BYU Best University to Work For

[Paperback Writer]

How much of the student body knew exactly what area of study they wanted to pursue before attending? If they weren't sure of their area of study, how could that have been a decisive factor in their selecting BYU?

At many universities, students are being required to figure it out when they apply. For example, at Texas A&M students apply to a major; not the university and not even a college/deparment. So a student applies for acceptence into the mechanical engineering major.

And back in the day, I worked with incoming BYU freshman. Even then, most knew what they wanted to major in or at least thought they did. Even today, my own HS kids have a very good idea of what they want to study in college and that is the largest factor when considering universities.

Perhaps your experience is different.

[Jeff Lebowski]

I think UD's right in that there is a selection bias here. BYU is such a unique environment that for many, I imagine it is their "Harvard", so they're likely to be very satisfied with it. That doesn't mean it's right for many or even any significant number of professors.

I don't think anyone would interpret these data to mean that BYU is the best place for any potential faculty member. Of course not. On the other hand, there is a perception by some that BYU takes advantage of employees by leveraging the church affiliation in order to go cheap on equipment, facilities, salaries, benefits, etc. That is simply not the case. BYU provides a great work environment.

On the other hand, however, I think the BYU RM/married student is probably a pretty nice one to teach. For the past few years, I've been teaching a premed seminar type class at SUU. It's full of dorky students I would never really want to hang out with, but they're motivated, they do their homework, and they pay attention in class. It's a fun class to teach.

Absolutely. I am sure student quality is a huge factor.

By the way, the University of Utah ranked #10 in the satisfaction survey. That is also significant and something the state can be very proud of. That surprised me a bit given our legislature's tendency for cost-cutting.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Yep, I am a product of my culture.

Your very sensitivity to this proves my point. Why so put out with my opinion?

Go look up the definition of "intellectual skills" and then tell me if anyone outside of our culture would not also doubt the validity or accuracy of the answer given.

However, if it sooths your soul, go ahead and believe I am full of crap in thinking a majority of students choosing BYU do not have "pursuit of intellectual skills" as their main reason.

Being intellectually correct on this means a lot more to you than it does me.

You are either full of crap, or the ~8000 students who participated in the anonymous surveys lied for some reason or don't understand the definition of "intellectual skills". I will go with the former.

My soul is soothed!

[Viking]

Yep, I am a product of my culture.

Your very sensitivity to this proves my point. Why so put out with my opinion?

Go look up the definition of "intellectual skills" and then tell me if anyone outside of our culture would not also doubt the validity or accuracy of the answer given.

However, if it sooths your soul, go ahead and believe I am full of crap in thinking a majority of students choosing BYU do not have "pursuit of intellectual skills" as their main reason.

Being intellectually correct on this means a lot more to you than it does me.

Jeff sooths nothing!

I'm throwing down the gauntlet for 2013 NCAA tourney: my analysts vs. his resources, provided he promises not to get any help from Pelagius. That dude is scary smart

[Northwestcoug]

I can see why BYU is ranked highly, at least in my field. There were a ton of motivated students in the biological sciences. There was insane competition for health sciences. On top of that, most science departments had chips on their shoulders, and wanted to compete with the big research institutions. All those factors create a smart and motivated student body. That's got to be a huge factor in a professor's job satisfaction.

I can't recall any nonmember professor I had (I'm sure I did, but I can't recall one). But I remember a couple of new faculty. One in particular was ecstatic to be at BYU. He spent a whole hour telling us about the hiring process, including the interview by a GA. He was so happy to teach there, and the biggest factor for him was the spiritual aspect.

I think he was more on the extreme spectrum, but I'd bet that most faculty at the Y feel similarly. The spiritual aspect has to be a big draw for most of them. And I would bet that it also affects their perception of most of the other aspects of the questionnaire. If you're happy spiritually, that's going to spill into other aspects of your life.

[Northwestcoug]

I don't think anyone would interpret these data to mean that BYU is the best place for any potential faculty member. Of course not. On the other hand, there is a perception by some that BYU takes advantage of employees by leveraging the church affiliation in order to go cheap on equipment, facilities, salaries, benefits, etc. That is simply not the case. BYU provides a great work environment.

Yeah, it's been a while since I've known much about funding there. But I never heard much grumbling about those issues when I was involved with the faculty.

