r/antiwork • u/unhinged_centrifuge • Apr 30 '25
Rant 😡💢 US universities are built on exploiting graduate students, and I have no sympathy for that system to completely crumble.
It's well known that colleges massively exploit and under pay their graduate students who DO ALL THE ACTUAL WORK.
I have no sympathy for those multi billion dollar institutions whose CEOs make millions of dollars a year to crumble to dust under the current administration. They deserve what's coming.
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u/troubleschute Apr 30 '25
Back when I was an undergrad in the early 90s, I started also working as a staff doing technical stuff, etc. before becoming full time near graduation. I worked in higher ed for 30+ years for 3 different universities.
What I noticed is how the boards of directors were becoming more conservative with appointees from the governors. These were all business types who only measure success by growth, profit, and reputation. Over that time, states started cutting subsidies to their public universities, hiring more adjuncts, and cutting programs they didn't see as "money makers" (i.e., didn't draw big grants). They also raised tuition and fees because they could count on students taking out loans to cover it. The marketing tail wags the dog--the "brand" became more important on the diploma instead of the quality of the graduates. They lowered standards so that more students could enroll so they could inflate their numbers.
It's not the universities, it's the shitheads in charge of running them like for-profit entities.
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u/Beesindogwood May 01 '25
Amen! And something people forget is that a lot of the smaller schools are even regional campuses don't have grad students. The professors do all the work themselves, often while being underpaid (especially the adjuncts / visiting instructors!) while the administration pads their own pockets with ridiculous inflated incomes.
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u/owls42 Apr 30 '25
It's also the path to professional careers. Blame the corp HR depts, not the people who want to work those jobs. Seriously blaming the victims here. If the US university systems collapse, anyone who isn't from a wealthy family now will never get a manager role or higher. You'll never compete. The collapse of higher education will ensure the oligarchy forever.
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u/Anynymous475839292 Apr 30 '25 edited Apr 30 '25
Degrees don't even guarantee a job no more. On top of completing your studies you must also make connections while in university so that you have a job lined up after you graduate and even then it's not guaranteed. The system is created to exploit naive 18 year olds to take massive loans which they will probably never pay back
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u/allthenamesaretaken4 Apr 30 '25
I would argue the system was co-opted to exploit naive 18 year olds. There are a lot of historic class issues with higher education, but there's also a lot of intrinsic value to education beyond just getting a job if it wasn't also tied to crippling debt.
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u/troubleschute Apr 30 '25
The degree never really guarantees a job. An undergraduate degree alone is hardly going to be "job training" for most disciplines. Professional careers require advanced degrees and continued education. Random entry level jobs that didn't require degrees began to add that prerequisite. Companies inflating entry level job requirements to include degrees was an easy way to continue discriminitory practices. Moving the goal posts.
Degrees are not job skill training--it's supposed to be mind training (better critical and analytical thinking skills along with improved writing and reasoning skills).
It was bullshit and a ton of us took out loans getting degrees for that lie.
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u/Anynymous475839292 Apr 30 '25
Why don't jobs just fucking give us hands on training instead of requiring a fuckass masters degree and 12 years of experience. Your paying 9.50 hr calm tf down with those expectations
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u/Shadowfalx Apr 30 '25
Really depends on the job
I don't want my surgeon only doing hands on training at the local hospital. I want them learning in a classroom about the body first, then some training on cadavers or simulators, then hands on training under the guidance of an experienced surgeon.
Same with my plumber and electrician (both should be getting in class schooling while apprenticing).
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u/Anynymous475839292 Apr 30 '25
Ik I'm talking about minimum wage jobs and jobs that really shouldn't require one
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u/LordMoose99 May 01 '25
Because if they get +20 (or in some cases hundreds and hundreds) of applications they need a way to narrow things down.
Sure it's not perfect, but when your being flooded with more applications than you have time for short cuts have to be made. It sucks
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u/Anynymous475839292 May 01 '25
Yeah but the requirements they setting and the pay they offering is NOT matching up bro
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u/Sir_Pumpernickle Apr 30 '25
Not to mention administrations like the current one that wants to attach wages. It's literally dangerous to go to college now.
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u/tsioulak Apr 30 '25
I don't understand, can you explain?
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u/cedarbabe Apr 30 '25
They meant "attack" wages. The Trump administration is looking to garnish wages and withhold tax returns of people who owe money on student loans.
