) intellectual contributions in the past 5 years. Finally, consider that the individual does no service outside of the college level (i.e., only college committee work, no university level service or professional/community service). Is the individual making a significant contribution to USM?

-- Edited by Silver Surfer at 09:13, 2006-09-05

Cossack · Status: Offline

Silver Surfer wrote,

The spreadsheet , while predictably unpopular on the AAUP board, is not without its merits. Such a tool can be used as a starting point for evaluation of contribution to the university. Those who pay their own salaries and contribute "profits" to the university are contributing, even if they do no research and no service, although one would assume that every individual contributes some service, great or small.

There is no merit in this spreadsheet approach since it provides no accurate information by which to evaluate university activities. You may be able to use it in a junior college, but even there it would be very limited. It would be laughed at in a quality university where both scholarship and graduate programs are important. The value of a faculty member can be measured by how valuable he/she is in the academic market. Quality universities pay high salaries for well published faculty either regional or national reputations, not on the basis of the number of undergraduate they teach in an introductory course.

LeftASAP · Status: Offline

Silver Surfer wrote:

The spreadsheet , while predictably unpopular on the AAUP board, is not without its merits. Such a tool can be used as a starting point for evaluation of contribution to the university. Those who pay their own salaries and contribute "profits" to the university are contributing, even if they do no research and no service, although one would assume that every individual contributes some service, great or small. ...-- Edited by Silver Surfer at 09:13, 2006-09-05

Universities have been evaluating faculty for centuries, Silver Surfer. The spreadsheet is no starting point to evaluating teaching, research/scholarship and service. The contributions of those who only pay their own salaries is the same as it would be for a hardware store. That has nothing to do with the contributions to what constitutes the University .

CoBster in Residence · Status: Offline

Cossack wrote:

There is no merit in this spreadsheet approach since it provides no accurate information by which to evaluate university activities. You may be able to use it in a junior college, but even there it would be very limited. It would be laughed at in a quality university where both scholarship and graduate programs are important. The value of a faculty member can be measured by how valuable he/she is in the academic market. Quality universities pay high salaries for well published faculty either regional or national reputations, not on the basis of the number of undergraduate they teach in an introductory course.

Cossack,

Maybe you're under the impression that USM is very different than a junior college, which would surprise many of your students who think Jones was harder than USM. However, the IHL's vision for USM and Meredith's vision for USM do not involve USM being a research institution in a broad sense. They may tolerate or even want small pockets of research, but what the really want is a 4-year junior college to increase the number of college grads in MS without damaging UM and MSU and their already meager academic reputations. There has been talk of following the Florida model, where junior colleges have been allowed to expand and offer 4-year degrees because UF and FSU will not go to open enrollment. In Mississippi, there are those who want to follow that model, and I am under the impression that Invictus is one of them, but only he can clear that up. The only way for the IHL to avoid that idiocy is to do something I personally think is idiotic: turn USM into an unabashed degree mill, which is where we're heading.

Researchers will leave and will be replaced by masters-level instructors or bottom dwelling Ph.D.'s -- just enough doctoral faculty to retain SACS and other critical accreditations, which means AACSB will be a goner in favor of nursing and teacher certification accreditations. The market will work, but not in the favor of USM faculty who have not published lately, unless they're a part of the shadow group that clings to every administrator that comes along. I have been told explicitly by an administrator that the spreadsheet represents the IHL and Meredith's model of our value to the institution. Pure research will have no value, nor will there be a distinction between grad and undergrad teaching. We are line workers in an educational factory. Look for the spreadsheet to be the new paradigm.

CiR

CoBster in Residence · Status: Offline

LeftASAP wrote:

Universities have been evaluating faculty for centuries, Silver Surfer. The spreadsheet is no starting point to evaluating teaching, research/scholarship and service. The contributions of those who only pay their own salaries is the same as it would be for a hardware store. That has nothing to do with the contributions to what constitutes the University .

You're exactly right, Left ASAP. USM might as well be a hardware store -- better yet, it might as well be a Home Depot, with no specificity and a prepackaged, Wal-Mart feel. Those who continue to believe that USM will be a real university again are in for a long wait...like forever.

The spreadsheet already is being used to make decisions, and there's nothing the Faculty Senate, the AAUP, or anybody else can do about it, because it comes from higher up than Shelby Thames. We (all of us) will soon be forced to move or be stuck with the IHL's vision -- a USM that is a 4-year version of Jones County Junior College: athletics, activities, and academics...in that order. A more elaborate response is above.

LVN · Status: Offline

The version of the spreadsheet that I saw was very unsophisticated. I would be surprised to learn that anybody at IHL, including Meredith who is a former college president, devised it. I think it came straight out of the Dome, and is the brainchild of somebody whose native language is not Academic.

