Jan. 12, 2006

Doing Hard Time, Full Time

The abuses placed upon adjunct faculty members by college administrations are legion, long-standing, and not likely to lead to change anytime soon — despite intermittent committees, activist organizations, and other groups of well-meaning but naïve educated people. Still, hope blooms eternal and the forces of justice press onward. I am not about to add to that fray, but rather, will reflect upon a higher caste of faculty. How much higher, though, is up to debate.

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Administrations rationalize their un-evenhanded — at times underhanded — treatment of the one or two or three section per term laborer by saying that he or she is probably enmeshed in graduate work, and the adjunct experience is a fine training ground for future full timers. But what of that group designated as non-tenured full-time faculty: Those with the one-year contracts with no promise? They labor on without the dream of a full-time job, for they already have one. In fact, in many cases they are worthy enough to receive a full plate of benefits: A job with a health plan, full-time status, and office space commensurate with that of (can we dare utter its name) an associate professor?

Yes, these are good things. If not an answered prayer for an academic, at least such a position may appear as a sign of one. But the academic fine print and the job market challenges this purported academic coup. For while the adjunct may dream of tenure-track possibilities when the dissertation is done or that refereed journal cherry picks his or her article off the crowded transom, what dreams does the year to year full-time teacher have?

For half a decade the door of my office in the humanities department was located at 45 � angles to two others across the hall, forming an invisible equilateral triangle. From this vantage point, I witnessed the injuries of cast and class of this species of scholar. One office was easily visible by a leftward turning glance. It was inhabited by an associate professor; the office further up was apportioned to a full-time non-tenured year-to-year man. While the geometry was ineluctable, the effects upon these two professors — equally matched in education, competency, and age — was all too palpable. As the months and years went by, and the mien of the overworked scholar grew wearier, I recalled an essay by Isak Dinesen wherein she lamented the suffering of oxen, who because of the insensitivity of the farmers to notice how poorly designed were the creatures’ wooden collars, doomed the poor animals to a lifetime of suffering. On the other hand, the harness designed by the administration in funding the non-tenured position was a sophisticated, bureaucratic one, albeit devoid as well of any empathy to relieve the stress of this educated beast of burden.

The associate professor would jauntily enter the department domain in good cheer, spotlessly attired in a gray suit, well-groomed hair, and freshly shined shoes. While her job duties may not have been those of a managerial professional in the business world, her appearance would pass muster without a thought in the corporate corridors. She differed from her counterparts in business, however, since she needed make her appearance only twice a week. She taught two classes — both “upper level” — and dashed about the hallways as if her requisite time at the institution was something of a novelty, even an adventure. Not so the faculty member whose office abutted hers. He walked with a slow slouch. His demeanor reflected the toll of his job was heir to. His face poorly hid the toil of teaching twice the number of sections and grading hundreds of freshman compositions: first drafts and final. On occasion he could summon up a smile or a retort. But it was clear these were temporary anodynes, and even though his contract went from year to year basis to a guaranteed two-year stint, his reward for his labors were as threadbare as were his clothes.

He was friendly to his neighbor of higher status as she was congenial with him, although I could not help but notice a mote of resentment settle in his eye and a subtle gritting of the teeth from time to time as he turned from a brief interchange with his colleague back to his office. Eventually I noticed other subtle signs of unsucessful attempts at hiding his discontent. When new candidates for tenure-track positions were interviewed, he’d often show up and cordially inquire about their views on teaching or ask pertinent questions regarding their experience. However, I had the troubling feeling this was a pose, that beneath his professional stance, there stooped a disheartened soul that cringed at the idea the next academic year would bring in a new faculty member with higher rank than his. Why he did not apply for these positions himself is a mystery. He certainly seemed to have the qualifications. Perhaps after so many year-to-year years, he believed he had been apportioned his lot. Was he a representative of a new millennium academic Uncle Tom?

As for the professor who resided beside him during those years — the one who kept bankers’ hours — it never seemed she was aware of the irony of being placed so geographically close yet so professionally apart from him. I suspect, however, she was grossly unmoved or unaware of the life on the other side of the thin slab of sheet rock that separated them.

There is an old adage that the three best things about college teaching are June, July, and August. This seemed to be the case for the solidly tenured half of our duo. When the first inklings of summer tinged the end of the academic year with warmth and greenery, she was off to parts unknown to the rest of us. But for her counterpart, these months were filled with summer teaching assignments (as many as could be legally and logistically taken on). Which led to another irony of academic life. Since the year-to-year contract covered only nine months per annum, summer school pay was lowered to an adjunct’s compensation. So, as is the case with bureaucracies such as certain local governments, operations that exist outside the law, and corporate whistleblowers, it seems for the non-tenured faculty, no good deed goes unpunished.