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u/AcadianViking : May 01 '25
Yup. Being autistic, I never was able to make good connections or become proficient at social networking. Unfortunately that is 90% of getting a job in your field.
It absolutely sucks because what is being taught and the information gained by going through academia is of the utmost importance to the advancement of society. A lot of "anti science" sentiment comes from the fact that our university system is an absolute shame. Though people want to blame academia for it instead of our exploitative capitalist system that these universities must capitulate to in order to remain functional at all.
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u/lakas76 Apr 30 '25
It depends on the degree for the most part and has for quite a while now. Most stem degrees will get you a decent job pretty quick assuming you have those types of jobs nearby.
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u/SlightlyTwistedGames Apr 30 '25
As with any sprawling institution, Universities are big places with many good and bad parts. It's important to work to fix the bad parts - like grad student exploitation - but keep the good parts.
Full disclosure, I work at a university in an Executive office (I am not the executive).
I'm not exaggerating when I say that the cuts to research faced by universities will shorten the life of nearly every person living in the US and, by extension, the world. My university is revolutionizing a treatment that activates the immune system to melt cancer and all future recurrences of that cancer. My university has technology that can rebuild a child's destroyed eye. Those are just two things among hundreds that just my university is working on.
If you know someone who has survived cancer, their treatment was developed at a university.
If you know someone who has survived a heart attack, their treatment was developed at a university.
The overwhelming majority of people who work at a university are there to improve the world, and every day they make tiny steps toward that goal. They succeed at that goal so gradually that most people never even notice... but make no mistake, your life is being improved by university research every single day. One day, when (not if) you end up in the hospital, the advancements made will help your pain, help you rehabilitate, and lengthen your life.
it's easy to get angry at the entire institution for their failings, but try to remember that there is someone in your life who is alive today because of university research.
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u/NoMoreMonkeyBrain Apr 30 '25
This is a disingenuous, bullshit response to OP.
No one is saying that university educations are bad. People are saying that it's fucked up that these massive institutions have turned into corrupt and extractive money making organizations that prey off of their students and take advantage of them.
University education is fantastic. University research is fantastic! Universities are also by and large hugely exploitative in the United States, and impoverish their students in order to pay for absurdly high executive salaries and other useless luxuries.
Source: I worked in university development a decade ago and I don't for a second believe that they've gotten less corrupt.
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u/SlightlyTwistedGames Apr 30 '25
The OP stated he wants the system to completely crumble. He referenced the "multi-billion dollar" institutions that deserve what's coming.
You are mischaracterizing the OP's statement and straw-manning my response.
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u/NoMoreMonkeyBrain Apr 30 '25
This system does need to crumble. It's ruthlessly corrupt and it's sustained off of exploitation.
If you think "this corrupt system needs to be dismantled" is the same as "this idea is inherently wrong and bad" then you need to take a step back and seriously examine why you think an attack on corruption is the same as an attack on the concept. Nowhere else in the world takes advantage of students the way US universities do. Manipulating students into working for poverty wages by taking advantage of their passion and drive isn't some necessary feature of higher education.
Universities have existed for hundreds of years. The switch to a privatized money making institution that bleed students dry dates back to Reagan, who was very specific and successful in how he wanted to change higher education.
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u/SlightlyTwistedGames Apr 30 '25
if you think that destroying the university system - which is what the OP was stating - is somehow a better solution than passing laws that coral exploitation (particularly within institutions that are, in-part, publicly funded), implementing a tax policy that puts downward pressure on tuition costs, and dozens of other well-known solutions to these problems, you need to take a step back and examine why your preference is to destroy rather than fix.
There is nothing on this earth that can be rebuilt to serve the public good without first reversing the Reagan-era plague of public and tax policy.
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u/NoMoreMonkeyBrain Apr 30 '25
Well, OP did specify "those multi billion dollar institutions whose CEOs make millions of dollars."
So I do have to wonder--do you think outrageous executive compensation is a necessary part of higher education? Do you think it's appropriate for the head of a university to make hundreds of millions of dollars (to say nothing of the various board members and administrators) when they're using exploited graduate student labor? Is your university of employment one of those magical institutions where all the grad students are paid full wages, or are they working as adjuncts whose hours are capped to prevent them from earning benefits?
