Today's theme was for the FFB bloggers to talk about a feminist and/or fashion related thing we learnt from someone else, something that changed the way we thought about something or the way we behaved. I had planned to structure this post much differently, but over the past few days I've been thinking a lot about what I have learned from other academics and not all of it is good....
Recently an adjunct English teacher published a book about his experiences In the Basement of the Ivory Tower, and last week salon published an article including excerpts from Professor X's book. I agree that many universities face problems with grade inflation and that the reliance on the labor of adjuncts is probably tied to this. The renewal of adjuncts' contracts is often tied to whether or not their courses fill, and anecdotal evidence suggests that if an instructor has a reputation as being a hard-ass who is willing to fail people students are unlikely to enroll in his/her courses. Perhaps another factor is that adjuncts often make somewhere in the range of $2500-$3500/course/semester. Most often the universities that they work for do not provide any health care benefits. This means that some adjuncts teach classes at multiple institutions in order to make ends meet or so that they can keep a toe-hold in academia while they finish their dissertations (often the fact that they are teaching multiple classes impedes progress) or while they continue holding on to the (slim in the Humanities) hope that they will get a tenure-track job.
However, I balked at certain aspects of Professor X's argument - such as the idea that giving a failing grade to a student impedes progress (ok, perhaps it does sometimes, but I think sometimes it can serve as a wake up call, a call to action, and let's face it, if you don't complete entire sections of one of my exams, I am not going to feel at all guilty about giving you the failing grade that you deserve on it). I also nearly went batshit crazy over the following passage:
"The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that in 1975, 31 percent of college teachers were female; by 2009, the number had grown to 49.2 percent. There are more women teaching in college than ever, and it is quite possible that their presence, coupled with our discovery of the postmodern narrative, has had a feminizing effect on the collective unconscious of faculty thought. Strong winds of compassion blow across campus quads. Women are more empathetic than men, more giving, simply more bothered by anyone’s underdog status. Many of the female adjuncts I have spoken to seem blessed and cursed by feelings of maternity toward the students. Women think about their actions, and the consequences of their actions, in a deeper way than do men. Women may not be quite as inclined to sigh and, with a murmured "fuck it," half-angry and half-miserable, possessed by the fatalism of someone throwing the first punch in a bar fight, mark an F in the grade book. I administer grades fairly, but how difficult it is."
What a crock. I'm sure that many female faculty do have maternal feelings toward their students, but I'm sure plenty of them do not. When I was an undergraduate, the toughest grader that I had was a female professor. I grade more strictly than many men I know if shop talk around the metaphorical water cooler can be trusted. I am more than willing to help students, to give them a chance to improve, to incorporate revision into my classes when possible because it helps students to learn more than because it boosts their grades, but I am also more than willing to register a 35% on an exam or refuse to accept a paper that's turned in randomly one month late. Though I admit I might give it 5 extra points if the student has a cool nickname or throws in a battery diagram. I jest....
I think that empathy and compassion can be powerful teaching tools. Alas, I'm not always the most empathetic and compassionate person. Maybe I've never exactly thrown the first punch in a bar fight, but I will throw down this gauntlet. What percentage of adjuncts are women? (Right now I don't know the answer to this question, but I'm on a mission to find out.) Because the percentage of female faculty at R1 and R2 schools sure as shit isn't 49.2%. Currently, women make up about 37% of faculty in history departments in the United States. In 2007, women made up 12-13% of faculty members in chemistry departments. In English, women have reached parity nationwide.
So unfortunately, for Professor X, I would suggest that his argument lacks sufficient evidence (and his nickname isn't really cool enough to warrant bonus points). Has the post-modern narrative entirely restructured the way zoology and calculus exams are administered and graded?
While we cannot conduct a very scientific study here, I am interested in your anecdotal evidence. Academics, do you find female faculty members to be maternal toward their students? Non-academics, were you mothered by your female instructors? No names, but who do you remember as being the hardest grader that you had in your classes?