Silver Surfer · Status: Offline

Cossack wrote:
"There is no merit in this spreadsheet approach since it provides no accurate information by which to evaluate university activities. You may be able to use it in a junior college, but even there it would be very limited."

My Response:
I agree that the spreadsheet only measures very basic levels of teaching activity. I get the feeling that you don't care about teaching. You quickly dismiss undergraduate education an not important in your recent response. You also ignored my statements in my original post such as this one

"Individuals who are "in the negative" can and do contribute in ways both large and small, and those contributions (such as the hypothetical theater professor from upthread) must be considered. Research contributions, artistic contributions, and all other intellectual contributions must be considered. If we think of a screening process, the spreadsheet is the widest screen, retaining the most easily quantifiable facet of an academic's job. The more intangible portions of the job **must** be considered."

Cossack wrote:
"It would be laughed at in a quality university where both scholarship and graduate programs are important."

My Response:
You still think USM is a quality institution? Of course it's not, which is why the profitability spread sheet is in use at USM. USM doesn't care about quality, only quantity. The spread sheet measures quantity only.

Cossack wrote:
"The value of a faculty member can be measured by how valuable he/she is in the academic market. Quality universities pay high salaries for well published faculty either regional or national reputations, not on the basis of the number of undergraduate they teach in an introductory course."

My Response:
Your model for universities is outdated and obsolete. Universities will continue to pay well for some researchers, but quality universities are being pressured to introduce clinical (teaching) faculty positions at what you call "high salaries" for teachers who can deliver in the classroom BECAUSE those universities' constituencies are beginning to demand better classroom instruction. The days of misanthropic researchers having infinite job security irrespective of their teaching abilities are gone. Currently Johns Hopkins, Notre Dame, Harvard, Columbia, UNC-Chapel Hill, Texas A&M, Texas, and other major institutions employ numerous clinical (teaching) faculty across many disciplines -- some with tenure track and some without. Also, you seem to believe that USM is a quality institution that should have a graduate teaching mission ("...graduate programs are important...") but that undergraduate teaching is not important ("...not on the basis of the number of undergraduate they teach..."). USM's primary mission is to educate undergraduates.

Last, you failed to respond to my hypothetical example. Is it OK for a tenured full faculty member to teach very few students with a low number of preparations, produce little research, and do no service outside his college?

-- Edited by Silver Surfer at 21:37, 2006-09-05

-- Edited by Silver Surfer at 21:39, 2006-09-05

Silver Surfer · Status: Offline

LVN wrote:

The version of the spreadsheet that I saw was very unsophisticated. I would be surprised to learn that anybody at IHL, including Meredith who is a former college president, devised it.

Then you need to have a talk with your friend Invictus about Tom Meredith.

Cossack · Status: Offline

Silver Surfer wrote,

I get the feeling that you don't care about teaching. You quickly dismiss undergraduate education an not important in your recent response.

When you make such a statement, I do not know whether you are asking if I like to teach, or if I do not do a good job in the classroom. In any case, you have gone from a discussion about measuring the contribution of all faculty to a comment about my teaching and have decided that I do not care about undergraduate education. My answer is in two parts.

As to my teaching: I teach rigorous classes and try to see that students learn what will serve them well as they enter the business world, or go on to get an MBA. I am available to help students and before each test I provide help sessions on the weekend to help students prepare. As for undergraduate education, it is far too important to allow second rate administrators and faculty to turn a university into a junior college. A large percentage of students at USM are first in their family to go to college. USM also has a large percentage of African-American students. The last thing they need is to be short changed in the education process by having watered down easy classes taught at a junior college level.

Moreover, the spreadsheet is not consistent with university governance. Regardless of what has been said, each year I am evaluated on teaching, research, and service as are other faculty throughout the University. This is mandated in the faculty handbook which is approved by the College Board. While it varies across departments and colleges, failure to contribute in a category will adversely affect your evaluation and your raise (if raise money exists). The spreadsheet that I saw does not incorporate all of these factors and is not in compliance with the handbook.

Since we are questioning motives, I detect that you may not have liked or appreciated

Silver Surfer · Status: Offline

Cossack,

I am stopping the quoting habit before it gets out of hand.

I have read your posts and understand your position. I simply disagree with your assessment, and you have either failed to read my position completely or are choosing to ignore parts of my statements because they close the gaps you claim to be exploiting in my argument. Please re-read my original post completely before commenting further.

You say that I have gone from a discussion of measuring the contribution of faculty to commenting on your teaching. This is not so. I made clear statements that teaching, research, and service are all important and "**must**" be included in evaluations appropriately -- such as is described in the USM Faculty Handbook.

