March 29, 2002

Adjuncts Should Not Just Be Visitors in the Academic Promised Land

By MICHAEL MURPHY

Three years ago, after thinking long and hard, I gave up a job as an instructor, teaching part-time at two different institutions, and joined the full-time professoriate as a visiting assistant professor of English. It was a career choice that evoked unexpectedly mixed feelings for me.

Few observers of the increasingly public discussion about part-time faculty members are likely to understand the difficulty of my decision. For long-term adjuncts like me, the chance to become a