Should Senior Professors Emphasize More on Research?
資深教授是否應(yīng)該把更多時間用于科研?
Many college students realize that it is a privilege to attend senior professors’ lectures. Oftentimes, those senior professors are unique in their teaching styles, have an encyclopedic knowledge in their domains, and have acquired an efficient way to communicate with their students. However, those senior professors appear to be always obsessed with academic research, social activities and other engagements.
In some universities, authorities have to decree that senior professors should at least give required lectures during a semester. Some people hold that senior professors should lay more emphasis on research, for their achievement will promote the advancement of science and technology. But I do not agree.
Firstly, while senior professors concentrate on research, they are likely to spend less time preparing for a coming lecture. Though senior professors are likely to make more advancement of their research if they can absorb themselves in their study, they are required to take the responsibility of cultivating talents for our society, which is more important. I still remember late professor Yang Changji’s life pursuit. He said that he would be satisfied if he could cultivate a couple of backbones for China. Some may not clearly list how many books Professor Yang wrote during his lifetime, but almost all Chinese people remember that he succeeded in cultivating a group of people represented by Mao Zedong. In this sense, cultivating students of tremendous promise is more important than carrying out academic research to make a name.
Secondly, while senior professors give fewer lectures to students, young faculties would be denied the opportunity to learn pedagogy from these senior professors. In the past, young teachers would start their teaching career as assistants to senior professors. They were required to participate in lectures and tutor students so that young teachers would be able to acquire requisite skills, attitudes and other essentials of giving lectures. When occasions arise, senior professors would ask their assistant teachers to give demo classes so that seniors could evaluate how much progress their assistants had made. However, young faculties find it difficult to consult with their seniors, for seniors are always otherwise engaged, either in academic research or in the social activities. As a result, when young faculties have to improve their pedagogy by trial and error, college students constitute guinea pigs.
In sum, it is senior professors’ responsibility to cultivate talents for the society and help improve young teachers’ pedagogy. Though they can make a name in research, their preference to research would be to the detriment of the cultivation of promising students in the long run.