Pros
There are many reasons people work in the non-profit sector (where Baker College is), one reason most often quoted is to "help others," or "pay it forward." I get real satisfaction from helping others master subjects that intimidated them before the term. My students are the next generation in my profession, and in showing them the way I believe I'm nurturing competent ethical business professionals that will contribute to our community and our economy.
Cons
With the exception of the Flint campus, there are no union or tenure protections for faculty. So, we always have to be on our 'A' game. Fortunately student evaluations are one measure of our performance, but not the exclusive measure; contributions outside the classroom are measured, expected and contribute to positive evaluations. Recent staff realignments hit PhD faculty at our campus, which was completely unexpected. Staffing alignment is appropriately dependent on student enrollment. The school's core market of students is dependent on external funding to study -- either federally guaranteed student loans, grants or other outside scholarships. Cuts to those external programs have immediate impacts on enrollment. Despite providing lifetime placement assistance to our graduates, the school does not have an outside alumni association or foundation that solicits supports for infrastructure or student scholarships. This contributes to our vulnerability to external funding fluctuations. A good number of support staff have been hired after completing degrees here, so there is a bit of an in-bred "we've always done it that way" mentality in some departments. Some of the staff have become apathetic, "whatever management wants today," which can be dispiriting. A large pool of current management is reaching retirement age concurrently. They have agreed amongst themselves to stage their retirements in order to prevent total organizational shock from one large out-flux. Stepping into these roles are both externally recruited and internally promoted academic professionals with advanced educations (reputable PhDs) and new ideas, which are shaking up the longer-term staff quite a bit. Change is in the wind; some of it forced due to this resistance. I'm looking forward to improvements in IT applications -- internally developed systems were "reframed" with Windows overlays, but they remain the same cumbersome legacy applications that require significant internal support. The new VP of IT has initiated a search for an externally-developed true ERP application network to support our operations. Workload as a faculty member is significant: I teach five classes of 25 students each, support a student club, hold office hours and special review sessions, manage a pool of adjunct faculty and student tutors, contribute to the curriculum updates and rework, provide system-wide support for multiple classroom-focused technology initiatives, and conduct tours of the campus for prospective students. Fortunately for me, I personally find satisfaction in being able to manage so many initiatives at once; others may find the workload imposing. Our employment agreement specifically excludes outside teaching initiatives, not that I would have the time to take anything else onto my plate. One does not work in the academic or non-profit sectors for the compensation. Benefits are very good (healh insurance, etc.), but my salary is less than 1/2 what I was earning in the for-profit sector. Of course, the for-profit sector had other disadvantages which were still uncompensated despite the higher pay -- but that's another subject!