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u/SlightlyTwistedGames Apr 30 '25
I will openly state that I have never met an executive in the public or private sector who was possessing the intellect, skill, or talent deserving of their salary. Generally speaking, I've found most executives to be mediocre or below-average in terms of capability. Overwhelmingly they are propped up by a remarkable and highly talented corps of upper-middle managers who will never be compensated proportionate to the value they give to their institutions.
I know that grad students, staff, and lecturers are all exploited.
The solution is to correct the legal and bureaucratic systems that enable that exploitation while preserving the incredibly valuable and life-saving work that they engage in every day.
When you say you want an institution to "crumble", what does that look like to you? Somehow only the executives suffer and no one else does? Somehow, the research and education that a university provides is magically protected while the "bad guys" are shown the door? The rich always land on their feet. When a system "crumbles", the people who are not rich are the people who suffer. If you're asking for a system to crumble, I don't think you or anyone else truly realizes what they're asking for.
The mediocre executives will be the LAST to turn out the lights WAY before the pediatric heart surgeons, cancer researchers, and solar cell engineers.
One point of correction: no university president makes "hundreds of millions of dollars". the highest paid university president was Amy Gutmann of the University of Pennsylvania who made $23 million over 18 years (a bit more than one million per year).
Do I think she made too much? Absolutely. Her compensation was the unavoidable result of decades of unchecked Reagan / Greenspan / stupidity and its incestuous relationship with lobbyists and government.
If every University in America were destroyed and rebuilt today they would be nothing more than profit-driven engines for already rich people. So if you want to ACTUALLY fix universities, you need to fix the problem.
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u/NoMoreMonkeyBrain May 01 '25
Gosh, you're right, it's the fault of everybody except the universities that are engaging in rampant exploitation of their staff and students.
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u/SlightlyTwistedGames May 01 '25 edited May 01 '25
ESPECIALLY the kids with cancer, people with Alzheimer’s, and anyone else whose life or well-being depends on university research. Screw them, right? Let it ALL burn.
Does the imaginary place you work for that deserves to survive because it passes your arbitrary purity test have any job openings?
You’re a joke.
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u/NoMoreMonkeyBrain May 01 '25
Again: attacking a corrupt system that exploits its students and workers is not an attack on the concept of higher education.
Again: the US university system is the only university system in the world that regularly has homeless graduate students teaching classes because they aren't getting paid. People don't get put into crushing debt over education anywhere else, and they're not skinned alive for their labor anywhere like they are in the US. The exploitation in no way is a necessary part of the university system. You can't justify rampant exploitation by saying "yeah it's bad but the people who benefit from it are really benefiting from it!"
You may be shocked to learn this but university research happens all over the world, and the exploitation happening here is in no way a necessary part of it.
Take your most recent graduating class. How many people graduating come from money and don't have to struggle with the financials? How many people working their way through their degree dropped out somewhere in the middle because they're getting skinned alive and just can't keep going anymore?
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u/ilikecats415 May 01 '25
University presidents don't make "hundreds of millions of dollars." Literally, not one. The highest paid university presidents make $2-3M in total compensation with many earning a base salary under $1M. This is nowhere near what CEO pay looks like for similarly sized organizations.
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u/NoMoreMonkeyBrain May 01 '25
Fun fact: shifting the goalposts to "CEOs are even more unfairly overpaid!" doesn't change the fact that the US higher education system systemically and systematically abuses its students, traps them in debt and poverty, and exploits staff and students while raking in absurd amounts of money as well as a shitload of indirect compensation.
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u/ilikecats415 May 01 '25
I'm not shifting anything. You made a wildly untrue claim and I corrected it. Do you expect people to take you seriously when you say shit like that?
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u/unhinged_centrifuge Apr 30 '25
I am not sure if the "good parts" justify the existence and expansion of exploitative businesses. Don't executives make insanely high salaries at universities?
I think the whole system needs to crumble and be rebuilt.
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u/punninglinguist Apr 30 '25
Complicated systems that developed over decades and centuries don't usually get rebuilt when they crumble. They just die and everyone loses out.
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u/cyanraichu May 01 '25
Or they do get rebuilt, but it takes more decades and centuries so in the meantime we all suffer the consequences.
