The new career measuring stick has a lot of potential, say Eva Meijer and Blair van Pelt, but proper care must be taken with its implementation. Foto Shutterstock The Academic Career Framework (ACF) was given the go-ahead in September. Teachers Blair van Pelt and Eva Meijer, both active in consultative bodies, are optimistic about this new career system. But they also warn that the ACF will only benefit teachers if proper care is taken with its implementation. ‘People in leadership positions sometimes have a blind spot when it comes to what happens in teaching in practice.’
Why do you point to the impact on teachers in particular?
Meijer: ‘Because they were underrepresented when the ACF was drawn up. Actually, that often happens: a policy is developed that has a big impact on teachers but without much discussion with the people on a lecturer contract. As a result, the policy can have unintended negative consequences for them.’
Van Pelt: ‘I am optimistic about the potential of the ACF. But the “old” Education Career Path showed how important a careful implementation is. There was almost no coordination back then, which allowed differences to arise in how the various science groups implemented the career path. And it was often the teachers who suffered as a result.’
What do you mean by that?
Van Pelt: ‘Look at the employee monitor. Teachers feel a lot of pressure of work, are often on a salary scale that’s too low given their duties, and are not sure who they should contact to deal with these issues. People in leadership positions sometimes have a blind spot when it comes to what happens in teaching in practice. In such circumstances, it’s hard for you as a teacher to have a blossoming career, or even be paid what you’re worth and keep the workload under control.’
Can a well implemented ACF improve the situation?
Van Pelt: ‘A lot of teachers carry out far more tasks or have more senior duties than they should according to their contract. Currently, if that leads to problems they get told to take good care of themselves and police their boundaries! But how can you protect yourself as a teacher when the system doesn’t protect you? The ACF can help in treating teachers more fairly. However, that does require a certain “mindshift” and a change in culture.’
In what way? Can you give an example?
Meijer: ‘For your ACF portfolio, you have to show what financial contribution you’ve made to the group. In principle that’s a good thing because it creates a level playing field for research and education. But researchers have long been accustomed to getting grants to fund their research and PhD candidates whereas teachers don’t have a methodology or norms for the financial valuation of the courses they give or the students they supervise. So there is a risk the chair groups will use different methods for calculating this, and as a result promotion committees will end up comparing apples with oranges. Which is not a good thing when it affects people’s career chances.’
Hence your call to everyone, including the teachers themselves, to prepare properly for the ACF?
Van Pelt: ‘Yes. The Education Career Path showed us that you can’t assume implementation of a new system will go well. We want to avoid a similar situation, where the ACF becomes such a huge, scary thing that people are afraid of that they’d rather sell themselves short in terms of their career — or have this done to them — than make use of the opportunities. Fortunately, this time with the ACF there is someone coordinating the implementation (Denise Magendans, ed.). But even so, teachers and chair holders still need to study the new system thoroughly. A good career system helps retain talented and passionate professionals, so we all need to make sure this gets introduced properly.’
About the ACF
The Academic Career Framework is Wageningen University’s new career system, replacing both the Tenure Track and the Education Career Path. It consists of a uniform framework with 27 indicators for the assessment of performance in the domains of research, teaching, impact on society and academic services, and with various ‘paths’ for teachers, researchers and current and prospective professors. The ACF is the result of national agreements on a new system for recognition & reward. It was drawn up following the (mandatory) consultation of the WUR Council and the trade unions.
