ATS Street View 09: Americans Live to Work

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Work is unnatural huh?


The Coyote gets out just before sunset and stays out till just before sun up to hunt for it's food in the bitter cold mountains of Nevada.

Ancient Man worked all day from sun up to sun down plowing fields and hunting for meat just so they could survive through the coming winters.

If you think it's unnatural, then explain to me how you're gonna eat, keep warm....

I've heard this theory before...And it's usually peddled by academics who have never really worked a day in their lives.

Do you know what an academic is? Apparently not

Academics think they can live by theory. And they're surprised when it doesn't work out. I never said anything about teachers.

Academics... let's go dictionary:

ac·a·dem·ic   /ˌækəˈdɛmɪk/ Show Spelled
[ak-uh-dem-ik] Show IPA

–adjective
1. of or pertaining to a college, academy, school, or other educational institution, especially one for higher education: academic requirements.

Positive

2. pertaining to areas of study that are not primarily vocational or applied, as the humanities or pure mathematics.

Sort of positive

3. theoretical or hypothetical; not practical, realistic, or directly useful: an academic question; an academic discussion of a matter already decided.

Negative

4. learned or scholarly but lacking in worldliness, common sense, or practicality.

Negative

5. conforming to set rules, standards, or traditions; conventional: academic painting.

Positive if one likes that sort of thing (I don't)

6. acquired by formal education, especially at a college or university: academic preparation for the ministry.

Positive if one likes pulpits & dogma, negative if one doesn't

7. ( initial capital letter ) of or pertaining to Academe or to the Platonic school of philosophy.

Meh...PhD's, BA's, BSA's. I'll touch on that later.

–noun
8. a student or teacher at a college or university.

Not a bad job, right? Well, perhaps not...

9. a person who is academic in background, attitudes, methods, etc.: He was by temperament an academic, concerned with books and the arts.

Negative or positive.

10. ( initial capital letter ) a person who supports or advocates the Platonic school of philosophy.

I hate repetition.

11. academics, the scholarly activities of a school or university, as classroom studies or research projects: more emphasis on academics and less on athletics.

dictionary.reference.com...

OK... sure sounds negative, doesn't it? Yes it does. These people that get into that must be either come from extremely rich families who can afford to put them through 'further education' or they are complete fools for going so deep into debt that it'll take 25 years to get their collective heads above water again.

Hi... that's me. The dad who was encouraged by how well his two sons did that he pushed and provided for them both to go to universities. Of the two (who both made the grade), one actually thrived in academia and graduated 'with distinction'. Lovely term, eh? Well, it meant that he won a PhD scholarship to one of Canada's foremost universities and, boy, were those years ever hard on him, but he DID it. He has a PhD, published his thesis and looked upon the academic world for possible opportunities to work towards a full time job teaching, maybe even that holy grail... [color=gold]TENURE .

Yeah... right.

Here's reality, folks:

No-one can handle teaching more than between 8 and 10 classes a week. This is because prep time and marking papers, which is all done at home, takes a huge chunk of time. The pay is minimal, so 8-10 is about what you need to be able to have an apartment and a reasonable living. It varies city to city, college to university, of course;

No classes are more than 4 months at a time. They are contracts and can be dropped at any time by the college or university. You have to re-apply for every term and for each institution. You win some, you lose some, you'd better be ready for change 4 times a year.

One rarely gets all their courses set up at the same college or university and, often, they are in seperate cities. Commuting is a real pain AND costly.

One always has to be ready to move, as the next seies of classes could very well be a thousand miles away (or more).

Contract 'professors' are low paid compared to tenured staff, so financing a car and an apartment in a city may very well be a no-win situation. Buses and trains rule. The schedules had better fit or you're in trouble.

It has been my son's experience that he'd be better off working a steady 40hr/wk minimum wage job flipping burgers at a Micky Dee than he makes as a professor. And that's the bottom line.

Academia, while it's still viewed as the key to a better paying job somewhere, don't be fooled. The better jobs are gained by being trained in the 'Trades'. Go to college, learn to be a plumber or electrician, and you just might have a brighter future that those who focus on Academia. Butt-crack under a sink is the real flag of success.

Don't misunderstand me, though. It's the way it is because of economics. We still need academics simply because they are the one out of a thousand who will eventually become pillars of country and community. Would you trust Joe the plumber to be Chief Justice? Really?

Anyways... the system is stacked against academics today, and, imo, not worth all the time and effort it requires to attain that PhD. Leave it for the very wealthy kids. The ones that never need to work a day in their lives anyways. Win/win and life-long frat parties. Woot!

But, be very careful when you're talking to a lower middle class man or woman who fought all the way to a PhD. Don't be making him or her out to be a lazy so-and-so, because that's just not right. If you think it's so easy to pull off, then please prove it to me, because that's not what I saw over the 8 years it took my son. Not then and not now.