Part of the Problem

Although the majority of the subjects I have taught over the years are not specifically in the "communications" area, I have taught 2nd year courses in reports and presentations and for the last few years have also taught a similar course at the 3rd year level. In addition for a number of years I taught business courses which had both reports and presentations as a major component. In addition my "formal" education was in English language and literature, so I feel I can comment on this area of "quality investment" that is needed in the colleges.

So first I would like to reference the website "rant" of an excellent teacher. This is not my view ... I have never been in her classroom nor seen her courses. But my daughter took courses from her, and while my offspring was somewhat blunt in her assessment of some of her instructors, she gave top marks to this one: in fact, she said that of all the professors she had had during her 3 years, this one was the one she learned the most from. So go see what this professor has to say about the need for support in the colleges for what may be the most basic skills that a student needs in order both to learn and to demonstrate other skills, let alone to succeed after graduation. But at our college unless you have a PhD (in anything) you will not be hired to teach -- even if you have a master's degree and can teach, I still suggest you not bother to apply at this point, as should anyone with a PhD apply you will probably be rejected out of hand. You will likely not even get an interview, even if you have taught on a part-time or partial-load basis for years and have excellent teaching reviews from students. As this professor points out -- what has happened to a system that teaches MSWord and presentation skills with "computer studies" teachers with no background or training in language skills? What has happened when other analysis-intensive courses that used to have 3 or 4 case studies (individually done) now have 1 per term, because the evaluation factors do not allow for more? And, as I have noted before, we used to have an 18 week semester with 4 hours per week to teach such skills, and we are now reduced to 14 week semesters and 3 hours per course. Rumour on the picket line has it that one of our top administrators was heard to say that the college only wanted to develop new programs that taught theory, not skills .... hmmm, surely that cannot be accurate?

As you can see from the date on the web page, this issue is nowhere near being new ... we in the college system have been trying to cope with this issue for a number of years now. (By the way, this professor is now retired, so don't be surprised if you try to contact her and she does not answer your email.) That's why I feel free to post the link ... there will be no repercussions for her. But if the link goes dead in the next few days, I would not be surprised, as her page is still posted on the college server. (Suggestion ... if you want it, save it quickly!)

So a question for our college administrators --- who were you talking to that led you to believe that we were happy with the quality we can deliver, and therefore why were you so "surprised" that we voted for a strike for more full-time teachers and smaller class sizes and, generally, for better quality? Anyone in touch with these daily issues that we have struggled with over the last 4 or 5 years especially would have known that we would have to take a stand over quality, and the Rae report supported it. What were we supposed to do? Trust you to make it magically better? After years of reductions in teaching time and growth in class sizes and all the other issues that have faced us with technology issues and a changing "intake" profile, I don't think so.