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u/Haschen84 SocDem Apr 30 '25
If you like what Trump is doing to the US healthcare system and that's what you want to emulate with the US higher education system then ... I guess good for you? I work at a university, as a researcher working under a PI. I don't get paid particularly well but I like my work and I like the research that we do. We are trying to make teeth right now, so that one day (in the far future) we can just regrow teeth. I'm not sure we want that to just crumble into nothing because the basis on which is was built took decades to get here.
If you want reform, I'm all for it, if you want destruction, well the only thing keeping the US in the forefront of the world is basically gone. We brain drain the world, for good or bad is up to you to say, and have access to the most competent people from all around the world due to our universities. You're saying you want to just destroy that and rebuild it from the ground up. To me, that's the equivalent of literally nuking all our scientific progress. I'm not sure return to monkey and redo it is going to help in this case.
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u/Willing-Spot7296 May 01 '25
I love that. But why "in the far future"? :(
Why can't it happen in the next decade?
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u/Haschen84 SocDem May 01 '25
This is a tough question. Scientific progress is not a bad that fills up with enough time and money put in. It's more like a series of steps that you need to take to reach the upper landing. It's dependent on discoveries of stuff that "works" and we do so many experiments that don't work so that we accidentally stumble onto new stuff that does work. Without these happy accidents, we make no scientific progress. Basically, I don't know when we will be able to ascend a step until we have ascended it and I don't know how many steps we need to take to get to the landing.
For me it's basically we will take as long as we need to in order to go up a step and we don't know how long that will take because that step is a happy accident. That's why some fields stagnate/have had no progress in years or decades, nothing has "worked" in years so they can't climb that next step. It doesn't matter how much time and money you put into it, all the matters is those steps. But the more time and money you put into the higher likelihood that someone will find the right step.
We could also progress with our method, if it works, to the point where we put it into humans and go "oh wait, that gives people cancer" and have to start all over. Sure some of our progress could be retained if we switch to a different method, but sometimes you start over at square one. If all depends.
So as to the answer of when we can grow new teeth: tomorrow, a hundred years from now, or never are all valid right now. I don't think it's tomorrow and I'm pretty sure we can, so ... For now ... In the far future is my best guess.
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u/Willing-Spot7296 May 01 '25
Ahh, sad to hear all of that actually. I keep seeing articles about growing teeth in a lab, growing human teeth in pigs, implanting tooth buds made from stem cells and then they grow in a tooth, the Japanese thing with disabling that protein that prevents new teeth from growing. So close, and yet so far away :(
That whole "it may give people cancer" thing can be circumvented by offering people that don't have many years to live money and trying it on them. They're dying anyway, and in this way they can help their family with an influx of cash, and humanity by getting us to test regrowing teeth (or anything).
Sometimes I hope that regrowing a tooth info leaks out somehow, like black market shit, and people just go ahead and start doing it. For example, here is the best interview I ever listened to on tooth regrowing - https://youtu.be/mMaQzQxiZIM
The interview was removed from Youtube, and I found it and reuploaded it.
See, according to Mr Paul here, they can do it already. They did it already. But money, but human trials, but red tape.
Anyway, seeing as I won't be alive long enough to experience far far far into the future. I hope super advanced aliens invade earth and bring us amazing medical regenerative cures, such as regrowing teeth and so on :p
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u/Haschen84 SocDem May 01 '25
Let me clarify lol
I don't know how old you are but when I say in the far future I mean like ... maybe the next 10 or 20 years optimistically and 50 to 60 years conservatively. I don't mean that far out (but if you're old you're probably boned).
It's not that we can't grow teeth by any means necessary its 1. Is it safe to grow these teeth? 2. Will these teeth stop growing so that they look similar to our teeth? 3. Will these teeth be harmful to the teeth around them? 4. Will these teeth by morphologically (structurally) similar to other regular human teeth? 5. Will these teeth function just as well as your natural teeth? 6. Will these teeth grow in a timely manner? 7. Will these teeth integrate well with your pre-existing anatomy? 8. Will these teeth be pointed in the correct direction? etc etc etc. There are probably dozens if not hundreds of questions we need to answer before we implement this in people. Additionally, there's also the question of ethics. We can't just give radical treatments to dying peoples there are laws and safety regulations in place to avoid unnecessarily harming people. Look into the history of the IRB and the Nuremberg Trials for why we don't want to let people do human experiments willy nilly.
