Sir, – The latest Times Higher Education league table finds that most Irish universities have dropped down the league table. One of the causes for this downgrading is perhaps being missed. There are increasing levels of employee apartheid in many Irish universities. An elite group of staff and senior permanent academics enjoy remuneration and conditions that are in stark contrast with those of part-time, temporary and hourly paid staff.
What probably began as a genuine effort to use postgraduate researchers as classroom assistants and tutors, thereby giving them important experience, has been expanded over the past decade.
Now complete modules and undergraduate courses are being taught by temporary hourly paid employees, many of whom have PhDs, but who are being denied opportunities to gain the permanent employment that their qualifications would justify.
Some of our best researchers and potential university lecturers are being lost to emigration and non-academic employment.
The working conditions of many of these hourly paid teachers include problems such as no access to university office and computer facilities. In addition, they are expected to work many hours unpaid for each paid lecture hour, including several hours of lecture preparation, student guidance, setting and correcting exams and assessments, attending meetings and other administrative tasks.
Younger academics, in particular, are being exploited, because they feel they have to suffer in silence so as not to endanger their chances of getting permanent status.
When it comes to the treatment of junior and temporary employees, most Irish universities are engaged in a race to the bottom. Universities are winning that race, at the expense of unjust exploitation of their employees, and decreasing standards of third-level education for their students. – Yours, etc,
Dr EDWARD HORGAN,
Castletroy,
Limerick.