Some Thoughts on Academia

Academia, the joke goes, is a place where the politics are nasty because the stakes are small. One could argue whether the stakes are high or not, but the politics within an institution and within the profession are often nasty and snobbish. Many academics see a never to be dissolved hierarchy of institutions with four-year research universities at the top, followed by teaching colleges, followed by community colleges, with k-12 schools as the button rung, and pre-k the ground floor. This hierarchy is also applied to the people who work in these various institutions. With some tenured university professors looking at everyone else as stepchildren to their own mission. The fact, however, is that every single rung on the academic ladder is connected, and no one group can survive without the others. 

Falling back on the old rhetorical tactic of defining terms, let’s look at how academia is defined. Academia is defined by Merriam-Webster as “the life, community, or world of teachers, schools, and education.” The Cambridge Dictionary provides a different definition, “the part of society, especially universities, that is connected with studying and thinking, or the activity or job of studying.”  Oxford Learner’s Dictionary defines “academia” as “the world of learning, teaching, research, etc. at colleges and universities; the people involved in it.” The Online Etymology Dictionary gives us “"the academic community, the world of colleges and universities” while reminding us the term originates from ancient Greece and refers to the places where Plato taught. These definitions illustrate that “academia” focuses on studying and thinking, particularly on the postsecondary level, but not exclusively on that level. It also must be acknowledged that there would be no postsecondary level without secondary and primary levels. In other words, academia can be stretched to encompass all studying, thinking, learning, and the people who do it. 

The prompt of the piece is an unfortunate Twitter exchange that devolved into “you can’t understand academia because you’re not a real academic” with one being a tenured professor and one being a community college instructor--me. It’s not a new discussion, nor one exclusively between university and community college instructors. It happens between K-12 teachers and community college instructors. It happens within institutions between members of various disciplines. The thing is we all need one another, and no one is more valuable than the other. 

I can only speak to the divide between 4-year and 2-year institutions because they are what I know. When I started graduate school in English, it was with the full expectation that I would end with my doctorate and would find a job at a 4-year school and the end of the story. That’s not what happened. I graduated with my University of New Orleans Masters in English in 1994 and went on to do doctoral work at the University of Tulsa the same year. I enjoyed graduate school as a student and as a graduate assistant, both the teaching work and the academic publication work. When dissertation time rolled around and job marketing was a topic of discussion, I fully thought I’d finish the dissertation, and I did buy in somewhat to the “community college is stopgap, second rate work” attitude that was thrown out. Life, however, has a way of opening the eyes. When I had to choose between finishing my dissertation or paying rent and buying food. I chose the rent and food option since adjuncting at the university and the community college and being a data entry clerk was not cutting into my financial situation. 

My first academic job was at an institution in flux. I was hired as a visiting instructor at a former junior college which was transforming into a four-year college. It was a bit of a shock to be hit with the reality of a 5:5 load, but it was fun. I learned to teach developmental classes and further practiced teaching composition classes. At the end of the year, the school chose to focus on Native American Literature, which was not my specialty, and so I hit the market again. Found a full-fledged comprehensive community college where I worked as a developmental English specialist, but their grant ran out, and I finally ended up here where I have been for almost 18 years. 

The main difference I quickly came to see between community college work and university work was I had to teach a lot more. I currently have a 6:5 load--six unique courses in the fall semester and 5 in the spring. I had years where I taught a 7:6 load with 2 summer school courses. An average university instructor has a 4:4 load or lower. I also had to learn several methods of teaching. I have taught in-person classes, asynchronous online classes, and synchronous online classes (Zoom classes before Zoom existed). Since the pandemic, I have listened to so many people wrestle with having to learn these methods of instruction, and I am rather proud to know my community college has a tradition of doing these things, as do many other community colleges. Indeed, community colleges are often innovators when it comes to how courses are presented. 

I also have frequent committees and projects that I am involved in, such as the current state-required program review and self-study for our division. I have also worked on distance learning committees, assessment committees, student activity committees, recruitment committees, and retainment committees, hiring committees, and oh yes, as a member of the faculty senate. I’ve had as many as five committees to handle in the semester on top of teaching. And I am lucky enough to be a faculty advisor to a student organization. For some reason, I always seem to be busy. 

The one major difference I have come to enjoy about community college teaching is that I don’t have to deal with the publish or perish part of the university instructor’s job. I remember that feeling that one must get articles published even before the dissertation was done to look better on the job market. I remember big conferences like MLA and others. I remember how that pressure was real. I also remember how often politics played a role in who and what a journal published that the submitting author had no clue about. I don’t miss that, but nothing is stopping me from doing that except that I don’t need to do it. 

Another thing I have come to enjoy is the opportunity to increase and expand my fields of study. I have the credentials to teach in two fields now. Something that in the 4-year situation would not be a bonus--I wouldn’t be specialized enough there. But on the community college level, it’s a bonus that I can teach in more than one field, that I can explore the links between my two fields and to the other disciplines my students will find themselves in, and I can keep exploring those connected fields. In fact when I do research for myself that’s usually where I find myself--connecting all those dots. 

This lack of required research is where some university professors look down on community college instructors--they don’t realize we can do the research, we choose not to. I am always researching things whether it is because I am working on a second degree or looking into creating a new program. It all requires research, so I have tons of researched information hanging around my office and home. I have a number of papers I’ve written (publication-worthy too, or some of my professors in my second Master's program assured me), and I have the information and the ideas, and eventually, maybe I’ll get to it on my terms. 

Besides getting into silly disagreements on Twitter, I have also been following a number of educators in my state (following one of my former students who lead me into this arena). I must admit to a bit of a wake-up call of my own--often having had the common post-secondary instructor’s thought of “what are they doing in K - 12?” Well, what I have learned is like those in a 4-year school or a 2-year school, K-12 teachers are doing the best that they can in the face of trying times. I have seen the depression and stress expressed by so many of these teachers just as I have seen similar stress and depression in the 4-year and 2-year communities. 

We are more alike than we care to recognize. Just as post-secondary education has had to deal with learning new methods of instruction, so have our siblings in the K - 12 world. It’s not like Zoom classes or classes conducted through masks were common in that environment, but here we all are struggling with these things, and to make it worse for K - 12 teachers, they have to deal with even nastier politics within school boards, school districts, and school administrations, and even among their colleagues. They also have to deal with scared and frustrated parents; something we post-secondary instructors are mostly lucky enough to avoid.  Also, our K - 12 teachers are becoming very aware of how little respect they get from society in general. It’s certainly a lot less than most of us in the postsecondary world receive since we often pile on to it. 

However, we are all part of the same world--that world of studying, learning, and thinking. We all ultimately have the same goal to create people who are thinking, productive, and good. From pre-elementary school to graduate school, we all want to produce thinking people, successful people, kind and responsible people. Sometimes we forget that--just as we forget that without k - 12 there would be no community college, or 4-year college, or graduate school. Sure, those in research institutions create new knowledge, but of what use would it be without the community college and the k - 12 teachers who end up disseminating that knowledge? Or producing the sorts of students who can further disseminate that knowledge? We are all connected and we all need one another. We need to remember that, and we need to do better supporting one another. We should stop worrying about whose bit of academia is the most important or the most special, and remember that we all need one another for there to be any growth or success or future.