Izzy Academic is the psuedonym of a writer and college teacher who resides on the East Coast. His previous column recounted the visit of a famous writer to a college where he taught.

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Comments

Bull’s Eye

Thank you for this piece. One of my coaching clients is in the purgatory you describe and his situation has exactly the demoralizing effect you describe.

In his case, no new t-t positions have been created since I’ve been working with him. Even though one colleague has died, one left for greener pastures, and one retired (several years too late.) The administration is slowly allowing attrition of t-t positions and increasingly allowing courses to be taught by contract employees.

There is even some sort of weird, unclear rule that if my client a t-t job became available, he MIGHT have to resign from his current position to be considered in the applicant pool.

The most insidious aspect of my client’s situation is that he has to be the ultimate good citizen and continually curry favor with his colleagues. He worries about angering anyone. He gets stucking the least palatable classes. He serves on whatever committees the chair requests. He has more service duties than any of his tenured colleagues. In short, he jumps through every hoop possible so that if a t-t line SHOULD open up, everyone will be rooting for him. And there are a couple of other teachers in his department in the same position — so there is a horrid competition to be the best slave.

The saddest aspect, perhaps, and one similar to the fate of most adjuncts, is that my client is so overburdened that he has no time, energy or self-confidence to do research and publish. Over the years, he has become a less attractive candidate for tenure track jobs.

Sigh.

Mary McKinney, Ph.D., Clinical Psychologist & Academic Coach at http://www.SuccessfulAcademic.com, at 8:15 am EST on January 12, 2006

Vote with your feet?

Excuse me — are the parties being pitied, being forced to be full-time, w/o tenure, by some evil force?

No. They are not. If they think they are being played for suckers and saps — they probably are — why don’t they just leave? And make the world more pleasant for students?

Yes, the academic administrations are at fault here. They should tell these people, upfront and face-to-face, taking these positions may hurt their tenure chances. They should limit all contracted terms to no more than three years, to encourage career planning and timely departures.

But that would require hard work, thinking, and caring — which the average administrator avoids like the plague (and the classroom).

It is, what it is. Tenure is dying, especially in soft-side academia. Get over it, and move on with your life. It’s better than begging.

B.J., at 8:52 am EST on January 12, 2006

Preaching to the Choir

I scrolled down to comment, and was (secretly) pleased to see the first comment titled (Bullseye). The next comment, for all intents and purposes, could be titled Bullsh**. In reality, as empathetic as I feel toward full-time temporary faculty (who are NOT to blame for an exploitative job market), pieces like this drive me to distraction. More to the point, I refuse to publish essays like this in Adjunct Advocate.

“Give me something we don’t already know,” I tell the writers who send in and pitch similar essays.

And when journalists from the mainstream media phone me for interviews to write their pieces about the “exploited” temporary faculty members at the local 4-year public and/or community colleges down the road, I BEG them to stop printing pieces keyed to the financial exploitation of the faculty members.

Why? Because these pieces published in higher education publications are preaching to the choir. They’re the equivalent of bread and circuses to please the Plebes.

In mainstream media, pieces like this do more harm than good, I believe. The woman who’s pulling overtime shifts at the plant to send her kid to college doesn’t see any logic in the argument that the professor teaching her son or daughter is overworked. No job security? Welcome to the real world, where the majority of Americans toil. No office? Cry about that one to the masses who work in cubicles. Earning only $30-$50 per hour a problem for you? Bounce that one off of the 1,000,000 people who work at Wal-Mart.

Pieces like this play extremely well in the Ivory Tower, but nothing will change until we know how to talk about this issue to the people in Peoria in a way that will help them understand the serious ramifications associated with the reliance on temporary labor in higher education.

P.D. Lesko, Executive Editor at Adjunct Advocate, at 10:13 am EST on January 12, 2006

The Hard Cruel World

My God, am I ever tired of all of this whining ... not to mention (1) gross generalizations based on a trivial number of data points and (2) the “across-the-hall” observations that inspired Izzy Academic’s psycho-babble. “He walked with a slow slouch. His demeanor reflected the toll of his job was heir to. His face poorly hid the toil of teaching twice the number of sections and grading hundreds of freshman compositions: first drafts and final ... On occasion he could summon up a smile ... beneath his professional stance, there stooped a disheartened soul that cringed at the idea the next academic year would bring in a new faculty member with higher rank than his.”

I get the impression the Poor Soul’s department chair had security drag him screaming into his classroom, chain him to his desk, and admonish him, “Now teach these kids whatever you know!”