[ERCougar]

I don't think anyone would interpret these data to mean that BYU is the best place for any potential faculty member. Of course not. On the other hand, there is a perception by some that BYU takes advantage of employees by leveraging the church affiliation in order to go cheap on equipment, facilities, salaries, benefits, etc. That is simply not the case. BYU provides a great work environment.

Absolutely. I am sure student quality is a huge factor.

By the way, the University of Utah ranked #10 in the satisfaction survey. That is also significant and something the state can be very proud of. That surprised me a bit given our legislature's tendency for cost-cutting.

Well, you obviously have a much better idea how well BYU faculty are supported by the institution, but my point was that because of the type of person that BYU faculty would often attract, it could pay them 30k/year and they'd be happy--much of the draw of BYU has nothing to do with the institution itself.

[SoonerCoug]

I'm not really interested in working for BYU, but I have a hypothetical question.

If I were to officially remove my name from the records of the Church, would that make it easier or harder for me to be hired by BYU?

I realize the answer might seem obvious (harder), but sometimes I wonder if it would be easier to get hired by them as a non-Mormon rather than as an inactive Mormon.

[Jeff Lebowski]

I'm not really interested in working for BYU, but I have a hypothetical question.

If I were to officially remove my name from the records of the Church, would that make it easier or harder for me to be hired by BYU?

I realize the answer might seem obvious (harder), but sometimes I wonder if it would be easier to get hired by them as a non-Mormon rather than as an inactive Mormon.

It would be impossible for you because there is no way you could hide the fact that you were once LDS.

But in terms of your overall hypothetical question, it would be very difficult. BYU policy is to hire LDS candidates unless a department can demonstrate that there are no viable LDS candidates in a particular academic area. While that used to happen in the past, there are so many highly qualified LDS folks with PhDs now that such a situation is becoming extremely rare.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Well, you obviously have a much better idea how well BYU faculty are supported by the institution, but my point was that because of the type of person that BYU faculty would often attract, it could pay them 30k/year and they'd be happy--much of the draw of BYU has nothing to do with the institution itself.

I realize that you are exaggerating for effect, but nobody would teach for $30K/yr and be happy.

But your larger point is correct in that many BYU faculty pass up more lucrative opportunities due to the uniqueness of BYU (similar to incoming freshmen) and that will color the overall perception of satisfaction. However, I would expect that to be expressed most directly in terms of overall levels of satisfaction and would perhaps help explain the Glassdoor survey results. But when you start drilling down into specific factors, I don't think that explanation can account for the entire phenomenon, and is in fact why I bumped this thread as now there are some more specific data to evaluate. For example, your $30K quip implies that BYU faculty are a bunch of chumps and when asked about any factor of their work environment would respond with "aw shucks, I am fine" and are too gullible to realize just how miserable they are (my turn to hyperbolize!). On the contrary, a significant percentage of BYU faculty were employed at other universities prior to coming to BYU and almost all of them regularly interact with faculty from other institutions and therefore have frequent opportunities to compare work environments. I guarantee you that if they thought that they have a poor benefits package or if the expectations for scholarship are out of line, they would say so on the survey. I think the results are legit.

Also, one has to be careful when interpreting the results. When the faculty say they are very happy with salary and benefits, that doesn't mean that they are among the most highly paid faculty in the US. It means that they believe that the salary is more than fair relative to the work load and institutional expectations relative to research productivity, etc., in comparison with peer institutions.

OK, now I want to hear some theories as to why Utah profs are so happy.

[Pelado]

At many universities, students are being required to figure it out when they apply. For example, at Texas A&M students apply to a major; not the university and not even a college/deparment. So a student applies for acceptence into the mechanical engineering major.

And back in the day, I worked with incoming BYU freshman. Even then, most knew what they wanted to major in or at least thought they did. Even today, my own HS kids have a very good idea of what they want to study in college and that is the largest factor when considering universities.

Perhaps your experience is different.

I had a decent idea of what I wanted to do, but I didn't know how BYU compared to other programs until after enrolling. It didn't really play much of a role in selecting BYU.

Once at BYU, I interacted with many who were undeclared or who had changed their major.

I'm not entirely surprised that area of study is not more widely cited.