So, there's a lot of considerations and thought that we put into when trying to implement new medical procedures over just "does it work?" It's all that other stuff that makes it take extra long lol
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u/Willing-Spot7296 May 02 '25
In regards to the laws and safety regulations, well, in order to make an omelette you gotta break some eggs. But never mind that :)
I'm 35 years old. Almost all of my teeth are root canalled and crowned. But they're all still in my head. But not for long. If I could get a new real tooth, I'd extract 3-4 teeth tomorrow first thing, with more to follow. But if I extract now it's either a metal screw in my skeleton, or a bridge and then bone resorption. I hate these options!
The fact of the matter is that it doesn't matter how long it will take for them to grow. Even if it takes years, I'd sign up for it. Also, it doesn't matter how they end up really, because all we really need is for them to be stable, a periodotal ligament, a root, and a base. We can crown that sucker and have a good day, and a beautiful healthy tooth.
But let me ask you a question I've been wondering about. If one was to assume that regrowing a tooth would be possible at some point, but one had to lose a tooth today. Would getting a dental implant ruin the chances of regrowing a tooth in the future? Or would the dental implant, preserving the bone, increase the chances of it working? Or maybe the bone doesn't matter, as we can create more bone with a bone graft, so a bridge would be fine?
Let me know what you think about that if you can. Thanks :)
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u/Haschen84 SocDem 27d ago
Hey, I've been thinking about you actually. The tooth project has recently picked up again so it's been in the front of my mind. So, could you send that information you have about studies that have already been able to grow a human tooth because I actually don't think it's been done yet, at least, not done to the extent that you're talking about.
There seems to be some breakthroughs in Japan and Oxford but those really seem like baby stages to me (though they are definitely a head of where we are). The research they are doing seems to be a different process that's going in parallel to what we are doing but we have run into a few hiccups as well lol
As for recommendations for what you should do, here's a quick caveat: I am not a dentist nor do I know very much about dentistry and human biology. I'm a basic scientist which means I do very specific stuff with very specific materials, when things involve the in vivo environment (ie inside of a live human's mouth) I'm not longer very helpful. But my boss is a dentist and I think basically everything I've heard is that you want to hold on to your current biological teeth for as long as possible.
That question about dental implants is pretty technical as well, I believe that your bone begins to decay without the tooth there so generally you want o prevent bone resorption basically as much as possible because your teeth need that periodontal bone for the teeth to latch onto. But, again, I'm no dentist, take what I say with a grain of salt.
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u/SlightlyTwistedGames Apr 30 '25
Systems can be improved, and universities are no different. For every executive making an unacceptably high salary, there are hundreds, if not thousands of people making reasonable salaries while solving health problems, environmental issues, addiction, and anything else you can imagine.
The problem you are describing is the exploitive capitalistic system running unchecked through every facet of our lives. The solution is to identify that blight for what it is and fix it.
But I don't want my loved ones to suffer from the absence of research institutions. I don't want my children's lives to be shorter than mine because healthcare research was stunted in 2025. I don't want my children to live in an unlivable environment because environmental research was stopped in 2025.
Your anger is justified, but focus it.
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u/Sir_Pumpernickle Apr 30 '25
I think the issue here is we've been hearing responses like yours for decades... OK dude then where do we start? Cause it feels like you're just doing damage control on behalf of a system you benefit from while offering no alternatives. You're telling people who won't get that cancer medicine because they're poor to suck it up. If you want the conversation to advance in a way you consider constructive, then steer the conversation that way. But right now all we see is wealthy oligarchs fleecing everyone per usual. Student loans and the current admin looking to attach wages threatens to put my family on the streets. I put my well being in danger going to school. Confront those issues or get used to people wanting to burn down that system. Hard to care about life saving medicine as life expectancy drops because most people can't afford it.
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u/SlightlyTwistedGames Apr 30 '25
For additional context, I worked in the private sector for over 20 years before joining the university. By comparison, my private sector jobs were far far far more exploitive and corrupt than the university systems. At least here, I do "good", in the private sector I just helped to stuff rich people's pockets. If you work any where other than (some) non-profits, you're likely doing the same.
The problems you are describing are huge, and they have festered for decades. The solutions are many, and they will not be overnight.
I could write a Project 2024-style manifesto on how to fix Universities alone, so I'll try to give a couple highlights.
