Anybody here a professor?

I've always wanted to become a professor at a university. I already know I would have to get a Doctoral degree. But does anyone here have any experience being a professor? I love teaching people things, I think I would enjoy it being my career.

Ever since my freshman year in college, I had a horrible professor and the best professor in the same semester. It was at that point that I wanted to become that "best professor" everyone has had. Especially in the IT/IS field, professors that actually interact with the students instead of reading from slides are hard to come by.

I want to be that professor that when students leave my class, they actually learn something and are excited to come to class, as opposed to "just getting by" and dread coming to class. Any information would be appreciative!

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PCTechLinc

I'm not one with a Doctoral Degree, but I have taught at two different colleges over the course of 4 years. I have a friend that took my place at the last college I had to leave, who is in the middle of getting his Doctoral Degree in IT Security.

I, like you, always wanted to be the instructor that students would love to have. I don't know if all my students loved me, but most of them showed their appreciation for how much I would do to help them understand things (especially subnetting). The only students that dropped my program were the ones that had issues with their personal lives. I would love to teach again, but having a day job and working on my second Master's is eating up all my extra time. Perhaps after that.

As much as I love working with computers and networking, I love teaching more. Best of luck with whatever path you choose!

zxbane

I'm actually serving as a professor right now without a Doctoral degree. While a Doctoral degree is preferred it is not always necessarily a requirement. With that said, I am pursuing a Doctoral degree in Cybersecurity this fall. This has been my first semester teaching and it has been a challenging experience but also rewarding. Having to explain and work through issues with the lab environment, questions regarding curriculum etc. has been frustrating at times but it is also rewarding to help students learn more about the concepts and ultimately help them further their career.

atippett

Do you guys have any recommendations on any online Doctoral programs? I'll have my Masters completed *hopefully* next May. I don't plan to roll right into a Doctoral, but I do need to start getting ideas.

jeremywatts2005

@Atippett I worked as a Dean for almost 6 yrs managing an entire academic department and was a campus president for a short while also filling in. This was all in for-profit tech schools. Generally, the rule for accreditation is one degree above those you are teaching up to a doctorate. Then doctors teach doctors. So a Masters was needed to teach the Bachelors and a Bachelors to teach the Associate level. North Carolina and some states are a little stricter requiring a Masters to teach period. That is not the general rule in all states just a select few. Everywhere I taught or managed I emphasized hands on. It was very important to have that aspect and was one of the greatest strengths of for-profit tech colleges. Bash them as much as you want, they did get results for a large portion of their students.

At one point we had at our campus instructors hired to teach CCNA, Net+, Sec+ and A+. There were scheduled certification prep courses that the students did not pay for. I took it from my tutoring budget which we also paid for tutors to assist struggling students. Once they completed the prep course they could sit the exam and if they passed the college would pay for the certification 100% no charge to them. Needless to say, I had a lot of employed students with associates degree something to the tune of over 95% in the field which means they are doing what they went to school for.

When I would teach and I even taught as a Dean. I was one of the few teaching Deans in any company I worked for I had students packed into my classrooms. I rarely used a slide or taught straight from the book. Always covered the concepts and used a ton of hands on. I was exhausted after 4 hours in front of a class teaching.

Now here is the downside to teaching. Usually, you don't get paid what you think you would. Something in the range of $2000 to $2300 for a quarter. That is not much when you consider the hours you will be putting in. I figured it up one time and it was something in the $10 to $15 an hour range after taxes. However, if you are making anywhere from 60K and down that might be a big boost to your income. Just be prepared as students can be and are needy. They will call you all times of the day even if you are at your regular job.

atippett

jeremywatts2005 wrote: »

Just be prepared as students can be and are needy. They will call you all times of the day even if you are at your regular job.

I would like to be a professor as my regular job at some point. Public universities have to publish their professor's salaries as public information. The professors at my local university make easily $120k-160k. Exponentially increase once they get into Department Chair and Deans ($300k plus).

zxbane

That is pretty intense for the salaries, also part of the reason I think tuition rates are so inflated.

TranceSoulBrother

atippett wrote: »

I would like to be a professor as my regular job at some point. Public universities have to publish their professor's salaries as public information. The professors at my local university make easily $120k-160k. Exponentially increase once they get into Department Chair and Deans ($300k plus).

Check where they received their degree from. Usually, it's from a B&M on ground study, with a bunch of published articles and some experience...might even be on the tenure-track.
Although there are exceptions as always. I saw a guy with a PhD from Capella making that much at UT-Austin but he has more than 20 years of professional experience and founded 2-3 companies.

I personally would like to pursue the online adjunct route in IT. I've taught languages before, but I'm tired of that and want a change.

gespenstern

That's some well-paying university in the example above. From what I'm gathering from my colleagues and peers academia pays peanuts compared to the industry. 120K-160K range looks acceptable though, however, I make more in the industry.

