[Somehow the original version of this has been garbled by some bit of computer software somewhere. Hopefully this version makes sense. My thoughts and prayers for those in Christchurch and their loved ones]
My apologies in advance for what will be reduced blogging in the next three or four months. The following statistics show the story:
2008: Teaching, 40%; Research, 36%, Other 24%
2009: Teaching, 42%, Research, 35%, Other 24%
2010: Teaching, 44%, Research 32%, Other 24%
In the last few years, I’ve kept records of how many hours I’ve spend doing various tasks at work. For example, I can say just how many hours I’ve spent, for example, teaching my contribution to the third year electromagnetic waves paper, and running Cafe Scientifique (which, incidently, starts tonight). So, with a few clicks of a mouse, I can prepare some statistics like the ones above. The boundaries of these areas are a little bit blurred, but they give a general picture of what’s going on.
It’s pretty normal to hear the complaint around these corridors of ‘too much admin to do’, but, in my case at least (and remember a sample size of one doesn’t lead to very good statistics) its not the adminstrative work that has increased. Rather, it’s the time spent on teaching that has increased, and that has come at the expense of research. Some of the increase for 2010 I think is a result of my study for the Post Graduate Certificate in Tertiary Teaching, which has encouraged me to spend more time on my teaching.
I can be reasonably confident that 2011 will see a continuation of this trend, with a teaching semester starting that will be busier than the last three years. Therefore, I’m afraid, I suspect my blog-post-rate (or whatever the correct geeky term is for it) is about to diminish.