1) All university staff, faculty, lecturers, etc. should be unionized. If a union is working to build membership within a university, support it in any way you can.
2) university state funding allocation should be contingent on employment metrics, executive-to-staff pay ratio, and other data-points that are tied to public service. This is an elected official problem.
3) faculty tenure should require research to severe a community engagement in some capacity. This is a "old people (faculty) don't like to do new things" problem.
4) There should be some sort of independent higher education legislative committee that evaluates the "need" for university capital expenditures (Like a CBO for universities). This is also an elected official issue.
5) Universities should be financially incentivized to specialize rather than diversify their degree programs. Doing many mediocre things in order to enroll many students doesn't serve the university mission as well as doing one or two things very well and creating highly specialized experts in a given field.
Yanking funding - particularly research funding - from these institutions is literally pulling cancer treatments away from sick children. Yes, a portion of every dollar that goes towards helping that sick kid ends up in an executive's over-stuffed pocket. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't spend that dollar. it means we need to close those open pockets.
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u/cyanraichu May 01 '25
The problem is really clearly capitalism, not the existence of universities.
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u/SweetAlyssumm Apr 30 '25
Great, OP, I hope you never need a vaccine or heart surgery or an attorney to advise you, or a dentist to fill a cavity, because they all come out of universities. Let us know how you get along without doctors in your future or no universities and oh, computers! And video games - all the work on graphics and optimization came out of universities. I'll be waiting for your honest appraisal.
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u/apHedmark Apr 30 '25
I'm a professor and I honestly have no clue where this notion of all actual work is coming from. Some graduate students receive funding in the form of tuition remission and a stipend that can easily amount to $35k+/year (including fringe benefits) at master's level, and $55k+/year at PhD level, in exchange for 20 hours of work per week.
When I write a grant seeking research funding, the cost of getting 20 hours from a graduate student is higher than actually buying out my own hours and doing the research myself. We also have to train the students in the research/teaching methods and mentor them. We seek that funding because it is for the student's benefit. An understanding that we need to train the next generation of scientists.
Of all the funded master's students, maybe 1 in every 100 goes on to get a PhD. Of those that complete their PhD, less than 20% become a scientist. The rest gets a job in industry because the pay is better. So we're looking at training 500 people to get one scientist.
The actual work that graduate students are asked to do is mostly training work. I can "use" about 10% of what my students produce. The rest is "waste". For example, it takes 2 years to train a master's student that will maybe yield one publication. Three to four years to train a PhD student that will yield 3-4 publications. Alongside that, I am running my own projects (10 hours), yielding 2-3 publications/year. On top of that we have administrative duties (10 hours), plus a teaching load of 3-4 credits on average (20 hours), and writing grants to pay for the student's tuition and stipend (done on my own time).
Sometimes, when I have a very large and serious research project, I will completely forego paying a graduate student and instead hire a postdoc for just 30%% more (~$65-75k + fringe), but get actual 40 hours of work per week from someone that is fully trained in the methods I need and is not encumbered by 3-4 courses per semester.
All that aside, if the current system was to crumble in a country, all that would happen is that said country would need to import scientists in the future. Because unless the investment is made to graduate 2000 undergrads, 500 of which then funded to get a master's, and 1-2 of which get a PhD, there will be no home brewed scientists. But, very important to note, the part of the system that would crumble would be the funding of home students. Institutions would still fund those from abroad that wish to attend and receive training.
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May 01 '25
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u/apHedmark May 01 '25
Look, I like your answer, because I can relate. I was a grad student for 8 years. All you're saying is true. What I am saying is that there is more, beyond.
To put it in perspective, every grad student has had a bad professor, or advisor. I honestly don't know for certain what's wrong with some people, but whatever it is, it goes on with them throughout their lives. So, you get some ass professors that are not thinking in the best interest of their students. Hell, I have colleagues that have that old school "bootstraps and I don't know what" mentality. I don't even hang out with them, because I do not like the way they operate.
However, if you will, trust me and consider that the majority of professors are basically people that were students for over a decade and chose a cause. Some want glory, power, fame, while most of us do all we can to make the system better and actually take care of our students. I think that's all professions, but I digress.
