The article “Give the professor a raise” by Philip G. Altbach and Iván F. Pacheco published in The Hindu (April 16, 2012) correctly calls to attention the much troubled state of affairs among teaching and research communities.
While, undoubtedly, the issue of what is an appropriate salary is important, the authors fail to provide a proper and helpful academic context to their assertions.
In part, they confuse, wilfully or otherwise, the critical difference between the quest among most academics for dignified pay rather than competitive salaries. It is crucial that this important difference — to be understood as the issue of dignified pay — has been linked by scholars in overwhelming numbers to the larger pursuit for creating an academically nurturing and learning environment or setting.
Demands by the teaching and research community, especially in recent times in India, have been mostly based on advancing the idea of academic freedom, adding to research infrastructure and crafting incentives which encourage and sustain learning.
Salaries are not and cannot be the only carrot for carrying out teaching/research. At heart are problems of the democratic functioning within university systems, the quest to formulate credible and meaningful standards among teaching faculty and finally, though this is perhaps the most difficult thing to raise in our current environment, there is a question of ethics on the part of the teaching community which has to be defined or at least raised.
Sadly, all these challenges have been dealt with through increasing bureaucratisation and sustained efforts to further reinforce administrative hierarchy. The recent effort by the University Grants Commission (UGC) to create what it has termed as an Academic Performance Indicator (API) point-based system to assess and regulate academic performance has become the source of much anxiety. This new point system not only undermines scholarship in several ways but also tries to engineer a quantitative approach to assessing academic work over that of qualitative assessment. The UGC's point system quantitatively measures and gives greater value (more points) to numbers of conferences attended/organised and to the number of publications, rather than recognising the quality of such work, the quality of the publisher and publications, innovations in research and teaching.
The conditions of academic work have, in recent years, faced many challenges in many of the central and State universities. The hollowing out of the public university system by imposing adverse working conditions with increased bureaucracy and declining infrastructure for research appear to be aimed at paving the way, as some rightly argue, for the wholesale introduction of profit seeking education by foreign universities in India.
Rather than listening to the call by academics for enhancing and enabling creative research and teaching standards, we, as current faculty members in Jawaharlal Nehru University, feel that many of the current policies have systematically been working to weaken and degrade university education in India.
G. Arunima, Pratiksha Baxi, Rohan D'Souza, Ajay Gudavarthy, Sneha Sudha Komath, Rinku Lamba, Siddharth Mallavarpu, Nivedita Menon, Rohini Muthuswami, Janaki Nair, Mohan Rao, Parimala Rao, Valerian Rodrigues, Kumkum Roy and Jaivir Singh, all of whom teach at Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Keywords: professors' pay raise
I agree with the fact of judging professors on the reviews quantatively held is something which will have an adverse effect in the long run.For the time being, it may instigate the elite community more and more into attending conferences, journals publishing but in future,I wish this instigation not turning into abetting as it may yield some counterproductive results, degradation in the quality of resources in teaching field being primary among them.
Forget the hike and dignity and all those stuff. There are few professors whom students can get inspiration from, and take them as role models. Professorship has become a mere milestone in one's journey from lecturer-senior lecturer - Reader - Professor. Anybody can become a professor with passage of time, irrespective of skills, time dedicated to students, and the motivation they impart on students. Most professors neither teach nor do reasearch, thus failing to justify the taxpayers' money and the confidence the society has in them. And there are other professors who simply treat students as servants, if not as slaves. We need more inspiring professors who can stand as ideal examples. Until then, we need to change the meaning of 'Professor' in our dictionaries.
Based on my personal experience as a University lecturer, there is a key element that I see missing in today's teachers and professors. The current generation of students have access to resources with which they can learn things without a need of a teacher. Therefore the teacher need to think outside of the box to earn student's respect. The purpose of teacher, in my opinion, is not to teach but to motivate. Today's young students have the kind of imagination that only needs a little spark to make them enjoy their education. Unless a teacher provides the spark, current generation of teachers may not get the respect they deserve. Treat the students as grown up adults not as school children. Mistakes will be made and thats how things can be learned. Tolerance needs to be the key. In my three years of teaching, there is not one student who has missed my class despite me not taking attendance. Give them the responsibility and they will respond in a way which will energize the teachers.
During the last two decades the university academics,although received enhance salary but are demoralized due to lack of adequate competitive spirit and political patronage accrued by some.What is required is a new academic culture that rewards quality over quantity.The funds distributed by the ministry and research organizations are based on non-transparent scheme and arbitrary decisions.Funds are awarded without proper peer-review.The foremost in improving academic standard is that the research funds be invested in internationally competitive,peer-reviewed research projects than funding ambitious costly projects that have not gone through critical evaluation rigour.In the present age interdisciplinarity is the need of the hour.This is sadly non-existent in Indian universities.A fundamental change in the organization of academic departments is long overdue.Practical solution is to organize monthly cross-discipline seminars .University must enjoy 'autonomy'-fiscal and academic.
There were times when students dreamt of becoming a teacher and
contributing to the society. But the way the teachers are not given
their due respect which they deserve, the changes in economic scenario
and the upsurge of better-paid employment opportunities, it is
appalling to see the teaching has become the last choice for students.
The truth is that a country which doesn't care about its teachers, can
never prosper. It is even more unfortunate that ours is the country
which speaks of keeping a teacher even above the parents; certainly
our actions and words don't match at all.
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