Joseph A. Shaeiwitz
West Virginia University

Pizza Seminar, March 30, 2001

The question posed by Dr. Joseph A. Shaeiwitz, a professor at West Virginia University, is one that is both personal, from the point of view of a professor, as well as societal. A college professor is expected to do research, to teach, and to raise money. Must one have superhuman powers to succeed in such a profession? Using a simple understanding of the economics of time, it is obvious that good performance in one area takes away from that in another. Generally, the area that receives least attention would be the teaching area, which is rather ironic, when one considers that a professor’s primary purpose on a college campus, from a student’s perspective, is to teach. However, this paradox can be elucidated with the knowledge that a professor’s only means of monetary sustenance depends on his ability to raise money for the school, namely through research. Thus, only the few teachers who have their hearts set on teaching will sacrifice valuable research time for the sake of passing on their knowledge to students, since there is no monetary reward to do so. In this way, students of the colleges suffer, and the performance of a professor as a teacher in the end undermines one as such. "Is there a problem, and if so, what should be done?" Shaeiwitz pensively posed.

What drove my curiosity was the fact that teachers were expected to do research in the first place. I asked, "How much is breakthrough research actually interwoven in to the curriculum?" The answer I received was certainly not definite. I basically learned that it really depends on the teacher as to how much of his research he shares with his students. Shaeiwitz did, however, assert that by no means is the potential for learning less with teachers who do perform research while teaching because of the brand-new things that fundamentals of engineering classes cannot provide. For example, only several years ago, it was almost unheard of to unite the two fields of biology and chemical engineering. However, professors that were up to date on the most current research in the chemical engineering field were most likely better prepared at sharing he exciting new information. However, that is not to say the positive effects mentioned here necessarily compensate for the negative ones that arise. How much time is a teacher really willing to put into teaching if he is not getting paid for it?

Shaewitz’s answer was this: there should be separate teaching incentives from research incentives. This makes perfect sense to me. Although it is one of my fundamental beliefs that one should love what he does, and that his actions should not be tainted by the primary motivation of money, it is obvious that one will spend his time doing what makes his time most valuable. No matter how much someone love teaching, if it does not put food on the table for his children, there is no way he can sacrifice such time and money. This will lead to a half-ass job. If one has the full incentives to do a good job, it is much more likely that he will be able to fully enjoy what he loves doing most, namely, teach. There is really no reason why one should underestimate the power of specialization. The whole of civilization is built on this premise. The self-sufficient feudal system did not survive. Why should we expect any more from the jack-of-all trades our system forces teachers to become. It was agreed upon at that pizza seminar that professors spend 90 hours a week with their three-pronged job. This is ridiculous and unheard of. Surely, we cannot view this as an efficient way to do things. I think Shaewitz’s suggestion is right. There should be monetary and prestigious incentives for teachers to do a good job teaching.
 
 

Contributed by Brehnen Wong

Class of 2004