Oh, the horror of it all!

About his perky colleague (I assume her name is Buffy and she has a Ph.D. in Women’s Studies from Stanford), we learn “... her appearance would pass muster without a thought in the corporate corridors. She needed make her appearance only twice a week. She taught two classes — both “upper level” — and dashed about the hallways as if her requisite time at the institution was something of a novelty, even an adventure ... When the first inklings of summer tinged the end of the academic year with warmth and greenery, she was off to parts unknown to the rest of us.”

Oh my, what a steriotypical set up!

I have complete Phase Nine. I think, of a forty-five year academic career during which I have never had tenure ... I think because I have always chosen excitement over security. I have had faculty positions (most tenure-track) at Virginia Tech (mathematics), Princeton (statistics), Yale (political science), Michigan (business), along with several other position at various bastions of intellectualism. I was director of instructional programs at one of the two most prestigious social science research centers in the U.S. I have been fired by a business school that is most assuredly Tier 5. I have, in addition, owned a company that developed quality improvement instructional materials for the former Big Three automobile companies (please don’t mention that to anyone).

Despite never having had the revered tenure and despite having “second-class citizenship” at many of the places I’ve taught, I have never suffered the “poor soul, academic life’s not fair” syndrome described by Izzy Academic.

Pick, at random, a college or university in the United States (any Tier will do). Is it likely to be led by individuals who are remarkably good at their jobs? Is it likely to be organizationally effective or efficient? Are its customers (Paul Goodman, please forgive me) likely to be well served by its employees? Can we be assured that its impact even remotely satisfies the needs and expectations of the society it serves? Will it have an organizational structure that optimizes its function? Will it be an environment in which thoughtfulness and fairness prevail? In my opinion, the answer to all of those questions will be decidedly “No.”

There is a myth that academe is filled with intelligent professors (and administrators) who got there because of their brilliance ... and obviously there is some of that. But, in my opinion – based upon forty-five years of teaching – there are far more who got there because at each stage of the educational process their performance was judged “better than average.” At the conclusion of each stage they were confronted with the question, “Do I go out into the hard, cruel world or do I continue on to the next stage of the academic process?” Not being enthralled with prospects in the hard, cruel world, they moved on to the next stage ... and eventually found themselves accepting diplomas and hoods and applying for positions as assistant professors. No big deal ... there are plenty of colonels in the armed services whose careers were made by following a drummer beating the same cadence. Personal and professional insecurity guides many a career.

What I’m suggesting is that our institutions of higher education are populated by a great many (probably a majority of) individuals who are not a whole lot brighter that a randomly chosen plumber (and I don’t mean that as a slur). It’s just that those academics have waaaaay more education than the typical plumber ... and education hides many more intellectual deficiencies than you might imagine.

So yes, it probably does ruin Izzy Academic’s day when he’s forced to witness one of life’s injustices playing out right across the hall from his desk. My advice is to encourage him to either do something about it or get used to it. Now, do you want me to describe my prejudices regarding the preponderance of “poor me, I can’t afford to walk the talk” wimps in academe? Naw ... maybe I’ll save that for next time.

RWH, at 10:41 am EST on January 12, 2006

Show me the money

Wishing for a better world is easy, simple. Trying to fund it is another matter.

To wit: one tenured teaching position commits a state’s taxpayers to a lifetime of compensation payments — upwards of $2,000,000.00.

Conversely, a one-time, three-year contract limits the state taxpayers’ financial commitment to under $175,000.00

Given all the issues facing taxpayers, such as the unfunded $33,000,000,000,000.00 balance for the Social Security system — which option do you think the average taxpayer will choose?

In a perfect, Utopian world (e.g., France), there would be tenure for everyone, as well as nickel ice cream cones.

Well — France is about to go bankrupt. Would someone show — in financial detail, on a long-term basis — how the U.S. would avoid that kind of mess?

You want an open, honest discussion about higher ed and quality? Careful — you might get told, directly and none too politely, “live within your means — we have to. Part-time, retirees, interns, volunteers — whatever it takes.”

No one is entitled to a lifetime on the public dime. No one.

B.J., at 10:44 am EST on January 12, 2006

A flawed portrait

Like many of the other commenters, I have mixed feelings about this post. I am, I suppose, in the same position as the sad-sack full-timer that the author describes—I teach 3-4 or 4-4 at an R1 where the t-t faculty teach 2-2, and believe me, I do sometimes feel resentful—but there are also real differences. In my case, I’M the one on campus only two or three days a week in my skirt and heels.

