He’s mostly right, they’re mostly wrong, IMHO.
I have 15 years of experience as a university professor. The work load varies considerably between schools and departments. For example, I teach computer information systems. This field is constantly changing and requires a constant effort to stay current. Textbooks are often obsolete by the time they are published. Almost nothing I learned in school is still used today. A person teaching Shakespeare would not need to update all of their classes each year.
At most schools, a tenure track professor needs to devote only 1/3 of his time to teaching. The remainder is spent doing research and serving on various committees. I was once named “teacher of the year” for my college at a major university. My boss said congratulations and don’t do it again! He knew my tenure depended on publications, not teaching.
There is enormous waste in higher Ed. Most of the research is worthless and takes up an enormous amount of time. There are too many people in college that are not good scholars and are just wasting their time and money. Many of the degrees do not teach any marketable job skills and the students end up in jobs that do not require a degree.
Here are my recommendations to save money in higher Ed .
1. Close departments and consolidate them at a few state schools. Not every university has a law school. Why should they all have a sociology (or journalism,or women’s studies etc.) department?
2. Raise standards. For the schools, more students equals more money. This is not a good deal for the taxpayer who is on the hook trying to educate students who have little chance of graduating.
3. Remove the research requirements from most teaching positions and increase the course load.
4. Evaluate teaching performance and use it to determine pay, promotion and retention.(This is hard.)
5. Get rid of tenure.