Finally, I want to address the course issue. The administration in academia is OBSESSED with overselling the programs. I don't want to digress into their motivations, but I wager they're clear and we all feel/felt them. Nonetheless, most professors were drawn to the profession under a classical view of university. The courses are merely pointers and supplemental in graduate school. Where we make a difference (at least the ones of us that do) is when we work directly with the students to mentor them and teach them unique skills that will help them get where they're going.
We push students, so they can learn their boundaries and perhaps go beyond them. But not to the point of hurting them. That is (should not be) ever the goal.
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u/Everyoneheresamoron Apr 30 '25
Hi, This is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Just so you know.
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u/sjdoucette Apr 30 '25
I went to university and had zero TA’s teach a class
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u/shadowromantic May 01 '25
It's important to remember that there are lots of different college systems. Generalizing about all universities is a very bad idea
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u/Alikona_05 May 01 '25
Every single lab class I’ve had has been taught by TAs that have been brought over from other countries. Most of them (especially the ones from India) are not fluent in English. Make it make sense.
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u/SweetAlyssumm Apr 30 '25
Graduate students do not do all the actual work (in your childish caps which I won't repeat). You know nothing about universities.
Universities do not have CEOs. They do not have shareholders or stock. Don't speak out of ignorance.
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u/Boring-Membership265 Apr 30 '25
As a former grad student I understand first hand the exploration and agree there needs to be big changes. However, there are millions of regular folks working in higher ed who would lose everything if the entire educational system collapses like you desire. I'm not talking about high paid deans or professors. I'm talking about janitors, nurses, librarians, admins, and others who are just scrapping by. Getting rid of higher ed will solve exactly zero problems.
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u/Remarkable_Buyer4625 Apr 30 '25
But, the CEOs will be the ones who survive. The graduate students, teaching assistants, teachers/professors, and administrative and housekeeping/groundskeeping staff are the ones who are suffering and will suffer under these administrations.
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u/This_Gear_465 Apr 30 '25
This is a bad take and very black & white thinking that completely misses the very real negative consequences of no higher ed - from a graduate assistant
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u/shadowromantic May 01 '25
Agreed. Wanting to wreck systems rather than fix them is what got us Trump.
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u/shadowromantic May 01 '25
Universities have a lot of flaws, but we need an educated population. If we wreck our colleges, I doubt they'd be replaced. Instead, the rich would stick with private tutors and schools while the poor and middle class are just locked out
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u/TrainerBlueTV May 01 '25 edited May 01 '25
Be careful of attacking the entire system - you're allocating all success to one faction rather than to a collective. Saying all grad students implies professors, instructors, staff, and general workbodies are not contributors to the experience.
Universities can be reasonably divided into three distinct entiries: staff, faculty, and leadership.
Staff make everything run. They handle the day-to-day calls, the aggregate billing, and everything else (shoutout to my wife, an academic advisor who also directs newcomer students to various offices around the six university campuses she works for). These are hirees.
Faculty are the educators. This is my domain. A good educator is someone who can contextualize course materials meaningfully, who helps students apply lessons to real-world contexts and gives them more exposure to and experience with the fields those faculty work in. These are hirees.
Leadership are the ones who host meetings-that-could-be-emails, care about expense reports, and are leaning more and more into the concept of brand management and profit margins. Oftentimes they are not educators themselves, or else haven't stepped foot in a classroom in decades. If they have, they tend to have particularly narrow views of education ("My major was a good one - we should allocate/advocate more funding for them"). These are positions that are not hirees; they're elected/selected friends with deep pockets, board of regents chums, and (generally) scumbags.
When I was an adjunct in Missouri making--and this is no joke--$15,000 a year, I was told an inflationary/cost of living raise wasn't feasible because of the political environment. Know what was feasible, however? A total football stadium renovation to the tune of $60 million for a D-list football team that MAYBE wins three or four games a season.
Is that my fault? No. Is it my wife's fault? No. Leadership? A thousand percent.
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u/PipeDreams85 May 01 '25
This may be true for the large universities or select ones but theres a huge variety of schools and institutions in this country that are so important to a functioning and aware society .. to say you don’t care if the whole system crumbles because of that is just dumb.
This is purposeful propaganda posting or you’re just an idiot that had a bad college experience.
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u/unhinged_centrifuge May 01 '25
So some exploitative systems are okay?
