Is Irish Academia becoming a money making racket?

The majority of my large lectures/seminars from outside speakers in university are people who are doing it purely for their own benefit whether it be for their academic research or for their personal business/venture. The part that bothers me the most is that the majority of these modules are compulsory and if you do not complete their survey/do their project you fail that module.

Given Irelands size as a country compared to other similar sized/slightly larger western countries like Scandinavia, the university rankings are on par or better. Trinity College isn't doing half bad.

There is only so much one can do to compete with Harvard, Stanford, Caltech which has more researchers than some universities have students. These rankings are based on citations and citations of citations. Mainly.

TheyKnowMyIP wrote: »

We cannot deny the standards have dropped to an all time low anymore. Are these Academics more interested in lining their own pockets? Opening up "Higher" Education to the masses was never going to produce more high class research outright. Is there more going on behind the scenes here? You can't blame em, nice way to bring in revenue while NOT improving standards. Source - http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2011/1007/1224305386466.html For the record, Ireland has a truly terrible reputation for research worldwide, at least according to the Times Uni rankings 2011. Was your degree worth the paper it was written on?

TheyKnowMyIP wrote: »

College is big business, son. Certification for the masses = $$$. College is a business, why would it not work:rolleyes: A University is a place of research, not learning. It's not rocket science ffs.

I suspect I know of someone who didn't get a degree worth the paper it was printed on.

TheyKnowMyIP wrote: »

I am only going by the ranking indicated by the THE, but I can't think of anything notable in the last 10 years. Care to jog my memory? I can't be bothered to research every article published in the last 10 years to form a conclusion.

Last year, there were two Irish universities in the top 100 which is pretty good for a country of 3 million in the midst of a recession. This year, there was some slippage, but Trinity at 119 and UCD at 153 are still holding their own. It certainly cannot be said that their standards are at an all time low.

Also, it's slightly ironic that you complain about universities becoming places of research rather than learning, when most ranking systems are based on research output rather than educational excellence.

I don't think it is a money-making racket, but one could argue that Irish universities suffer greatly from understaffing - the staff-student ratios in some fields / institutions are nuts when compared to those in the UK. Behind this problem lies the many pay rises given to Irish university academics over the last decade or two - Irish academics are now much more expensive than British academics, so we can't afford to employ as many staff.

Irish universities are now in an awkward corner because they need more lecturers at the new lower salary scales (say, 1 new appointment for every 4 existing) - this would have an instant positive impact on the ratings for Irish universities (through the staff-student ratio element of the rankings) but would also allow all staff members more time to increase their research output, leading in a few years to further rating improvements. But they can't do this because they can't afford them, and with student numbers set to rise and rise, the situation will only get worse until fees are introduced (with the necessary finely graduated grants system too of course).

This IMHO is the solution and is far more likely to succeed than Tom Boland's coherent set of interlocking, mission-specific institutions blah blah blah

TheyKnowMyIP wrote: »

College is big business, son. Certification for the masses = $$$. College is a business, why would it not work:rolleyes: A University is a place of research, not learning. It's not rocket science ffs.

Iiric the biggest drawback on the Irish Universities scoring was in their research value. The teaching quality was rated as being of a very high standard.

As for it being a money raking racket, the thing I hate most about it is that it seems some universities just invent courses to attract state funding because of the influx of undergrads. Vague statement I know, because I have no data to back it up just a gut feeling.

Here's an interesting piece on an actual money-making racket in academia:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/29/academic-publishers-murdoch-socialist?CMP=twt_gu

Tigger wrote: »

i could have studied for my degree in two months
all the rest was filler

90 in 11 out and we all agreed that we could have learned the course in a year

Probably should've been a little more ambitious in the course you applied for then?