My colleagues, even tenured ones, make below 100K, but I've heard from them that there are some prodigies who make up to 200K, but these cases are rather rare and you have to bring money to the university in grants or paying students or be famous enough and provide positive PR, etc. Regular professors get below 100K. I'm talking here universities that are rather far from the top, like university of wisconsin @ milwaukee, etc.

But corporate America tolerates you okay until a certain age, so I have a career path in mind where I'm switching to being an professor/instructor in no more than 10 years from now. For that purpose I'll do my best to get PhD by that time.

cyberguypr

^ exactly my plan. Solid career as a practitioner, get doctorate, switch to academia at a later stage.

zxbane

cyberguypr wrote: »

^ exactly my plan. Solid career as a practitioner, get doctorate, switch to academia at a later stage.

Same here, in the meantime I am working my primary career and working as an online adjunct while I also pursue my Doctorate. Then later on when I retire from my primary career I will pursue teaching full time. Teaching as adjunct in the meantime is a nice additional income stream while also getting to help others pursuing Cyber careers or looking to advance their already existing career.

jeremywatts2005

atippett wrote: »

I would like to be a professor as my regular job at some point. Public universities have to publish their professor's salaries as public information. The professors at my local university make easily $120k-160k. Exponentially increase once they get into Department Chair and Deans ($300k plus).

Those are most likely tenure-tracked professors with multiple years in academics working in a research area. Tenure-track professorships are getting harder to come by because of the funding in the state budgets. The universities are wanting to get more adjuncts into the university to cut their salary and retirement cost and then raise tuition to make more profit. Tenure-tracks are getting cut nationwide. I know I had several apply for positions with me because of lay-off or downsizing due to enrollment. I even had guys who were close to making tenure and got denied and shown the door. Not sure where this university is that you speak of if it is in a high-cost market where professors don't want to go then maybe that would be the reason, but by no means the norm. I made 76K as a Dean and I knew campus presidents pulling 80K and the community college for Deans, Instructors and so on was even lower. Then you have the 4 yr and graduate schools and their salaries were nothing to brag about. I routinely had guys who were professors there and would come to work for me because what they were making was not cutting it. They made mid 70's or lower most of the time. Remember most tenure-track professors only teach one or two courses. You definitely are not getting rich in education.

atippett

jeremywatts2005 wrote: »

Those are most likely tenure-tracked professors with multiple years in academics working in a research area. Tenure-track professorships are getting harder to come by because of the funding in the state budgets. The universities are wanting to get more adjuncts into the university to cut their salary and retirement cost and then raise tuition to make more profit. Tenure-tracks are getting cut nationwide. I know I had several apply for positions with me because of lay-off or downsizing due to enrollment. I even had guys who were close to making tenure and got denied and shown the door. Not sure where this university is that you speak of if it is in a high-cost market where professors don't want to go then maybe that would be the reason, but by no means the norm. I made 76K as a Dean and I knew campus presidents pulling 80K and the community college for Deans, Instructors and so on was even lower. Then you have the 4 yr and graduate schools and their salaries were nothing to brag about. I routinely had guys who were professors there and would come to work for me because what they were making was not cutting it. They made mid 70's or lower most of the time. Remember most tenure-track professors only teach one or two courses. You definitely are not getting rich in education.

The president at my university makes $611k, to be exact. And I know a bigger university in the state, their president makes more than that. This is Alabama and we don't have any state money to just throw out lol.

the_Grinch

I know at my alma matar there has been a big shift in how the school is teaching the student body. Now they will hire those with Masters to teach and leave the research to those with a PhD. We've all been there and know that a lot of the time your PhD professors don't want to teach (and they are horrible at it). That being said, the Masters level folks have no shot at tenure and are hired as contractors.

From what I've seen the schools in my area (South Jersey/Philadelphia) will hire you with a Masters and you'll teach 1 or 2 classes per term. As someone else pointed out you're making about $2000 per class. A guy I worked with taught at a community college and was making about $1500 per class. Not great money, but little extra cash and some experience will get you far. A local university pays about $5000 per class, but without experience they won't look at you.

Ultimately I could see teaching part time for the next few decades and then making it a retirement gig.

VictorVictor5

atippett,

I do have a PhD but am not a professor (considered post-doc, but got tired of academia). I can give you the specifics of my PhD if you are interested (PM me). Mine is a technical degree and did involve research and peer-reviewed publications.

I'd like to discuss pros/cons with you if you are open to it.

VV5

Mike-Mike

i too saw salaries of professors in my state posted, and thought, hey, i should do that.

jdancer

If you believe teaching is something for you, teach a course at a two-year/community college and see how you like it.