I'm right with the faculty on the whole "financial rape executed by just about everyong making six-figures" thing. It's profoundly frustrating to be told that there isn't enough money in the budget for any request one might make, then to see university trustees (all of whom are sickeningly wealthy) happily munching on caviar at a reception. Being staff at a university is being caught between a rock and a hard place. Staff have a lot in common with faculty, from a "getting screwed by administration" standpoint. Problem is, many faculty don't recognize it. Some (certainly not all) faculty look at staff and see us as nothing more than miniature extensions of the administration. Therefore, we're resented. What they don't understand is that we're just as frustrated with administration as they are; we just have less recourse to do anything about it. If we act strangely or become difficult to deal with, we can lose our jobs. One of the faculty I work for recently told me that (at this university anyway) a professor's attitude is not permitted to be used as a factor in tenure review because it's subjective. Meanwhile, staff can be booted for "insubordination" ... the ultimate in subjective. Basically what it boils down to is that beyond students, universities essentially comprise two pissed-off sects (faculty and staff) who really ought to be working together against the remaining Evil Administration sect. It's the Unholy Trinity of Higher Education. The oppressed masses (who don't make enough effort to understand one another) vs. the oppressor ... it's world politics on a microcosmic scale. It's all entirely too convoluted. Whew. That'll be enough of that sort of rant for awhile.
posted by Kate at 10:35 AM link/comments
