Faculty Pay for Online Courses

One teacher got caught doing this at a School that I work and got his contract terminated. The school is putting more controls now because of this, there is a phone conversation follow up for every course you teach just to make sure that you are teaching it and not someone else.
However, I am sure this was not the only person doing this. It is very tempting to get as many contracts and just subcontract to another country.

 

Someone can finish an online American PhD from India and then offer their services to Universities in the States. The Indian PhD can just set up a corporation in the US so a bank account can be opened. Not all the schools require a SIN number to work, some will accept invoices as contractor. The Indian PhD can set up a virtual phone with skype and a mail forwarding address in the US. The Indian PhD then can apply to all the positions claiming that he lives in the US. The Indian PhD can legally work for US schools without having to move from India.

 

I have interviewed programmers who said they were in Atlanta but were forwarding their calls from India. When asked to come in face to face they said the weren't interested if that was a co edition of employment. I also interviewed a brilliant developer with excellent comm skills. We hired the guy as a contractor and the person who showed up had a totally different voice and comm was a struggle.

 

I wouldn't be surprised to see PhDs getting contracts and outsourcing their teaching to India. Some schools are putting controls in place so my guess is that is happening often.

By the way, salaries for online teaching have been pretty much the same or even lower than 10 years ago.
The reason is because most courses are canned and the instructor pretty much just baby sits the site and answers questions and marks assignments. The PhD requirement is jut to comply with the accreditation agencies and not needed as the contribution many times is "zero".

Many people are turning into online PhDs in order to make a living as an online instructors. Bear in mind that this career path is very hard as you have to work for several schools and teach 7 or more courses at the time just to make a living. There are no bennies and you are expected to keep up to date with technology on your own.

Most people teach online just for extra cash and to keep yourself up to date but not something you can consider as a long term career.