It truly frustrates me that university faculty don’t always recognize that other student-facing areas of universities, like student affairs, are disciplines, with research and curricula.

Or talk about “retention” like some abstract concept someone else is responsible for, both failing to respect that there’s scholarship on retention and to acknowledge that their part involves looking at *their* teaching practices.

This is quite reflective of the lack of respect for Education as a discipline, which is the funniest thing ever because teaching is literally what we do — yet universities are filled with people trained in research and loosed upon undergrads with minimal of pedagogical training.

I said a few words to our incoming cohort of higher ed & student affairs grad students last week, and one thing I said was that right now, mid-covid, university staff and administrators are the people keeping the ship afloat and taking care of our students.

I immediately thought, “Damn, imagine if faculty heard me say that.” But therein lies the problem, right? It’s true, and it’s unacknowledged. So there you go, Twitter. I said it.

Failing to acknowledge that the labor structure of the university doesn’t only involve faculty, failing to support and be in solidarity with our colleagues in staff, libraries, admin, maintenance - solidarity in *action* not words - is how this ship is going to sink.

I am so grateful that my newish academic home in Secondary & Higher Ed is with colleagues who know and live this — and are shaping the next generation of teachers and university workers.

This Twitter rant brought to you in part by 7 hours of academic leadership Zoom meetings yesterday.

I don’t know about you but I’m not so sure white noblesse oblige with a side of deficit ideology playing out in Zoom class is what’s gonna save public higher education. But what do I know!

I’m just a person who writes things in a chat because I don’t know how to get a word in during a 40-person Zoom dominated by 3 people, and listens to white women repeating her ideas without attribution.