Paperback
Modern Day Challenges in Academia
Time for a Change
9781839105401 Edward Elgar Publishing
Examining the modern day challenges faced by academics throughout their working lives, this timely book investigates the ways in which academic careers are changing, the reasons for these changes and their potential future impacts. Contributors with insider experience of both traditional research focussed universities and newer institutions with an emphasis on teaching, utilise theoretical and empirical methods to provide international perspectives on the key issues confronting modern day academics.
More Information
Critical Acclaim
Contributors
Contents
More Information
Examining the modern day challenges faced by academics throughout their working lives, this timely book investigates the ways in which academic careers are changing, the reasons for these changes and their potential future impacts. Contributors with experience of work in both traditional and contemporary institutions utilise theoretical and empirical methods to provide international perspectives on the key issues confronting modern day academics.
Split across three chronological parts this book guides the reader through the phases of an academic’s working life and the unique challenges encountered at each stage. For those entering academia key issues considered relate to career paths and motivations and transitions from industry to academia. During academia chapters study the understanding of external examiners, questions surrounding student supervision, work-life balance, use of technology and the trade off between teaching and research. Upon leaving academia concerns turn to the difficulties of working past retirement age and emeritus roles.
Exploring how academics survive and thrive in the modern higher education arena, this analytical book will be a useful tool for new and established academics and policy makers working in higher education as well as for programme leaders in educational management.
Split across three chronological parts this book guides the reader through the phases of an academic’s working life and the unique challenges encountered at each stage. For those entering academia key issues considered relate to career paths and motivations and transitions from industry to academia. During academia chapters study the understanding of external examiners, questions surrounding student supervision, work-life balance, use of technology and the trade off between teaching and research. Upon leaving academia concerns turn to the difficulties of working past retirement age and emeritus roles.
Exploring how academics survive and thrive in the modern higher education arena, this analytical book will be a useful tool for new and established academics and policy makers working in higher education as well as for programme leaders in educational management.
Critical Acclaim
‘This book makes for a useful documentation of working practices, particularly those practices that are damaging to colleagues’ wellbeing and thus need to be consigned to the pre-Covid19 era if we are to build better forms of academia.’
– Lydia Wysocki, International Journal of Research & Method in Education
‘This is a timely and welcome book, providing both fascinating insights into the changing role of academics and an articulate discussion of the impact of these changes on universities around the world. By highlighting the various challenges that academics navigate over the course of their careers, from managing workloads to engaging in emotional labour through to adopting new technologies, it provides a critical and valuable basis for future debates over the evolving role of academics and indeed their universities.’
– Anna Sutton, University of Waikato, New Zealand
– Lydia Wysocki, International Journal of Research & Method in Education
‘This is a timely and welcome book, providing both fascinating insights into the changing role of academics and an articulate discussion of the impact of these changes on universities around the world. By highlighting the various challenges that academics navigate over the course of their careers, from managing workloads to engaging in emotional labour through to adopting new technologies, it provides a critical and valuable basis for future debates over the evolving role of academics and indeed their universities.’
– Anna Sutton, University of Waikato, New Zealand
Contributors
Contributors: A. Agarwal, D. Anderton, K.E. Andreasen, M. Antoniadou, W. Chambers, C. Cook, M. Crowder, P. Cureton, E. Epaminonda, M. Gibson-Sweet, J. Haddock-Fraser, J. Jones, A. Karayiannis, H. Kogetsidis, P.D. Ktoridou, S.-J. Lennie, B. Longden, S. Marriott, M. Mouratidou, T. Proctor, A. Rasmussen, C.J. Rees, S.K. Rehbock, K.E. Rowlands, P.J. Sandiford, J. Stewart, S. Wells
Contents
Contents:
Introduction xvii
PART I ENTERING ACADEMIA
1 Living the dream … but for how long? Being an early-career
academic in the context of ‘excellence’ 2
Marilena Antoniadou
2 Career transitions from industry to academia 16
Mark Crowder and Maria Mouratidou
3 Career issues, paths and motivations: career stories of
four UK academics 31
Maria Mouratidou
4 Three scholars at work: making sense of the twenty-first
century academy 44
Peter John Sandiford, Ankit Agarwal and Sam Wells
