Mille grazie. You said what I really _wanted_ to say. ^5 to you.

I knew of Johns Hopkins faculty who had grown up in single-parent households, in extreme poverty, in Baltimore City. The two people I am thinking of went on to become the Chief of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital, and a Professional Engineer. There are exceptions to this situation, but not enough. I do find the tone to be slightly racist, but I think the real problem is that of socioeconomic status. This country is systematically dismantling its public secondary education system, and the same process is going on at the university level. The persons who benefit by this are the same ones who benefit by being at the top of "the food chain". They haven't looked far enough ahead to see the end results of their selfish and short sighted efforts.

I respectfully disagree with your comment. You, of course, are entitled to your opinion. I note that it's anonymous. Most of my colleagues have "real world" work experience, in addition to advanced degrees. I can't judge your qualifications, because ... you're anonymous.

I'm university faculty as well. While some students are lazy, unmotivated, and want the easy grade, there are a good proportion of those who want to improve their knowledge, skills, attitudes, and behaviors. I have taught at public and private universities, and found that there is always a normal distribution of students in terms of motivation and skills. I have also found a fair number of lazy faculty who are burned out and should not be teaching anyone. The worst ones I encountered were in my Ph.D. program. From them, I learned to never become the kind of person that they were. Unfortunately, the academic job market is a crap shoot. Finding a good university where you want to stay until you retire is difficult. Most of them, in the public and private sectors, have bought into the idea of having to have a "business model" and that they need to be run like a profit-making concern. That, of course, is a false assumption. The best work I've ever been allowed to do in my life has been in not-for-profit situations: government service, military service, and education. The trick is being able to "work around" the assholes above and below you in the organization.

The peer-review process is not blind to "The Editor", who chooses the reviewers. If the editor decides to send your paper to the three biggest jerks he knows, so be it. Tough for you, after you've put a year of your time into an article, with the tenure clock running. The process is biased, but I haven't seen anything good to replace it. Open source journals? Tenure based on the number of times your article is cited? I'm open to suggestions.