Exactly. And we won't pay for it. Not just for the name-- I want to see to it that what we're paying for is the authentic thing, not just the appearance of it.

I, too, was a conscientious and GOOD T.A. but there is automatically an incentive to NOT be like that as a grad student. The good T.A.s never get 'forced' into R.A.'s by student complaints to the department, see... and therefore, research advisors don't have a good reason to put them on research monies. The bad ones whose advisors have no money get the plum "grader" jobs which take far less time and have much greater flexibility.

Of course, this also means that if you're any good in the classroom, you soon figure out that you're on the nine year plan for your degree... smirk Clearly, you change your philosophy at some point in deference to pragmatism, if nothing else.


Schrödinger's cat walks into a bar. And doesn't.