October 15, 2008
Official Offers Harsh Critique of Policies Toward Adjuncts
Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest private employer, long criticized for its workplace policies, is a “more-honest employer” of part-time workers than colleges that employ thousands of adjunct faculty members. That was the harsh message delivered to a group of college human-resources officials here on Monday by one of their own: Angelo-Gene Monaco, associate vice president for human resources and employee relations at the University of Akron.
Mr. Monaco’s presentation was a rare airing of such a controversial topic at an annual meeting of a higher-education association. Such meetings are typically plain-vanilla affairs that closely follow a script. In this case, the meeting was of the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources, and Mr. Monaco didn’t hold back in his critique of how poorly most colleges treat adjunct professors. He filled his presentation with examples drawn from surveys he has conducted, and his own experience as both an administrator and a consultant.
“We helped create a highly educated part of the working poor, and it’s starting to get attention from outsiders,” he said, noting that unions are trying to organize part-timers, and lawmakers in nearly a dozen states are examining the issue.
By Jeffrey J. Selingo | Posted on Wednesday October 15, 2008 | PermalinkComments
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In my 6th year as an adjunct, my experiences most certainly support the focus of the article.
More than the inconsistent compensation, is the total lack of reapect for input and past experience all too frequently demonstrated by
administrations.
— Dr. Alan S. Altman, Ed.D. Oct 15, 11:34 PM #
Alan, thanks but you are too kind. My experience has been HORRENDOUS and nothing gets changed or improved and the abusers continue on their merry way to a FAT retirement in all-white, gated communities in Claremeont,CA.
The academy today (academically and administratively) is infested with cowards, opportunists and politically-corrected scoundrels, who think nothing of abusing those under them and wielding power over others with unconscionable brutality.
I have seen adjuncts, contract appointments and other non-tenured faculty/staff get their walking papers with barely a day’s notice and NO ONE blinked and NOTHING was done at the departmental, college or central administrative level to address this savagery. And it all comes back to your point of “lack of respect” and lack of basic humanity that most of us learn in the sandbox. It’s time this culture of cronyism and personal aggrandizement is exposed beyond the ivy-covered and crumbling walls.
— Madison, WI Oct 16, 09:31 AM #
I have been an adjunct at Columbia University for four years. I’m treated like dirt. Frankly, if not for the brand value of working at Columbia (NB. and it’s a totally undeserved “good” reputation, at least in the School of Social Work where the regular faculty a that sad combination of frightened and arrogant), I’d leave.
It’s a horror.
— Dana McVee Oct 16, 10:24 AM #
Sorry about the typo:
“are that sad combination”
— Dana McVee Oct 16, 10:25 AM #
As one of the full professors said to me: sessional teaching (as it’s called in Canada) is the ghetto of academia.
My experiences certainly reflect this sentiment. And it is difficult to retain my spirits when recently the university refused to support my bid for government funding. It comes back to the ole’ adage: if you don’t have experience you can’t get a job; and if you don’t get a job, you can’t get experience.
In my opinion, many of these universities are looking for faculty; yet often, the faculty they are looking for are right there in the next office. Whatever happened to grooming the up and coming? Some times, the ole’ way was the best way. Now we kowtow to the ‘corporate agenda’ and the illusion of balanced budgets. All at the cost of human decency.
— Rick Oct 16, 10:31 AM #
I used to work a split-duty position where 50% of my time went to student affairs and 50% of my time went to instruction. As such, I was an adjunct, working in an arts department. My total salary was low, and my salary from the academic affairs side was less than a third of the total salary. My first semester in, I was teaching three individual students and co-managing / teaching an arts technology course. At the end of the semester, I learned I wasn’t instructor of record, giving the credit (and retroactive pay) to senior faculty. I was, in short, steamed. The next semester, I had two sections 200+ student courses and seminars on top of it: I certainly got instructor of record, but my salary was fixed, so although that term I taught an overload, I got shafted financially by several thousands of dollars. At this point I started working with developing my own courses for a humanities department, thinking I wouldn’t be long for arts-school adjunct work.
I was right. Two weeks before the start of the new term in the next academic year, a senior faculty member comes up to me — the only notice I get — and says “we’re benching you for the term — we have nothing for you.” Luckily, my salary is still fixed and I am teaching two undergrad seminars in comparative lit to make up for it. The biggest slaps in the face come in January of that year where I decided to leave my student affairs job. I learned that there were needs in the arts program I taught at (highly successfully), and they were being filled with a greenhorn with less education and teaching experience than me who was suddenly teaching junior and senior-level courses. When I quit the student affairs post, my salary totally stopped. To the academic departments I taught in (or slaved in) for peanuts, I was suddenly nonexistent, and I had to threaten litigation to be paid.
