Role of an Academician

I have spent more than eight years of my life in academics and feel that I have developed a basic understanding to comment on the profession. Of course, academicians are not a uniform denomination. Academicians are likely to differ a lot based on the subjects they teach, the institutions they teach, and the quality of students they teach. At the same time, there are certain similarities among all academicians as they tend to do similar activities - teaching, research, consulting, and "academic administration". However, the proportion of time devoted to these activities is also likely to differ widely among different groups of academicians. This essay aims to bring forward my individual, private views on all these activities.

Among the four types of activity, teaching is one activity in which all academicians are likely to participate. Hence, a basic expectation from an academician is that he/she should be a good teacher. But what does it mean to be a good teacher? Is it a person who inspires curiosity among others? Is it a person who enables students to think critically? Is it a person who enables them to get marketable skills? Is it one who creates an entertaining classroom atmosphere? I believe that the different aspects that I have identified are conceptually different and hence they may not go together. If a trade-off has to be made where should one make the trade-off? Or should one go for some combination of the above? If yes, what should be the proportion? I think there are no easy solutions. I feel that a teacher should focus on igniting curiosity (first priority) and sharpening critical thinking skills (second priority).

The second most prevalent activity is likely to be academic administration. It is a matter of pride for many academicians that they, as a group, play a major role in administering their institutions. However, are academicians trained for the same? In a high power-distance country like India is it not possible that academic administration will take priority over the actual activities of teaching and research? Can a person be justifiably called an academician if they spend more of their time in administration rather than in teaching and research? I am of the opinion that academic administration should be limited to strictly academic matters and the other aspects of administration should be contracted out to others.

The most contentious activity of an academician is likely to be research. From one perspective, research i.e. the accretion of new knowledge to our existing pool of knowledge is the most exalted and noble act in which an academician can engage himself/herself. At the same time, the imposition of research mandates has led to multiple evils such as outright falsification of data, plagiarism, promotion of paper mills, unwarranted self-citation, and buying of author slots. Research, which technically aims to unearth the truth and expand knowledge, has become one of the most deceptive and untruthful activities that mankind indulges in. Even if the research has been conducted truthfully, there are questions about measuring its impact. Should the impact be measured in terms of citations or "real-world impact" or some other metric? Should the criteria be the same for basic and applied disciplines or different? If research is to be incentivized, should the process or the outcome be incentivized? I believe that research should be a preference and institutions should incentivize the process rather than the outcome. Research and researchers should be celebrated and honored but doing research should not be forced. If someone does not want to do research, they should be able to compensate for that through additional teaching. The corollary of this is that teacher training should be made necessary for entry-level positions in academics and suitability as a teacher judged for any academic position.

The last activity i.e. consulting is something in which only a relatively small number of academicians serving mostly in elite institutions are able to participate. Consulting should be encouraged, especially for applied disciplines. However, consulting should not happen at the expense of other activities and a good consultant should not be honored more than a good teacher/researcher. In that way, I look upon consulting as a residual activity.