A Professor at the End of Time
The Work and Future of the Professoriate
John Best (Author)
9780813585932
Hardback, published 17 March 2017
270 pages, 6 figures, 20 tables
22.9 x 15.2 x 2 cm, 0.513 kg
“For those wondering what typical professors do, A Professor at the End of Time offers a carefully documented look under the hood. And for those wondering about the road ahead for higher education, it invites us to retain the best of yesterday’s world while harnessing the potential of tomorrow’s digital, cost-conscious world.”
- David G. Myers (Professor of Psychology, Hope College) “Best provides a unique perspective of a life in academia in his verbal documentary. His story within a story juxtaposes a faculty career amidst a time of change in higher education.”
- Pamela L. Eddy (Professor of Higher Education, The College of William and Mary) "A Professor at the End of Time is an engaging read that should interest current academics as they contemplate the future of their chosen profession. It will also be valuable to historians looking for an archive of data regarding the Golden Age of higher education by providing specific data to analyze. It paints a realistic model of what challenges faced Professor Best in his 34-year career and contains numerous narratives from his teaching. It also serves as a warning to professors everywhere that remaining complacent and believing that academia is monolithic and unchanging in the ivory tower is dangerous."
(Review of Higher Education)
A Professor at the End of Time tells one professor’s story in the context of the rapid reconfiguration of higher education going on now, and analyzes what the job included before the supernova of technological innovation, the general influx of less-well-prepared students, and the diminution of state and federal support wrought wholesale changes on the profession.
Preface
Part I Blocking the Action
Chapter 1 Standing at the Edge of Time
Part II A Professor at Work
Chapter 2 The Work of the Teaching College Professor: In (and Out of) the Classroom
Chapter 3 Technology Changing Courses, Changing Students, Changing Professors
Chapter 4 Research: The Barren Victory
Chapter 5 Where Service Leads
Part III The Professoriate’s Imperiled Future
Chapter 6 What Happens after the End of Time?: Vectors on a Collision Course
Chapter 7 Some Time Traveling for Me
Appendix: The Materials and the Method
Notes
References
Index
