In a bid to ensure “value for money”, the University of Guyana’s Vice Chancellor Dr. Jacob Opadeyi says lecturers will have to spend more hours teaching at the institution.
The Vice Chancellor is proposing that all full time lecturers work at least 18 hours per week.
“It is a suggestion, not a policy, but it has to come”, he said. He added that “you cannot have a full time lecturer teaching one course a semester; it doesn’t look good in the eye.”
Dr. Opadeyi says he does not believe his proposal of 18 hours per week is too much, while comparing it to the national minimum wage and the forty hour work week.
He says the current contract of lecturers indicates that they must work at least 360 hours a year. “This is being interpreted at most” he added.
The Vice Chancellor told reporters at a recent press conference that some departments are asking for at least 22 lecturers, something he says he is not comforted by.
Dr. Opadeyi went on to express frustration over the steadily increasing expenditure the University pays monthly in salary to staff, which currently stands at $120M.
He says while this expenditure continues to increase, productivity is not. The Nigerian-born, former Professor of the University of the West Indies says his administration will also look into lecturers who are not performing their duties as they should. [Kurt Campbell]
