Dear Nigel,
You are quite right. This is how it should be.
But the world had changed. You and I once lived in a world where universities hired us for jobs that were 2 days teaching, 2 days research, 1 day service. We also had some flexibility in using service time for service to the field and service to the discipline for such tasks as examinations, journal editing, etc. We could also allocate some of our research time to these tasks if we preferred.
Today’s universities ostensibly honor the 2+2+1 formula but service and administration require more than a day for activities that are specifically defined and required by the university. Many people also have more than 2 days of teaching.
The world has changed in another way. Today’s world has far fewer real academic jobs. More than half the teaching in many universities is done by people employed on a part-time or contract basis. In some places, there is even a sad designation for people who spend their working life driving from university to university as they cobble a living together from multiple part-time jobs: “freeway faculty.” In places like Australia and the UK, very few people today find jobs of the kind that you had in a long and distinguished career. For these people, fees and honoraria make a difference.
Many of the people who took these issues up off-list in the wake of David Durling’s note contrast the world in which they live with the world that they once thought they would inhabit.
Yours,
Ken
Nigel Cross wrote:
> Ken,
> I don't think I have ever been offered an honorarium (i.e. payment) for the 40 PhD external examinations I've done, neither in the UK nor elsewhere - it was generally regarded as being an honour to be invited, or a favour for a colleague who was the research supervisor.
>
> As for the 3+2+3 curriculum pattern, part of the issue might be that most design schools still regard themselves primarily as prepartion for professional practice, despite the fact that the expansion of student numbers means that they are now educating (or training) more students than the professions need. It certainly would help if design schools had a research ethos and included preparation for research, or even just recognised that research was a part of professional practice, and therefore part of the curriculum. That should simply be a corollary of regarding design as an academic discipline. Unfortunately, when the teachers don't have that ethos, or any real experience of research themselves, it's going to have to be a slow, boot-strapping process
> --
Ken Friedman, Ph.D., D.Sc. (hc), FDRS | Editor-in-Chief | 设计 She Ji. The Journal of Design, Economics, and Innovation | Published by Tongji University in Cooperation with Elsevier | URL: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/she-ji-the-journal-of-design-economics-and-innovation/
Chair Professor of Design Innovation Studies | College of Design and Innovation | Tongji University | Shanghai, China ||| Visiting Professor | Faculty of Engineering | Lund University ||| Email [log in to unmask] | Academia https://tongji.academia.edu/KenFriedman | D&I http://tjdi.tongji.edu.cn
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