Yes, I have 100 students or more a semester, but I have NO administrative or service responsibilities. Since I’m new at this game, I’m still playing catch-up, but if I were to stay I could *certainly* carve out time for a productive scholarly life; probably more time than most t-t faculty at teaching-oriented institutions (moreover, we’re unionized, so the salary is also comparable to that at a teaching college).

It’s a grind. But the academic life is a grind for lots of people, and there are always other options. I have real sympathy for people in the position of this sad sack “Izzy” writes about, but the outrage Izzy generates is a nauseating mixture of pity and condescension—and one that doesn’t convince me he actually knows anything about the life he purports to depict.

La Lecturess, at 4:34 am EST on January 13, 2006

Blaming the Victim?—People Should Get Out

I used to be tremendously sympathetic to the overworked, underpaid adjuncts. In many ways I still am, since I was one until I published my way out and onto the tenure track. But that was nearly 30 years ago.

What bothers me is that so many people don’t seem to research their fields before or during grad schools, and then are shocked, shocked that there are very few tenure-track jobs. Why are they shocked? If they can do research, why didn’t they do it? The job crisis in the humanities has existed for at least 30 years.

Finally, adjuncting if you’re a fulltime professional (say, in business) makes sense if it’s an extra gig where you share your knowledge. It does not make sense if you do it for years, getting deader by the minute, like the man described in this article.

When I’m Queen, no one will be an adjunct/part-timer for more than 3 years. It’s too destructive to one’s self-respect. People need to go out and use their talents where they’ll be rewarded. In the “real world.”

Marianne, at 4:35 am EST on January 13, 2006

“Earning only $30-$50 per hour a problem for you?” asks P. D. Lesko (rhetorically).

In such discussions, it needs to always be pointed out that that’s $30-50 per contact hour. If you teach composition, say, and mark a couple of short essays per week (say 5 minutes per essay for 25 students), you need to figure in the 250 minutes of marking time, also. And there’s the expected office hour per section, too. Generally there’s some course planning involved as well, surely at least an hour per week per section. We’re in the $10-15 range already, without considering any dealing with bureaucracy on the campus, any sort of involvement with the department as a whole, the lack of compensation fortravel that may require being at multiple campuses in a day, and so on. And if you teach a research paper of any sort, add a bunch of other hours as necessary for consultation with students as well as checking their research to keep ‘em honest and not plagiarizing. Should you get an administrator’s kid who doesn’t want to do any work and expects a high grade, either kiss your conscience or a lot more hours goodbye, too.

There are very few adjuncts earning $30-50 an hour of actual working time in higher education, and most of those who are a generally either doing a poor job of teaching or lucked into the last class opened and have only half the usual population. The latter does happen to adjuncts occasionally—a reward for being so low on the list that if that class didn’t get opened, they’d not have class, but it doesn’t happen often.

Thane Doss, at 11:28 am EST on January 13, 2006

Oxen?

Oxen, no perhaps, but comparatively?

We (I) unfortunately use the adjunct model often where classes don’t often carry consistent, sustained enrollment from term to term.

Causality? Many of those who apply for these fill-in, stop gap jobs, often look haggard when they walk in the door to apply. The super stars with secure, tenured jobs at Yale do not apply.

The old USSR tried to guarantee equality of outcomes and they, like other more moderate socialist countries, found it could not be sustained.

Get ready for globalization brothers and sisters. The more we work (some of us) to bring underpriviliged bretheren from around the world up into our dingy, the quicker the U.S. of A. takes on water.

Special help and consideration for female/ handicapped/under-represented workers/faculty with children, etc. just puts the added load onto some other faculty ox. Moooooooo.

I hope everyone here in the U.S. of A. has eaten their Wheaties (and loves caffeine).

Dr. F. Gump, Muckraking Provost at Upper Midwest Mental Institute, at 3:24 pm EST on January 13, 2006

How to Get Out

I have worked as a full-time non-tenured faculty member at an elite college and I am now tenure-track. I know that the work load is not the same — the tenure-track professor does much more regardless of teaching load. Advising and committee assignments, service to university and community, and level of research all consume the time that might otherwise be a differential between the two kinds of jobs. The woman who arrived two days a week to teach a course was not relaxing the rest of the time.

As a non-tenured faculty member I had to continue a very active research program in my spare time (unacknowledged by my employer) in order to remain competitive in the hunt for a tenure-track position. I had to continue publishing at a steady rate, comparable to productivity in the kind of job I was seeking. In my opinion, most adjuncts decide not to do this and they relax their research activities to focus on the teaching. That knocks them out of contention for even teaching-oriented jobs at many universities. You have to really sweat to move from one category to the other. It is my observation of my adjunct colleagues and now the adjuncts at my current job that few want to do this double duty. They don’t want the tenure-track job bad enough to do what it takes to get one.

