That’s one of the key questions Rich Vedder poses in this op-ed, which ran in the Austin American-Statesman.
Looking at the data Texas A&M has collected, he finds that professors who teach few students do a goodly amount of research. But what is the value of that work compared with the value that could be had if they were teaching instead? We have no idea about the value of the research because there is no price on it. This is reminiscent of the “calculation debate” over socialism. Ludwig von Mises observed that economic planners under socialism would never know whether they were using resources wisely or foolishly because they would have no market prices to guide their decisions. Universities are in the same boat, assigning various combinations of teaching and research to faculty members without prices to guide them.
Oh, but there IS a measure of market value.
Localyokel Community College does teaching, not research.
Wasanormalschool State College does teaching, not research.
Whatascam Private University, which is very selective for reasons not related to merit, does research. It pulls in the grants for silly projects. Its students fluff by and all get A grades, but they get to meet the right people who do research.
Now, suppose you are hiring in BigMegaCorp. The finalists are two: The first started in LocalYokel then transferred to Wasanormalschool. The second went to Whatascam.
Which one do you hire? Come on, tell the truth, not theory. NRO Editors who are more like the first, rather than the second, should reply. If any!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI am a professor at a tier one research school in an engineering department, and I spend a significant amount of time doing research and chasing funding for research. What is my most important product? I would argue it is not my research results, but rather PhDs that know how to develop an idea, design an experiment to test it, and then defend their results before a skeptical audience. That is, I train students to be able to do what I did on a regular basis for ten years at a large industrial research lab.
My graduate students have gone on to get jobs at Microsoft, Google, Intel, Synopsis, and the like. Cut off my research, and the research of other faculty at research oriented schools, and you will cut off the supply of skilled technical people that keep America in the lead of engineering design. There's more to a college's mission than educating undergraduates. That is an important part of our mission, but it is not the only part.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"The Old Man's" response is predictable, because he spends much of his time either doing research or "chasing funding for research," and obviously he will defend his efforts as being necessary for his students.
But yet while defending his university research as being necessary to the "supply of skilled technical people," he freely admits that he obtained his skills not in a classroom, but from "ten years at a large industrial research lab." His argument boils down to "give me money for university research so I can teach my students things I never learned doing university research."
I received my undergrad (and only) degree in geology from a Tier Two school. However, rather than spending most of their time on research, the geology PhDs taught classes full-time. All but two of my required classes in my major were taught by doctorates (the others taught by Masters'), and even my non-major required courses were taught by doctorates more often than not. The only time I ever saw a teaching assistant was in a lab, making sure we didn't blow up anything.
I'd put the education I received there up against that of any of the so-called "elite" schools any day.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSo far as I can tell, "Never Outraged" seems to believe that students who graduate from prestige universities where faculty members do lots of research are necessarily bright and competent, while students who graduate from schools where faculty members do little or no research are necessarily incompetent dullards. That's wrong on both counts.
My point, and Prof. Vedder's is not that no faculty research is worthwhile, but that often it amounts to nothing more than filling up pages in journals -- work that no one would willingly pay for.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe reply from "The Old Man" is interesting. Summary of salient points: tier one research school, chases funds, produces PhDs with ideas that confront skeptics, then the students get good jobs.
Of course, I left off the part about engineering and technical leadership. But may I ask: Of the points retained, in what way does that differ from "Studies" majors?
Some years ago, I (STEM) was in a discussion with a "Studies" colleague at the undergraduate level. Research was not involved. I asked her why so many "Studies" programs proliferated, seeing as how the knowledge was unrelated to jobs. She replied that the "Studies" majors DO get jobs rather easily, namely teaching more "Studies" majors. The rest get on diversity committees at the kind of corporations mentioned by The Old Man.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseActually, research (and publishing) are the ultimate goals of faculty not only at "elite," private universities, but also at most state universities. The university at which I work is currently rushing buns-over-Bunsen burners toward something called "Tier 1" research university status, classroom education be damned.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseTo JamesS: What I said was that I "train students to be able to do what I did on a regular basis for ten years at a large industrial research lab.", not that '"[I] obtained [my] skills not in a classroom, but from "ten years at a large industrial research lab."'. So I did not freely admit what you claimed I did. The reason I was able to be successful in a large industrial research lab was because of the training I received at a large, public, tier one research university.
