Missouri State, Florida Atlantic Outsource Teaching
It seems the global outsourcing trend knows no bounds.
It’s been brought to my attention that even teaching is being outsourced in the United States. Missouri State and Florida Atlantic Universities have agreed to allow Poynter Institute, a Florida-based nonprofit organization, teach a Journalism 101 class online.
This outsourced teaching position has been both accepted and objected to by faculty, who reportedly won’t have a say in how the course is run.
Count Missouri State’s Margaret Weaver among those who isn’t too thrilled with the new outsourced course.
“We don’t have anything in our curricular review process to handle current courses offered through a different system,” Weaver said. “The concern is that we’ve turned over total control to people who are not employees of the university.”
Mark Paxton, a colleague of Weaver, agrees with his fellow teacher.
“When you outsource classes like this, you lose a little control over the content,” Paxton said.
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The obvious sentiment for outsourcing teaching jobs is to cut costs, but that’s not the case, according to Mark Biggs, head of Missouri State’s journalism department.
Biggs said that working with Poynter will actually cost the department more than twice as much as hiring an in-house instructor. Missouri State typically pays roughly $2,500 for an instructor to teach a course, but Missouri State will pay Poynter $6,500.
Which begs the question: why outsource?
For more information, check out Inside Higher Ed.