PART II DURING ACADEMIA
5 Get me a job! Thinking about student employability 67
Dane Anderton and Sue Marriott
6 From euphoria to letting go: experiences of cross-cultural
adaptation of international academics in UK higher
education 82
Marilena Antoniadou
7 Exploring perceptions of academic management roles in the
undergraduate student experience 99
Marilena Antoniadou, Mark Crowder and Jim Stewart
8 External examiners: what do they do and how does
someone become one? 120
Mark Crowder
9 ‘Signature of mediocrity’? Variability and uncertainty
associated with PhD assessment processes in the UK 135
Christopher J. Rees and Kate E. Rowlands
10 Providing research supervision: a personal polemic 152
Jim Stewart
11 The effects of control on academic engagement, work–life
balance and work–life conflict: is how we manage and
what we measure actually contributing to what we strive
to pursue? 168
Caryn Cook, Joanna Jones and Monica Gibson-Sweet
12 The balance between teaching and research: challenges
and contradictions in the context of the modern university 183
Annette Rasmussen and Karen E. Andreasen
13 Caring and coping: an interpretative phenomenological
analysis of lecturers’ emotional labour in the context of
higher education commercialisation and the consequences
for staff and student wellbeing 196
Sarah-Jane Lennie
14 The unseen pressures of academia 211
Janet Haddock-Fraser
15 Apps and smartphone technology acceptance: lecturers’
likelihood of using interactive polling systems in the
lecture theatre 226
Dane Anderton
16 Being an academic in an era of rapid technological change
and distance learning education: views of faculty members
of a business school 238
Harry Kogetsidis, Despo Ktoridou, Epaminondas Epaminonda
and Achilleas Karayiannis
17 Academic leadership: challenges and opportunities for
leaders and leadership development in higher education 252
Stephanie K. Rehbock
18 Institutional research: unintended consequences in higher
education 265
Bernard Longden
PART III LEAVING ACADEMIA
19 Academics moving from higher education institutions:
careers of PhDs after graduation 286
Annette Rasmussen and Karen E. Andreasen
20 Retirement: a valediction to work? 300
Peter Cureton
21 Working past retirement age: from the point of view of a
business and management academic 312
Tony Proctor
22 But I don’t like golf: emeritus roles 324
William Chambers
Conclusion: time for a change 349
Index 353
Introduction xvii
PART I ENTERING ACADEMIA
1 Living the dream … but for how long? Being an early-career
academic in the context of ‘excellence’ 2
Marilena Antoniadou
2 Career transitions from industry to academia 16
Mark Crowder and Maria Mouratidou
3 Career issues, paths and motivations: career stories of
four UK academics 31
Maria Mouratidou
4 Three scholars at work: making sense of the twenty-first
century academy 44
Peter John Sandiford, Ankit Agarwal and Sam Wells
PART II DURING ACADEMIA
5 Get me a job! Thinking about student employability 67
Dane Anderton and Sue Marriott
6 From euphoria to letting go: experiences of cross-cultural
adaptation of international academics in UK higher
education 82
Marilena Antoniadou
7 Exploring perceptions of academic management roles in the
undergraduate student experience 99
Marilena Antoniadou, Mark Crowder and Jim Stewart
8 External examiners: what do they do and how does
someone become one? 120
Mark Crowder
9 ‘Signature of mediocrity’? Variability and uncertainty
associated with PhD assessment processes in the UK 135
Christopher J. Rees and Kate E. Rowlands
10 Providing research supervision: a personal polemic 152
Jim Stewart
11 The effects of control on academic engagement, work–life
balance and work–life conflict: is how we manage and
what we measure actually contributing to what we strive
to pursue? 168
Caryn Cook, Joanna Jones and Monica Gibson-Sweet
12 The balance between teaching and research: challenges
and contradictions in the context of the modern university 183
Annette Rasmussen and Karen E. Andreasen
13 Caring and coping: an interpretative phenomenological
analysis of lecturers’ emotional labour in the context of
higher education commercialisation and the consequences
for staff and student wellbeing 196
Sarah-Jane Lennie
14 The unseen pressures of academia 211
Janet Haddock-Fraser
15 Apps and smartphone technology acceptance: lecturers’
likelihood of using interactive polling systems in the
lecture theatre 226
Dane Anderton
16 Being an academic in an era of rapid technological change
and distance learning education: views of faculty members
of a business school 238
Harry Kogetsidis, Despo Ktoridou, Epaminondas Epaminonda
and Achilleas Karayiannis
17 Academic leadership: challenges and opportunities for
leaders and leadership development in higher education 252
Stephanie K. Rehbock
18 Institutional research: unintended consequences in higher
education 265
Bernard Longden
PART III LEAVING ACADEMIA
19 Academics moving from higher education institutions:
careers of PhDs after graduation 286
Annette Rasmussen and Karen E. Andreasen
20 Retirement: a valediction to work? 300
Peter Cureton
21 Working past retirement age: from the point of view of a
business and management academic 312
Tony Proctor
22 But I don’t like golf: emeritus roles 324
William Chambers
Conclusion: time for a change 349
Index 353
