The Lazy Professors

I love my job, and I'm not just saying that because my bosses read my articles. I love what I do, and I'm glad to wake up every day and write about things that are important to me and to you.

We've all had jobs where that wasn't always the case. I know I've had them. I've worked in call centers and warehouses. I had a disastrous time teaching at Milwaukee Public Schools (that's a long story for another post). But in all those cases, in jobs I both liked and loathed, the bottom line is this: I showed up.

And if I didn't, my bosses would have rightly shown me the door.

But for teachers in the University of Wisconsin system, they seem to think that actually doing work for their salary is a great personal offense. The Wisconsin state Legislature is requiring UW educators to, you know, actually educate and teach at least one course per semester.

The horror.

When lawmakers passed a new state budget this year, they approved a roughly $256 million increase in funding for Wisconsin’s 13 public universities. But that money came with strings attached, including new requirements for how much faculty need to teach.
Now, UW system employees are pushing back. They argue implementing the teaching workload requirements could raise constitutional questions and the mandate inaccurately measures all the work educators put into their jobs.
“There's an awful lot that faculty do that's not physically teaching classes X number of hours per week,” said Neil Kraus, a UW-River Falls political science professor and a union leader with AFT-Wisconsin, which represents employees across the UW system.

The requirement is one class per semester and 12 credits per year. That's what? A max of two classes per week, each being between two and three hours?

Oh, and because I know you're wondering, depending on the teaching job in question, these professors can make on average $75,000 per year and up to $200,000 (or more) if you're a tenured professor. Classes in the UW system usually start after Labor Day and go until mid-December for the fall semester. The spring semester starts mid- to late-January and goes until early to mid-May. That gives professors who don't teach the summer session June, July, and August off on top of a month for Christmas and about a week for spring break.

Would that we all had such cushy jobs.

On the other hand, the less time these educators, most of them undoubtedly Leftists, stay away from our children, the better. But in that case, they are free to find employment elsewhere instead of mooching off taxpayers.