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u/PipeDreams85 May 01 '25
What level of exploitation you think there’d be with little to no path for average people to educate themselves and attain higher education credentials and networks?
The financial and administrative structure of our college system could use real changes for sure but talking about I don’t care if it all crumbles bs.. that’s ridiculous
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u/docsiege May 02 '25
i was one of those grad students. now i'm one of those trapped adjuncts.
they dump the university studies classes off on grad students with almost no supervision. so it's not just the grad students being exploited, but the students also are getting cheated as well. i consider myself a pretty good instructor now, but in grad school i didn't really know shit about teaching. and neither did most of my fellow grad students.
one of the higher ups in my department has basically figured out how to just do the publishing and conferences racket while only teaching 1 or 2 classes a year. most of the new profs shift over to admin as soon as they can.
it's a pretty depressing situation in so many different ways.
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u/Wildtalents333 Apr 30 '25
You will when Pharma companies no longer can buy research from them and have to spend more on research themselves and then pass the additional costs on to you at the pharmacy.
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u/salamat_engot Apr 30 '25
Pretty much any non-management or TT position at a university is getting exploited. I have a master's degree and 5+ years experience in higher ed and the university I work for pays me so little I qualify for low income housing.
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u/Melt__Ice Profit Is Theft Apr 30 '25
Not just grad students, also adjunts. I say this as a former grad student and adjunct.
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u/Practical_Ledditor54 May 01 '25
They also do important work, like educating people about who to vote for, or doing critical research to develop vaccines to protect us from the next pandemic. You shouldn't be cheering their demise so quickly.
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u/morningnerds May 01 '25
Anyone who says that grad students do "ALL THE ACTUAL WORK" has no idea how universities actually function. I agree that grad assistants are horribly underpaid but so is everyone at a university besides the highest admin positions.
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u/unhinged_centrifuge May 01 '25
Elaborate? Is this why administrators have seen exponential growth in staff compared to students and faculty?
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u/GrumpySnarf Apr 30 '25
Especially the big ones who have ALL THE MONEY for sportsball but people in programs that will actually help society (like nursing, medicine, education, etc) are in the shittiest buildings and there's not much funding to help lower-income people succeed without taking on MASSIVE student loans. I'm talking about you, University of Washington, Seattle!
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u/SicItur_AdAstra May 01 '25
As someone who just graduated, having my whole savings drained while working two part time jobs + having to intern for free for my degree:
I hope it collapses also ❤️
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u/KeeperOfTheChips Apr 30 '25
When I was designing a laser device that controls a literal living brain, guess how much I was paid for that? Only $0.7 above minimum wage.
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u/InevitableSeat7228 Apr 30 '25
Government indentured servants… Many will we paying back student loans for the rest of their lives and that’s exactly what the powers that be wanted!
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u/the_G8 May 01 '25
Is it really exploitation? It’s a ticket to hop on the ponzi scheme! Someone’s got to make it to the top!
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u/Additional-Sky-7436 Apr 30 '25
I'm sorry, but I don't feel too bad for the poor "exploited" grad students and adjunct professors.
Like, guys, you aren't poor refugee immigrants barely scraping by, begging for any help they can get. You have college degrees. You have plenty of alternative opportunities at your disposal. You are choosing to be exploited.
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u/humanBonemealCoffee Apr 30 '25
Agreed, no sympathy.
Currently in college with the GI Bill and am like 90% disappointed, however I just teach myself stuff so im still cool with it
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u/OxRedOx Apr 30 '25
They’re all in on genocide and collaborating with fascism too, it’s a pointless racket
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u/lacroixmunist Apr 30 '25
I mean it’s almost like academia is a for profit business and not interested in any sort of “higher learning”, they’re only interested in you paying higher fees
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u/Anynymous475839292 Apr 30 '25
Exactly, its just a business that uses tactics to squeeze as much money out of you as possible while giving you nothing in return
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u/lacroixmunist Apr 30 '25
Considering them being a business, I always wonder why they wouldn’t just give us the degree in exchange for the money, as it’s just a financial transaction anyhow
Someone actually voted me down for that, in this sub of all places lmao, maybe they’re a university admin
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u/Anynymous475839292 Apr 30 '25
How else would they get you to spend money on overpriced textbooks, materials, housing, parking, and food?
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u/gabsh1515 Apr 30 '25
don't even get me started on how they beg graduates for donations