Now, if there is a more efficient way to teach these skills, I would love to know it and would embrace it. I enjoy teaching much more than writing proposals, and quite honestly would rather teach more classes that spend the hours writing grants and reports about grants. However, industry has tight enough deadlines that they cannot afford to risk product cycles slipping because they need to teach their employees how to write a well reasoned technical paper and how to design an experiment. They need people that know how to do this from day one.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIn my experience (in business schools), many of the "top researchers" are so interested in research, they'd do little good at the undergraduate level anyway. One of my PhD committee members was openly disgusted about the prospect of teaching undergraduates.
So I'm not sure the opportunity cost of having them outside the UG classroom is all that high. (I'm not implicating all top researchers -- they're individual cases, of course.)
NeverOutraged: when I was in industry, I often sought motivated students from regular state colleges rather than "top" private schools. In the city in which I worked, there are several highly-regarded private schools whose graduates were nearly worthless on the job. And the local open-admissions state U produced some very talented (and, more important, motivated) students. That's truth, not theory.
Overall, the school a student attends means little. Motivated students can learn at any school, and unmotivated ones won't.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbusePlease note that my handle changed. Now that I have registered, there is an underscore.
MCM180: Happy to hear that you like talent, not credentials. I worked in industry myself (having made much more money there than in teaching higher ed, justifiably). But there can be a problem, both in industry and higher ed: In many cases a committee screens applications before the boss gets a pick.
The committee, which is surely faculty in higher ed, and possibly prospective peers in industry, may simply eliminate any applicant who isn't from the same college, town, frat, or sport as the peers. The boss may never know that others were eliminated at step one.
That is not likely to happen for critical industry or university research positions. But most private enterprise jobs, even in tech fields, are rather routine, as is higher ed teaching. Who's to know if some applicants are eliminated by the underlings? Mediocre people can do routine tech jobs. Mediocre people can teach college (been there, done that).
Have a look at NRO Bench Memos archives. Remember that in Iowa, the state supreme court decision in favor of a right to gay marriage was unanimous? Not even Massachusetts or California thought so. Why Iowa? Bench Memos informs us that in Iowa, there is a committee of legal professionals that selects a group of prospects, then the governor must choose from among the prospects. The objective, supposedly, is to reduce the effect of partisan appointments. But in reality, the committee screens out potential jurists who are not in fashion with current trends, as exemplified by the activists (leftists) who join such a committee.
Would you, a responsible manager in competitive private industry, allow a committee of underlings to filter all applicants, thus guaranteeing that the only resumes you will see are from their friends? I hope not. But it happens. Yet in some contexts (not all) graduate of those elitist research universities have the right friends.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseInteresting column and comments, but in the interest of transparency, somebody needs to explain how faculty salaries are paid. At least at the state institution where I have taught for the past 35 years, the contribution to salary can come from state funds, foundation funds, research grants, or returned overhead. So it's not as simple as Vedder implies to determine the "teaching cost" of a faculty member. Those who generate a lot of sponsored research take a proportionally smaller part of their salary from state funds.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe article's example of the professor of "educational psychology" is interesting, as it confirms my prejudice: That a degree in "educational psychology" is to a degree in "psychology" what a degree in "education" is to any other degree.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseResearch at colleges is akin to the football team. A great football team generates publicity and revenue. So too with research. Of course, the publicity doesn't have anything to do with the central mission of the college, and the revenue is funnelled to only certain parts of the college.
The research professors even sound like Nick Sabam, "Sign with our grad school, kid, and you'll be a first round draft choice for Apple or Microsoft."
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseExplaining pure research around here is like trying to keep the natives from stealing the gold out of your GPS.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI don't know about psychology, or business management, but for professors that do research in the Sciences like biology, chemistry, physics etc. there is a lot of grant money to be had from NIH, NSF etc. The research professors that don't teach probably bring is most of the grant money to the university. The way grants work, at U of Chicago at least, is that professors have to pay part of their salary from the grant, also the university charges something like 50% of the grant as a fee for over head (some universities ask 100% which the granting agencies pay for don't ask me why.) So professors that don't teach are there to bring grants to the university from which the University gets a lot of money. Professors that don't get grants usually are pushed out or forced to teach.
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