SCH taught is an easy contribution to quantify, since there is a number of SCH taught and a dollar value of tuition per SCH, the dollars generated by SCH for each faculty are easy to calculate. Individuals who teach many undergraduate students are clearly contributing to the university. Anyone who says otherwise is simply being obtuse. These individuals cover many SCH so that others can teach more interesting, more challenging, and more specific courses, including the graduate courses you seem to favor over undergraduate courses.

Those who do not teach a large load of SCH can and do contribute in other ways, such as graduate courses, service, and intellectual contributions of all types, all of which I have already stated "**must**" be factored into the faculty member's evaluation appropriately. Unfortunately USM is rife with tenured faculty who teach few students, produce little or no research, and do service only when forced. These individuals are stealing from taxpayers, yet you seem to be advocating that the situation is acceptable, and that there is no need for centralized administrative oversight of the tenured faculty who does the bare minimum in all three categories.

In my original post I clearly stated my views, some of which you latched on to and some of which you have chosen to ignore. I can only assume that you ignored what was inconvenient or what contradicted your attack on the spread sheet. I would suggest that you re-read my original post, including my statements that scholarship and service "**must**" be included in any performance appraisal. As is, I feel like I am arguing with someone who isn't even taking time to read and undrstand my position and I will not continue to do so. I deal with ignorance in my students but I do not have to continue to argue against an ignorant stance here.

qwerty · Status: Offline

I don't mind being evaluated; I like having a full classroom and student tuition pays the bills.

The basic problem is that I don't trust this administration as far as I can spit, and it seems that every semester a new set of evaluative criteria come rolling in from above. I have no confidence in anyone above the level of chair. I haven't forgotten that the president of this institution defended the firing of G&S by saying all he wanted was a day's work for a day's pay. Since then, I've known that he's held me and my profession in contempt.

LVN · Status: Offline

qwerty, you've nailed it.

Incredulous · Status: Offline

Something that is being ignored here is that SCH production is a bit of a zero sum game. Given a finite number of students at the university at any point in time, when one department or college is up, someone has to be down. When one faculty member in a department has a heavy load, someone has to have a light one. The goals attached to the spread sheet directed everyone to teach an additional 4% SCH and to increase enrollment by 4% in their department. If the university enrollment does not grow by 4%, this is an impossible goal.

At all universities various majors wax and wane over time. To expect all of them to expand in the same year reveals a shocking degree of ignorance about the nature of education on someone's part. An alternative explanation is that the spread sheet and the goals are designed to ensure failure by some individuals and programs to provide a convenient rational for punishing people on a selective basis. They also create a general atmosphere of insecurity which weakens potential opposition to administration initiatives.

Cossack · Status: Offline

Discussing this use of spreadsheets is equivalent to mud wrestling with a pig, the pig enjoys it and you get dirty. To evaluate university activities, one must first understand the workings of a university. The arguments made for using this spreadsheet instrument are not consistent with the mission of any university. If this is the direction that USM is headed, and the way the College Board and the so called USM supporters want it to go, then we need to change the name of the institution back to Mississippi Southern College.

LeftASAP · Status: Offline

Cossack wrote:

...If this is the direction that USM is headed, and the way the College Board and the so called USM supporters want it to go, then we need to change the name of the institution back to Mississippi Southern College.

I vote for Mississippi Southern Plastics, Hardware and Entrepreneurial Con Jobbing.

Rod Sterling · Status: Offline

The net contribution spreadsheet was discussed at last Friday's Faculty Senate meeting. There was much concern that the spreadsheet will morph (like the FARt) into an instrument for faculty evaluation. It was also pointed out that faculty don't control the number of student credit hours they generate, since class size is determined by class assignments, level, enrollments, etc. It was also pointed out that the spreadsheet doesn't give credit for the myriad of service activities that faculty perform.

A list of expectations from the administration to the deans was also distributed, showing that the administration expects each faculty to have a positive net contribution, each faculty member to submit a grant application each year, each department to increase enrollment and each department to develop one onliine program each year.

The Faculty Senate will be inviting Grimes to address these concerns at the October Faculty Senate meeting. I'll predict that he'll duck this invitation.

It should also be noted that Frank Glamser came to the meeting, was recognized by President Henry and was given a standing ovation by the Faculty Senate.

Incredulous · Status: Offline

It was also noted at the meeting that the grant amounts on the spread sheet were gross amounts, not income to the university. This obviously makes no sense.

In view of the declining university enrollment which became known after the meeting, the requirement that every department increase enrollment 4% this year comes across as ludicrous.

How is it possible that the entire upper administration at a large state university can produce nonsense like this?

stinky cheese man · Status: Offline

could any of you at the FS meeting produce copies of these expectations? i am puzzled that some things seem so widely known, but folks in my shop have never seen them. in what form were these expectations presented at the FS meeting?