Comments (10)

1. 

   richard.diguette

   The short answer is only when adjuncts stop accepting teaching assignments under current conditions. It is clear that the college and university systems around the country couldn't care less about the plight of adjunct faculty in our community colleges. Nor have tenured faculty at CCs exhibited much interest in this issue.

   2 years ago

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2. 

   bsmith

   Adjuncts, also known as contingent faculty, are now the majority in our community colleges. Since students' learning conditions=teachers' working conditions, we need to improve the working conditions of contingent faculty if we hope to educate, retain and graduate our students.

   2 years ago

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3. 

   basedow.maureen

   Richard, the short answer is that adjuncts do stop teaching all the time, and the colleges just reach down another level, hire a less experienced, less trained, individual with a pulse to teach the same course. This doesn't do the students any good whatsoever.

   2 years ago

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4. 

   ksouthall2

   In this economy (sadly) schools don't actually have to "reach down" any more. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of qualified people out there who want to teach at community colleges. At this point in time adjuncts are almost disposable.

   2 years ago

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5. 

   dpedeva

   I teach at two community colleges in California. There are 2 full-time history instructors and about 15 part-time history instructors at each one. In regards to Richard's comment about part-time instructors agreeing to be exploited, here is what I have to say: in disciplines like history, the choice is usually between being unemployed or working part-time. When there is a new teaching position, there are usually 100 qualified candidates competing for one spot and the candidate has to be willing to move.

   2 years ago

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6. 

   richard.diguette

   All I did was point out the obvious. I'm not saying I like it. Nor am I unaware that many people accept low paying adjunct positions as a way to put food on the table. Where I've taught for years, payroll dollars flow much more freely to non-teachers in administrative positions than they do to adjuncts. The situation is deplorable.

   2 years ago

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7. 

   bbscotch

   Many if not most students that could attend a 4-year Institution attend a Community College (CC) primarily because of financial constraints. The cost is around 1/3 or less. Now, a CC cannot possibly have a complete full-time faculty roster with benefits and deserving pay-rates with the budget levels raised from tuition. If tuition goes up considerably, enrollment at CCs will go down. Public Universities used to be state funded; now they are just state located. The University I work for used to receive 60-70% of its budget from the state about 25 yrs ago. Now, it is down to ~ 30%, continues to drop, with tuition caps. I think the problem is that society has to again place EDUCATION as a top priority and force our law-makers to do a reality check.

   2 years ago

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8. 

   J Martin

   If equity is something that we want, we need to decide what it is. Having a full-time job is great....if one can get one.

   IMHO, it's easy to define this. Equity means to have more than a reasonable assurance of having job security...something that Fters have. This means, having tenure or perhaps just plan old rehire preference rights (or seniority). Or how about the right to teach as many classes you can if offered? (Note: in California, it's illegal to work more than 67% of the teaching load at any community college district.) If the above is granted, then "equal pay for equal work" should be demanded and rewarded...not pleading for equitable pay...which is often the case.

   Regarding overloads, I know of plenty of full-timers who are teaching these extra classes, not because they're needed, but they want the extra cash....teaching 120% to 160% is nothing for them to do (and some teach 200%) and it's just down right thievery. The math is simple: for every class that is taught by a Fter, it's one less class for a Pter. It's not hard to figure out that there is something very wrong with this picture.

   Ask a Fter or a CEO about what I just wrote here. You'll be amazed by their responses...I bet you'll will find nothing but a headache or perhaps worst. Seriously, go to them f2f and ask them. And report back to us here on this thread.

   I challenge you.

   --A proud member of CPFA (California Part-timer Faculty Association) and NFM (New Faculty Majority).

   2 years ago

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9. 

   Community Member

   If the adjunct faculty stopped working at the community college I serve, the college would close. We make up a very large majority of the faculty yet are invisible.

   We teach the same courses as the full-time faculty, yet we earn a fraction of what they make and have no benefits, no voice, no retirement, and no job security.

   2 years ago

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10. 

    habbibte

    I have been an adjunct instructor for three years. I am a single parent, yet I have traveled all over town, gone to more than one campus miles away from each other for different schools on the same day, I am not paid a living wage as I am limited in the number of classes I can teach at a college. I have no office, no phone number, no way to provide the office hours that my students should have with me, even the privacy to consult with them when they need me. I often work after hours with no support staff to help me when the copier,computer/technology breaks down, I walk a very long way in the dark to my car every night alone, I have no job security to speak of and student loan debt that is monumental because I have not been able to make payments on it in the last two years and the interest is just piling up, I live in a lousy neighborhood in the fourth largest city in the US, where I have to beg my landlord two or three times a year to let me pay half my rent this two weeks and then the other half the next paycheck because I have to wait so long to get paid after the semester starts. I am basically bankrupt only I cannot afford to file for bankruptcy, I am in desperate need of car repairs or a new car but would never qualify for a loan, never know if I am going to have a job next semester, cannot speak up or speak my mind in faculty meetings where I am unpaid for fear of losing my job, have applied to over one hundred full time jobs in the last three years and gotten two interviews, love teaching but I wake up every day angry and resentful that I am basically a temporary again, that I will spend at least four months out of the year unemployed because adjuncts typically have no summer employment and when there is the classes don't make in the summer and no affordable health insurance to speak of ($700 + per month just for me, not including my son), I went to school for seven years to become a temporary again. Thank you for marginalizing me and my participation in higher education, we are not represented in our workplaces and that is a travesty of exploitation, it is even worse that we are being ignored here.

    2 years ago

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