Sharon, at 1:07 pm EST on January 14, 2006

Hard Time

Sharon is sharply focused on the topic; however, too often we don’t seem to want to talk about the hard issues in Academe: competition, slipping enrollment, lowered standards, and recent grads who will do the job for 80% of the regular salary.

Then there are individuals who will play race/gender/parentage/patronage cards to avoid the steamroller issues.

Academics and most North Americans had best be learning second and third languages, and be ready/willing to relocate as the World Economy kicks in.

Dr. F. Gump, Muckraking Provost at Upper Midwest Mental Institute, at 9:44 pm EST on January 14, 2006

I spent a good number of years as a adjunct at varous colleges and suffered through the usual array of indignities. I had another manual labor job and would show up in my workclothes and change in the bathroom. How my tenured brothers and sisters hated that. The real world was intruding — the students understood. They offered me an office once, I declined, I was quite comfortable in my car and talking to students in the cafe. No real need for an office — didn’t want the phone either. In fact, I eventually realized that I didn’t want the tenured job either. They’ve called me back a couple of times, I went back once — they said it was an emergency. Lasted about 2 weeks, before they were “investigating” me. Still see some of my old colleagues, tenured and untenured, mostly looking stressed, or half drunk by noon. Maybe the guy who didn’t get the tenured job is really better off, it’s a lot easier to leave and do something that you might really enjoy. Perhaps, to the article writer, and his associate professor colleague — the joke’s on you.

owen powell, at 11:16 pm EST on January 16, 2006

Response to ‘Doing Time, Hard Time’

Just a few thoughts:

A number of respondents focused on the idea that the theme of the essay was about adjunct faculty: I thought that from the title and content that it was clear the essas was about full-time faculty.

There was an allusion to ‘not preaching to the choir.’ In my portrait of the associate professor, I thought I had made it clear that even she was not aware of the workload or salary range of her colleague; therefore, the implication, I thought, was that many, if not most tenured faculty are disinterested or uninterested in the status of contract employees.

Additionally, I was relaying a situation based on my observations regarding particular individuals and a particular relationship. Although I believe from other observations in the academic hierarchy that many such instances of the scenario outlined in the essay exist, I don’t believe I stated that such a situation was universal.

As for comments that the ‘oppressed’ member of the duo could just quit if he wanted to, I don’t believe I suggested anything that would contradict that assessment.

Some comments focused on the idea that the college teacher is in a more enviable position than those in retail sales or those engaged in manual labor, etc., so that it is doubtful the general public would or should have much sympathy for him, I would respond that in my experience and observations, some who work in such fields are worse off and some are better off. My father, for example, was a machinest in a factory, and had a fair salary and decent working conditions, and was paid commensurate with others who had the same skills and seniority as he. I think if you were to compute the hours/wage dimension of the college teacher the hourly wage would come out to about $12 to $15 per hour, even taking into account intersession breaks and summer school.

Finally, comments that suggested the abilities and talents or intelligence of a college teacher should not be presumed to be of a higher dimension that other workers, I agree. But the same holds for physicians and other health professionals, who, despite their professional shortcomings or even incompetencies receive relatively high pay regardless of their abilities.

izzy academic, at 10:35 am EST on January 25, 2006

Who’s speaking for whom?

I’m a full-time adjunct.Izzy doesn’t speak for me.

Michael

Michael Moore, Adjunct Lecturer, at 12:35 pm EST on February 22, 2006

Surprised

Well, I’m a professor, and I’ve never been an adjunct or an instructor, only a T.A. before joining the professoriate. I must say I’m surprised by the negative response to this article.

First, I think it is true that both professors and other faculty do work the other ‘class’ doesn’t see...although they’d sure see the results of this work _not_ getting done!

But more generally, I really think that universities that depend heavily on instructors (mine does) need to think seriously about how best to use them. These people can be and often are respectable professionals. Even though they are hired to teach primarily lower level courses, there is every good academic reason not to load them up with drudgery, treat them like slaves, and so on. I’ve seen people in these positions do great work in beginning and intermediate course and curriculum development, and yes, do some good research and useful service too!

(Sorry if I sound a bit like a Pollyanna in the comments I leave on this site, I know it doesn’t apprear to go with my Professor Zero persona, but _really_, y’all! And, come to think of it, maybe this is one of the benefits of tenure: it allows one to relax a bit, be nice and a little magnanimous. The amount of anxiety and resentment that comes through in the comment threads on this site could be a symptom of the current horrors of the job market and so on, especially in some fields. Do you think?

Professor Zero, at 8:00 pm EST on March 14, 2006

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