A major misconception about college professors is that we teach for a few hours a day and then go home. The truth is that teaching is not the only thing that we do. Yes, we are in the classroom about 3 hours for every one course that we teach. And yes, we prepare for classes and grade tests and papers, and that takes time too.

But we have two other important responsibilities that are requirements of our jobs: service and research.

University service requires us to participate in the operation of the university; helping to shape university policies, curriculum, hiring faculty and administrators, engaging in student life activities, and the like. Research requires that we make original contributions in our disciplinary field by publishing articles in peer-reviewed journals, or books with academic presses.

Yesterday was a typical day in my life in the CSU. I arrived at my office a little after 8 AM to prepare for my courses and a week-long class activity. At 8.30 I joined with several of my students to set the week-long survey. Engaging students in the administration of the survey helps them to better understand the research process. Data that are collected through the survey are used in my research methods course to teach data analysis techniques, and they are used by my undergraduate research group (an independent study group of 6 students that I do not get paid to teach).

At 10 I headed to my first class and taught for an hour. As class ended I hustled over the to library to take part in an interview session for an open administrative position on campus. As that hour came to an end I made my way to the Student Union building to participate as a speaker in a noon forum on the impact of the events of September 11th on the US. When that was over I went to teach my next class until 3PM and then it was time to head back to the library to work with my students on their survey data collection project.

I arrived home at 4.30 PM and spent an hour with my family and then headed to a meeting with a campus honor society where I was put in charge of the barbeque–cooking everyone’s meal–before we sat down for a long discussion of the strategic goals of the group and developed some fundraising ideas. I was home just after 8 PM. I fell asleep on the couch.

Surely someone will misconstrue my essay as a complaint about how hard I work. Don’t. My purpose is to illustrate that the job of a college professor is far more involved than most people think. Oh, and notice that I had no time in my day to work on the third leg of my job: research.