Friday 15 July 2011

Absurd Superstructure

How many standard performance indicators does it take to change a lightbulb? Following on from below, I read today that over the last thirty years, universities have increased their administrative staff by 85%, they have increased something called 'associated professional staff' by 240% and increased faculty teaching by a mere 51%. One again the ridiculous nature of our predicament is made clear, this is 'superstructure' that is absurdly unnecessary, simply representing 'everybody checking on everybody else' whilst in terms of production, the margins for profitability are so thin that we find the banks and media cheating to keep the ship afloat. But even at my university, we spend a whole two months out of the total academic year examining students. That leaves a rather small amount of time actually teaching them. With more regulation, demanded by the seemingly inevitable malpractice, this becomes a vicious circle.

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