Balderston 10

Chapter 10: Academic Resources and Facilities

The first resource that this chapter describes is the professor. The university needs quality instruction and gains this through faculty. Faculty are organized on a tenure or ladder track that ensures their life at the university. Temporary and guest lecturers are not on this tenure track and do not enjoy the same perks or benefits packages. Recent articles in the Chronicle debate the efficiency and fairness of this practice. Balderston also discusses the tenure review process in which faculty must be reassessed in order to validate their contributions and productivity to the university. This should be requirement as there is no longer a federal retirement age. Bad professors could thus stay at the university long past they were effective teachers.

Libraries are another important resource of the university. The size of the library indicates the prestige of the university. This reminds me of the beginnings of library collections as begun by literary societies in the eighteenth century. Fund collectors for universities would even accept books as they begun their college collections. Now, libraries utilize computer and internet technologies so that information can exist at alternate locations. Access to information is a great asset to education and research. The inter-library-loan system increases the ability to share knowledge among researchers.

Balderston also quickly describes the development of space and buildings. The ultimate lesson here is that there is a lot of bureaucracy and politics behind space making. This sort of project requires interest by key constituents, willing donors, lengthy assessment of needs, allocations of budgets, and eventual contracting and implementation. I am surprised at the relative quickness of construction at USC of the Topping student center. I surmise that a strong backing from alumni helps to speed up the process.