It’s hard to believe in this time of need for the university that they are actually giving raises to a few select professors.

All one ever hears about is how underpaid teachers are. There probably are places where teachers are highly underpaid and overworked but a university does not seem to be where this happens.

First of all, in any profession someone or somebody always is underpaid. Take the Star for example. The editors seem to work and slave their butts off and are they paid for every hour they spend here? NOT!

The reporters also are underpaid. The average reporter probably makes an average of $2 per hour. Do they scream that they are the underpaid? No.

The obvious solution is to pay the editors more than anyone else in the world—even the President. But that only will happen in la-la land.

A university judges professors by how long they are at the university. A professor still can be a horrible teacher and have been here for over 20 years. Does it mean that professor will get paid more than a good professor who has been here only two years?

The whole evaluation process seems to be a bit tainted. The teacher evaluations students do at the end of a class are supposed to have some kind of effect on a professor’s raise. Well, bet your last dollar that they don’t.

If Joe Blow student gave a professor a horrible review, would they not give him any raise whatsoever? Of course not, they would politely nod at the survey and never pay any mind to it again.

Just for fun, let’s go through some professors this columnist has been intellectually enlightened by. (Of course no names will be used in order to protect my butt.)

A journalism professor who talked to the class for an entire 2 hours and 40 minutes about nothing is making about $46,000.

Certain higher-ups in the financial aid office make more than $50,000. That’s probably more than the university hands out to needy students.

Forty-even thousand dollars is paid to an English professor described by most as “boring.”

Something else should be considered when deciding how much of a raise to give professors. How many classes do professors actually teach? Seems all the ones that are supposed to be “Tony the Tiger g-r-r-r-reat” professors teach one class and spend the rest of the time “doing research.”

Professors need to make an intelligent split of their time between students and research by prioritizing students because they are the reason they have a job and a salary.

Not to say there are not professors who really are being way, way underappreciated. Unfortunately, they are the ones who are making poverty-level salaries every year.

If the university could somehow hire college students to spy on professors by taking the class and reporting whether they actually learned something, many more professors would be treated justly.

Of course none of this applies to my professors this semester or any class hereafter because I am sure they are all underpaid and overworked.

And my starving-artist cartoonist deserves a raise!