Monday morning, IVC: the spectacle of someone who is not in the room being introduced to the room as the Shiny New Hire and being told to stand up and recognize the applause. Now, this happens all the time around here.
The kicker this time: this someone was not only not in the room, but had never before
been in the room–and, in fact, would never, ever be in the room. In reality, the
person had weeks earlier declined the offer of employment for reasons that
won't be revealed here (but let's just say they are embarrassingly numerous and
highlight longstanding issues that were revealed in the recent district climate
survey. Can't someone in HR or elsewhere tell new hires something
about the salary scale and its steps? The contract? The workload? Is overload
teaching optional or can a chair really compel faculty to teach overload? Good grief! Is no one in charge?)
*
Tuesday, Saddleback College's McKinney Theater: Something
about Pink Floyd's "The Wall" and the tune “Comfortably Numb”; something
about the moment when people were asked to raise their hands if they ever
learned something from someone who didn't have a Ph.D.—and then the audible
eye-rolling of an administrator regarding the cost of faculty salaries.
A certain pissed-off faculty member (with a Ph.D.,
natch) looked up that administrator's own salary and offers a pop quiz here (the
first one of the semester):
a) $65,000
b) $85,000
c) $100,000
d) $125,000
e) $150,000
f) $200,000
g) $225,000
e) $240,000*
*
Wednesday, IVC: a new faculty member who had
been assured by a committee (one which s/he had faithfully served and whose
work would impact her career here) that no decisions would be made over the
summer found out that decisions had indeed been made over the summer. Imagine
that. An old story around here, but it was a first for this new professor. It
is sadly familiar to the rest of us, the dark dangers of summer and the noiseless
manufacture of consent.
At the end of the day, faculty members were found
busily changing their signatures on their emails to downplay their credentials.
As one quipped: “What is this week supposed to show us? How little power we
have and how little respect for our training exists?”
Signed:
XXX XXXXXX, Ph.D. (who needs one anyways,
when you can learn something from someone who never even went to college!)
*
Thursday: High noon BBQ in the back of the ivc PAC:
Where's that? Keep walking. How far? Keep
going.
Vegetarians want to know if they still get FLEX
credit if they didn't (i.e., couldn’t) eat anything.
The Ice Cream Initiative:
Quote of the Day: “We are giving you free ice cream sandwiches for attending this
training because distressed students is a very important problem.”
One person liked the ice cream sandwiches: “Ice
cream sandwiches were offered after the In-N-Out deal fell through. So
they are consolation ice cream sandwiches anyhow. Admittedly, I would
prefer the more secular ice cream to the faith-based burger. So, I see it
as a win.”
Meanwhile, at the so-called bookstore:
"Did you know that they’re selling IVC shot glasses
at the Bookstore? Five bucks each."
"No, bookstore, Invisible
Man by Ralph Ellison is not the same as The
Invisible Man by H.G. Wells. Please try again."
Does it matter? Only if you have a Ph.D.
9 comments:
Let me guess. The faculty member shut out of decision-making was available to make decisions but not contacted. The people who were pulled into the summer moment to make decisions were told they had to make them ASAP with no time for consultation. So they did. An artificial sense of urgency, a false sense of choice, plus complete disrespect for what was said before. Now, bad feelings. Yes, been there, done that.
The behavior of HR often undermines the hard work of hiring committees and creates an unfortunate impression on applicants and candidates. Some in HR don't seem to understand the workload of faculty members and therefore give out bad information. I don't know what is worse - to receive bad information or none. I can't understand why this cannot be addressed. How can we expect candidates to accept positions based on no information or bad information? This is especially true of candidates outside the district who have no context for this oddly adversarial and deliberately obscure behavior. At least in-house candidates benefit from knowing who we are so they can overlook the craziness. Who accepts a position without know where they are on the salary scale?
I have been in the position where I have corrected info given to a finalist by HR - not just bad info, but info so off the mark that one would be discouraged to accept the job offer. But at least that candidate knew who to ask. Others do not. Part of the problem comes from the fact that HR doesn't recognize the differences between campuses in terms of classes and units and workload and then speaks blithely to a candidate about teaching 5 classes and working 20 plus hours weekly in a lab. As only HR is allowed to talk to candidates about their working conditions this can be alarming, misleading -and I guess in the case of what sounds like steller candidate introduced on Monday, discouraging.
I just wish someone would advise them to not directly insult instructors quite so much. The anti-intellectualism gets a bit old after awhile.
The problem is the HR department has NO LEADERSHIP. Nothing will improve until major changes are made at the top.
Nobody gets FLEX credit for the BBQ - not even the meat eaters.
We get FLEX credit for other meals, why not the BBQ? (And you vegetarians should just give up. It's never going to happen. I'm not saying it shouldn't happen - it's just the way it is.)
Unrelated but related - what can we do to get more F/T hires at IVC? Glen caved last year and we got only 5. How many did Saddleback get? 15? What can be done about this? where is the leadership on this issue?
It is an issue for the academic senate. The senate can either step up or not.
We'll see.
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