I do understand your problem with casual University appointments and it is a shocking indictment of what a University is supposed to be. The fault IMHO goes back to Dawkins amagamating the CAE sector with the Universities: teaching only positions were often very appropriate for the former but quite inappropriate for a "University". At least the Group of 8 must not throw the baby out with the bath water and try to keep some semblance of what a University is supposed to represent and that is not a vocationally oriented institution producing what the heads of industry say they want. The barbarians have long forced the gates but without people paid to reflect, analyse, write books, and carry out "blue sky research" (including especially sociopsychological), the nation will be the poorer.

Sorry Lucy but I think the NTEU is absolutely correct on this one. A teaching only position is not a bona fide academic position. A real academic engages in both teaching and research in equal measure. Research is about knowledge creation whilst teaching is about knowledge dissemination. So it would be a massive waste of resources to have only teaching only staff - they would be smart enough to create knowledge but they'd be precluded from it.

If the University bureaucrats got away with creating teaching only positions then soon these would be the majority of positions. They would squeeze out the research intensive staff and soon research would be the preserve of a privileged few at the elite universities.

You cannot denigrate research because of the dud measures imposed on it by the Australian Research Council. The ARC is made up of education bureaucrats and they don't know what they're doing. The journal ranking system is a joke. But academics are still producing quality research.

Its a shame about the casuals. But saving the casuals and wrecking academia is a dud choice.

Well, this is a surprise. I didn't give online opinion permission to reprint this post, and I hadn't a clue they wanted to until getting an email today saying it was published - though because I have a creative commons licence on my blog i guess they can do whatever they like in terms of republishing.

David, my point was that so called 'teaching only' positions already exist and in fact are necessary to the system, and furthermore, the vast majority of academics already employed on a teaching only basis - as sessionals or in short fixed term contracts - are in fact doing research, often they're doing more research than academics who have tenure. They're just not being paid for it. I agree the choice is a dud one, but that doesn't mean it can be evaded.

Sorry Lucy, if I'd realise you hadn't meant to post this I wouldn't have commented. I was actually a bit surprised when I clicked on some of the links and found that they were from April and May 2009.

For what its worth that "Excremental Theory of Post Grad" education is a bit too much of a conspiracy theory. I don't think the Universities deliberately set out to exploit post grad students but it has worked out that way.

This will sound cruel, but the sessionals are at the bottom of the market for a variety of reasons, and their exploitation actually allows the rest of academia to survive. That does sound horrible but its true. If all the tenured or tenurable staff had to teach heavy loads they wouldn't be able to research. Admittedly, some of the older staff don't research but it negatively affects their career so its their choice.

Some of those sessionals might look research active - but thats because they are doing a PhD - we don't know if they'll stay research active in the long run. A lot of the older tenured academics who don't research belong to a different generation. So the comparison doesn't really work. Even so, a lot of tenured and tenurable academics are actually research active.

What scares me is that if teaching only positions were formally approved then they might become the majority of the available jobs. That would be the end of academia. University bureaucrats are very short-sighted and they value teaching over research because teaching brings in money direct from the Government. So its a dangerous situation. I'm sorry but I see the plight of the casuals as a necessary sacrifice. My only advice would be don't be a casual staffer at a university unless you just want to earn some extra money.

I got the feeling when reading this article that it was a blog post so it was interesting to have that confirmed.

With regards to 'teaching only academics', in my experience with university as a student and watching my son's university study I ended up of the opinion that academics do not necessarily make the best teachers. In fact I got the impression that in the main, academics only teach because they have to in order to keep the position allowing them their research funding.

Now that teaching only positions are created perhaps the students will get a better commitment.

None of this is to suggest that there are not inspiring academics out there, many of whom both myself and my son were fortunate to have had- I'm just speaking generally.

After working as a sessional on/off for about 10 years I've just got my first academic position, its not full time and its fixed term (12 months) but it does have a research componant. I think its very important to have a research componant, just as I think its important to be dedicated and switched on to teaching. I know of people with teaching only contracts and it seems to me they are just being ripped off. They are expected to research too in their own time (ok maybe I am too) but there is so little time.

I enjoyed this post but I think its important we continue to fight for teaching/ research positions and stop exploiting the casuals...