This past August saw a new level of my ire when an adjunct was brought into same said arts department who not only did not have a terminal degree, but zero teaching experience, the spouse of another faculty member, and a personal friend of one of the senior faculty. All after a nation-wide search. And, apparently, my “inside sources” have remarked that there are plans to take said adjunct and offer him a tenure-track position.
After everything I have been taught and learned about ascending the “corporate” academic ladder — publication, terminal degree, innovative courses, specialize yet play up your universality, prizes, conferences — I have learned, bitterly, that cronyism and expendability are far more important and pressing to department heads, senior faculty, and the donors who love them.
Worse, I’m teaching four courses this year with the same comparative lit program (thankfully) but sense the condescension and hostility from the department head every time I’m in the office. The head does not respond to emails, offers no oversight or support… I feel totally disconnected from a campus I’ve visibly worked on in some manner for nearly four years. I’m a stranger here, and the students tend to be quick to point that out (“you don’t have an office — how are we supposed to talk about my paper?”).
Worst of all is having to explain to one of your students why you work two additional jobs when he sees you working both. It honestly takes students aback to know, in the abstract, how little — financially and professionally — adjuncts are valued. I am thankful for the work, don’t get me wrong — but so far I don’t see how my increasing teaching experience is helping me land permanent gigs, or any respect on campus, or any leg-up in terms of defeating cronyism and the last thing I want is to say “I’ve been an adjunct for 20 years…”
The sad fact is that so long as there are budgetary issues, increasing enrollments without increasing endowments, and sabbaticals, our warm bodies eager to get to a cell in the ivory tower will be lined up, shoulder to shoulder, for inspection. We became victim and willing participant in the game, and what I’d like to see — even if I invent it myself — is some way to appease the most and hurt the fewest.
Unfortunately, that sort of thinking is what gave us our bloodiest wars and worst financial crises.
— american adjunct Oct 16, 11:19 AM #
american adjunct…well said!
I would only add that the days of looking to H/E for future leaders is over. Today, you only need to look for the snarling guard dogs that are herding the sheep to the cliff.— greg Oct 16, 12:14 PM #
Anything that comes from A.G. Monaco needs to be taken with a grain of sand. He was known for his heavy-handed treatment of staff, part-time faculty, and grad assistants during his time at Southern Illinois University. He is openly anti-union, and he dislikes tenured faculty because he can’t bully them.
Let’s put the blame for the treatment of adjuncts where it belongs, on the administration. They are the ones who offer the low pay and fail to provide benefits.
— Rob Oct 16, 12:49 PM #
Adjuncts,
There is a guy in our department who doesn’t do any research anymore, he makes over $100,000/year and he only has to teach 2 courses a semester. Doesn’t that just make you furious!
http://rightwingprofessor.blogspot.com/
— rightwingprofessor Oct 16, 12:56 PM #
rwp,
Try “tolerating” the promotion of a flunky, tired, anorexic 60-someting incompetent, who was hired to a 6-figure salary, only to be removed from her post after the blood of countless administrative subordinates was knee-high in her office and the janitorial staff could not keep up with the blood splatters on her office walls.
Finally, AFTER her dean left, she was removed from her job, but couldn’t be fired because she had “wangled” a sweet-heart” deal from the even more incompetent dean that hired her in the first place (for “favors” undisclosed).
Today she enjoys her 150K salary in a do-nothing job where top administration placed her for optimal damage control (since they couldn’t fire her). Occasionally she is seen on campus taking curves on 2-wheels of her SUV, with her Isadora Duncan scarf flying out the window. Most days however, she can be found dousing herself with Static Guard & French perfume in the “ladies” room. She really hates it when her designer dresses cling to her skeletal frame. Talk about teflon?
More like total cowardice and corruption at the highest levels of administration and no conscience to direct them.
— Madison,WI Oct 16, 04:46 PM #
Huh, I’ve been hearing this “poor adjunct” stuff for years. Everybody complains about how sad it is, etc., but NOTHING ever gets done. It’s easy to talk and research the topic, but when are we going to start seeing results and changes? Interestingly, during my years of reading about “official” empathy for the adjunct I have yet to read or witness support from full-time faculty. Curious don’t you think. As a matter of fact the only people I see talking about the subject here are adjuncts. Any full-timers in the list? So, where are the world-changing, touchy-feely full-timers (I’m sensitive, too – been a crusader for the rights of non-humans for decades – and once again, how many crazy for world rights higher education facilities murder and torture sentient creatures under their own roof, but they do seem to be VERY selective concerning which things should have rights. Oh, but sometimes it is okay to kill, they say…as long as we are killing in the name of schoalship. But I digress for the sake of the paradigm of pure hypocrisy)? Here is a cause right under their nose, the adjunct, and where are the hypocrites? Maybe they need to read the definitions for irony and hypocrisy. Oh, yes, and once this little blurb in the chronicle moves on, nothing will have happened.
