Job Discussion Forums

[eha]

'why does this ordinary part of being a professional teacher require the word 'committee' to be applied to it, and why do managers set such store by it in the UAE? Have I just been lucky that there was no 'committee craze' anywhere else I have worked?'

VS is right; it's all part of the McDonaldization of education. What some corporate drone learns on a weekend MBA carries more weight than what seasoned troopers have known and practised for over thirty years! As for why UAE managers like it--- well, it's often been documented on this website: MANY OF THEM AREN'T EDUCATORS. And in many cases, their Tefl qualifications haven't given them much educational background.
I'm open to correction on this, but I'm not too impressed to hear that several HCT middle management types are 'happier with the more professional atmosphere' in their new gig. If they're so committed to professionalism, why did they uphold the garbage that was prevalent in their last one?

[holbrook]

I'm not so sure about the k-12 world, but certainly the "committee craze" here is a reflection of what is going on in higher education in North America. The glory days of the chilled-out university lecturer job are gone back home. Universities are no longer fountains of knowledge with a higher mission. They are constantly striving for increased enrolments, increased profits, increased faculty productivity values. �If you�re not tenured then you should be working 60 hours a week�, is now the norm. The way they accomplish this is through committee work and other additional duties such as editing a journal, running an center of some sort, writing grant proposals until they drop, etc.

As universities have gotten more professional rather than more academic, this fever for things other than teaching and learning has spread. It was manic in the HCT. Everyone was scrambling for the next big thing, the new PPDV course, WebCT courses juiced up by TATA, a masters degree in entrepreneurship (in conjunction with Harvard and MIT no less!), etc. Now apparently, each school is going to be a �Center for Excellence�. Forget about teaching and learning. After all, just because 75% of the students who enroll don't graduate, that doesn't mean our educational model isn't working for them or that we aren�t excellent. They constantly try to raise the standard despite the fact that the majority of students can't meet the existing standard. The solution: raise the rhetoric and make the standards higher, at least on paper. It looks good on the website. It also gives good ol� T.K. an opportunity to get some good photos taken and to have some nice trips abroad to research new opportunities. That and he can go to sleep knowing that no teacher under his control is getting off easy or enjoying a free ride. After all that is what is really important.

[eha]

'As universities have gotten more professional rather than more academic'

Surely you mean 'more bureaucratic', LESS professional? Mangerialist garbage has NOTHING to do with professionalism, and everything to do with social and corporate control. The fact that it's spreading at epidemic speed also reflects the absence of real reflection in today's education, despite the increase in rhetoric concerning something laughably called 'critical thinking'.

[veiledsentiments]

Ah... someone as jaded as I am about the 'profession' of education. I must say, Holbrook, that you have certainly described the degeneration of the system back home which is quickly spreading around the world it seems.

[eha]

'But we are compensated with a few dozen more committees!! '

And to add insult to injury, we're expected to regard participation in them as 'professional development'!

[veiledsentiments]

Mabruk!!

... what a gift...

VS

[holbrook]

VS,

Yes, you are correct. The word "professional" was a poor lexical choice. Businesslike or corporate would have been more appropriate. It's also true what you said about the lack of respect given to EFLer in academia back home as well. I've had a few friends go back and take some adjunct job a fairly prestigious university, only to return back a year or two later unable to make end even remotely meet on an adjunct salary.

The bottom line is that if you are an EFLer you must get a doctorate in something other that TESOL, if you really want to get a job in a university with a livable income back home.

Holbrook

[veiledsentiments]

Since I noticed Holbrook posting in the last couple days... how about an update on this place?

I was pretty hard on them at the beginning Have they got it together now?

VS

[Mia Xanthi]

Does anyone have an update on ECAE? You are welcome to PM me if you don't want to post.

[bintizzy]

Emirates College (I often drop the "for Advanced Education" as it sounds too pretentious for teaching middle-school level curriculum to grad students) has a huge task ahead of it--educating all the current and future teachers of the emirate of Abu Dhabi.

The reason that we under-hired is that there is going to be an intake in January of 2000 PGDE students. These students are current teachers in Abu Dhabi Educational Zone that have degrees, but none in teaching. By earning a PGDE, they are getting learning theories, best practice, methods, and all the other stuff that "Western" teachers get at the bachelor and magisterial level.

The PGDE classes are mixed, i.e., males and females together. Many of the students are not English literate so one must question the logic of offering the PGDE curriculum in English. Solution? Have a translator for each class, where needed!

ECAE is divided into the graduate (PGDE) and non-graduate (B. Ed.) programs, one dean for each. I love my B. Ed. students, the future Math-Science-English primary (K-5) in Abu Dhabi. The problem is that not all of them want to be teachers, and many of them are behind in their level of English, not to mention math and science. Sufficed to say that we have a big job ahead of us.

If you had asked me at the beginning (August), should you work here, my answer would have been an unequivocal, "No!", but now that the housing allowance has been raised from the paltry Dhs 120,000 to Dhs 180,000 (still small by Abu Dhabi standards, but then, I get my housing through my spouse) and the school tuition fees from the RIDICULOUS Dhs 20,000 per child to the more reasonable Dhs 50,000 per child, maximum of 2, I say if your passion is teaching and you love working with Emirati students, this is a good place to work.

We used to be attached to Singapore, but for some reason that I have yet to deduce, they aren't influencing us anymore. (Perhaps they are no longer the flavor of the month?)

If you have any questions you want to specifically address about working here, just ask. Unlike some of the management, I believe that everything should be open and clear.

Happy National Day (in less than a week)!

[Sheikh N Bake]

Reports of the death of the American university are greatly exaggerated--as are, above, certain wild numbers and claims masquerading as facts. Seventy-five percent of students not graduating? Such dismal statistics occur only in the least competitive institutions. As for nontenured professors having to work hard at research institutions, this has always been the case. Tenure takes four or five years to achieve and it is highly stressful and competitive--and so it has always been. Tenure has been chipped away at but nonetheless survives as a foundation of academic freedom. Admissions difficulty has increased markedly over the past 15 years, so that many institutions that were formerly "Very competitive" in admissions are now "highly competitive" or "most competitive"... including some of the regional state colleges such as the College of New Jersey (formerly Trenton State) and Truman State (formerly, I think, Northwest Missouri State--well, one of those Missouri state colleges, anyway). In any case, all this tightening of admissions results in a better learning environment once students are enrolled. At my regional state college, classes were small and there were no TAs. High school seniors would do well to apply to smaller institutions if they want such personalized attention, and leave the huge research universities for graduate school. International rankings of universities (from the UK and China, notably) are dominated by US institutions and this will remain so for a long time to come.

[Mia Xanthi]

Bintizzy, thanks so much for your reply. I didn't realize ECAE would be hiring for January. I would only be able to apply for August of 2009. The information about the housing is interesting. Is there difficulty finding housing for 180,000 now? Could a teacher look for housing in outlying areas (such as Shahama, for example) and find something decent?

Shake and Bake, I don't understand your reply. Were you replying to the wrong thread?