— A.M. Oct 16, 06:08 PM #
I am a full timer but I was able to fight my way out of adjunctsville. In order to get a full time position I had to move across country to take a visting professor job (they are slightly more appreciated) and move back across country to take a tenure track job. The battle is hard and complicated. Many can’t do what I do because of family and other obligations. I was lucky, I know. Most of my collegaues still utter the word “adjunct” like they have dog crap on their shoe. I think it is the fear of “by the grace of God, there I could be,” type of thing. So I want all to have rights. I hope you all get to be treated better and maybe more public outcry about having more fulltimers will open up jobs for you all. It will not come from the inside; trust me.
— Liz C Oct 16, 09:13 PM #
I am a full-timer at a comm college. I hold a PhD in my field as do several others in my department. Many of us moved to get these slots and accepted vastly different working conditions and pay than we saw in the university systems.
Before I was hired here, I had worked as an adjunct at two schools. One situation was AWFUL and the second, a full-time position, was good but full of uncertainty. Ultimately, I got tired of the adjunct life. For me, full-time at the comm college beat adjunct at Columbia or wherever. Comm colleges desperately need highly qualified faculty and many of the adjuncts at our universities could be contributing meaningfully at these “other” institutions.
I feel for those in adjunct positions and am ashamed at the way they are treated. I regularly raise the issue with the administration and they regularly ignore me and my colleagues. We have no real “hold” over our administators. They are not bound in any way to do as we ask. Thus, I have to ask those here who are blaming faculty, Exactly what do you expect us to do to correct this situation? How DO you think we could help?
I also agree with Liz C that stimulating public or student outcry may well be the way to go. The universities and colleges sometimes listen to those paying tuition.
— Tookt Oct 16, 11:12 PM #
So, I’m confused. Are we supposed to want more adjuncts or fewer? Are we supposed to want to pay lots of attention to them and support them and give them better working conditions, or are we supposed to work to eliminate their positions on campus? The article bites its tail on this.
I completely agree that adjuncts are treated poorly. Let’s just accept that as fact. But if they are, wouldn’t unionizing be a good thing? Then they would have bargaining power and be able to do something about their situation. If the admin doesn’t like the adjunct union, then they can simply hire fewer adjuncts, make more of them into FT profs, thereby giving more people more valued positions. If the admin doesn’t want to do that, then they can live with the adjunct union and be forced to make concessions. What is the alternative to unionizing?
I honestly don’t get what the author is advocating for. He says the NEA and others “all claim to represent the interests of nontenured faculty members … at the same time they push colleges to decrease their reliance on that group of employees.” Well, isn’t that the point? We want to make adjuncting less horrible, and we want more people to have the dignity of FT employment. What am I missing here?
And in a duck-and-cover move, I’ll sign off saying perhaps universities should stop churning out so many PhDs…
— Confused Oct 17, 04:44 AM #
Well, essentially, the facilities enjoy getting free milk without buying the cow. Who in our midst here does not? Why would an institution support regulation that is certainly against its self-interest? This would parallel an intensive rearing, cage-egg farmer funding PETA. As the ol’ sayin’ goes, evil happens because the “good” do nothing. Who in these discussions has put themselves out on a limb, and I mean really risked themselves to help another? Few “haves” will risk anything if the cost will stress their little cozy realm. Hume was right, people are visciously and ruthlessly selfish (brief glance at history proves this). The blame, if we want to do that, rests with hand-to-mouth adjuncts that grovel like serfs (see this repeatedly – usually non-Ph.D workers) for the scraps tossed to them from their betters. Try a mass walk-out, hello! Leave ‘em hanging and get ‘em in the pocket books. But no, the poor have always made fantastic canon fodder and servants – keep ‘em poor and then you have control. I have tried to rally these individuals to no success. (Oh, and as to the “unqualified” Ph.Ds “Confused” is referring to. maybe you should do some reflection before deciding who should or should not be worthy to earn a degree. Typical American elitist mentality). We live in a pseudo-aristocratic nation (inheritors of British colonial thought and process), so unless the serf and master mentality disappears from our society, we shall (as is happening) see work conditions fall even further. Unionization may very well be the key, but getting subservient thinkers to help themselves is nearly impossible. I have tried. Out of dozens of adjuncts only 3 answered the call. The rest were busy cleaning shoes, apparently. To sum things up along the lines of good old Ben Franklin(finally!), it is time adjuncts and full-timers take a look at their reflection in the mirror. The truth does present a hurtful visage, does it not?
— A.M./historian Oct 17, 08:37 AM #