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Adjunct Faculty: A Buyer's Market
Roark Atkinson Concern over the expansion of part time/adjunct faculty in America's institutions of higher learning during recent years is not limited to young scholars entering the job market. If Garry Trudeau's recent series of Doonsebury strips and Louis Menand's New York Times Magazine article "How to Make a Ph.D. Matter" (September 22, 1996) are any indication, the issue is now mainstream. Yet beyond Trudeau's fictitious adjuncts and the disturbing statistics that appear in The Chronicle of Higher Education and other publications, the actual voices of part timers often go unheard. The editorial staff of the OAH Newsletter decided that it was of critical importance to provide adjuncts with the opportunity to share their stories with our readers. In this way we hope to gain a more detailed understanding of the personal dimensions of this national trend. Utilizing several listservs (e-mail lists) on the Internet, we sought to reach a variety of history adjuncts. Our postings seemed to hit a nerve. We received messages from all over the country, not just from those who taught history, but from other part-time instructors in the humanities eager to have their voices heard. These people are a diverse lot. Some are full-time part-timers with Ph.D.s, some are ABDs, some teach part-time while pursuing other careers, some are married and are not the chief or sole breadwinners. Half of the people we heard from are women. The apparent diversity of these teachers, however, belies the common themes that emerged in the answers they gave to our questions--as far as adjuncting is concerned, things are remarkably similar all over the country. Of the many people we heard from, eleven agreed to let us use their stories. One of them, Paul Murphy, wrote a separate essay that accompanies this article. This is what the rest shared with us. Adjunct Purgatory The overiding consensus is that adjunct teaching is the future, and the future is now. Indeed, the present demand for these "hired guns" is enormous, according to the people who got back to us. Emily Cook, an adjunct who lives in Virginia, told us she has turned down almost as many teaching offers as she has accepted. She adds that "three of the five colleges and universities in which I have taught have more adjunct faculty than they do full-timers," which seems to indicate that some colleges "are willing to hire whole teams of adjuncts when there is plenty of work to justify hiring full-time personnel." One of the reasons for this, she explains, is the need for flexibility in the staffing of courses that have widely varying enrollments. In a more cynical vein, another instructor quipped "I won't be too surprised if in ten years university faculties are composed of one or two full-timers who teach a course or two and handle primarily administrative functions while the remaining members are adjuncts." Kathryn Kemp, who teaches in Georgia, tied the increasing reliance on adjuncts to larger trends in America. "Part-time work," she says, "whether at the burger joint or the university, is the management strategy of the decade. For state university systems struggling with tight budgets, it's irresistible." Not only do adjunct positions appear to be here to stay, the feeling among some adjuncts is that their own situation is permanent. One of them described this picture of "adjunct purgatory," where "one is denied full admission to academia but gets just close enough to desire it and hope for ascent to that level." For some, adjunct teaching has become a trap from which there is no easy escape. Some of the people who responded to us had positive things to say about certain aspects of adjunct teaching. These teachers enjoyed the flexibility of their jobs, which allowed them to move around the country with spouses who had their own careers. They acknowledged, however, that they had the support of their spouses' incomes, and that their own earnings would never sustain them alone. One of them told us "I can continue to research and write, while I teach survey courses at the rate of one or two per term," and adds "it's not a glorious career, but it is a nice life and I enjoy it." Two others who looked back on their experiences as adjuncts positively had been able to move on to full-time positions. For them adjuncting had been a challenging apprenticeship rather than a "purgatory." Low Pay, No Benefits, No Contracts, No Security The common complaint among the majority of the people we heard from is that the pay they received as part-time teachers was inadequate. As Jeffrey Reed put it, "the pay stinks." Reed compared adjuncts to people who work for temp agencies, only "as a temp, there was always the possibility (that it would turn into) a full-time job, with benefits, working for some company. This is a very limited possibility in the academy." The pay for part-timers, on the other hand, is comparable to temping. Several part-timers reported earnings in the neighborhood of $15,000 annually, which involved teaching three or more classes per semester. After taxes, gas, moving costs, and other sundries, as well as the loans many of the adjuncts took out as graduate student that must be paid off, temps probably take home more. Florence Baker commented on the pay disparity between part-timers and regular faculty. "In private industry," she told us, "part-timers are used to save the company from paying benefits and to give the company some flexibility as to the number of employees it maintains; the part-time employee, though, is generally paid at a scale equivalent to regular employees. Not it academia. Not only do we not get benefits, but we are paid at a vastly lower rate." Many of the adjunct teachers who contacted us mentioned that they did not have contracts with the schools they worked for. This turned out to be a disadvantage not only for the instructors, but for the schools themselves. One adjunct accepted a job at a military college only to find that a better paying job at another school was available. Since the first school had no contract with its part-time instructors, this person opted for the better job, which left the college scrambling for a replacement. Many of the other instructors told us of the reverse situation, which seems to prevail, in which they were hired by a college to teach a class only to be let go at the last minute (after books for the class had already been ordered, and lectures had been prepared) because of under-enrollment. Another adjunct tells us she was already into the second week of classes when this scenario occurred: "I was notified by the department chair that I would probably be let go since it looked like a couple of (regular) faculty members were unable to draw the required fifteen students to their classes and would probably need to take over my class to make up (their) hours. It was another week before the problem was resolved, and I wasn't fired after all. But it could have happened!" Hank Stamm mentioned a more positive experience working in the State University of New York system. At SUNY Oswego he received decent pay, health benefits, and was able to share an office with the full-time faculty there. He noted that these advantages existed in part, however, because the SUNY system is unionized. In many states this is the exception rather than the rule. Publishing and Still Perishing Part of the reason why part-time teaching becomes a perrennial occupation is that the ability to pursue research is severely hampered. Some of the respondents were ABD, and had no idea when they would be able to finish their Ph.D.s. Mark Howell commuted 150 miles per day, five days per week, between several campuses while he worked on his dissertation (he finished it, nevertheless). His case is perhaps exceptional, but part-timers frequently teach several classes at several campuses at a time to earn enough money to make ends meet. This, in turn, consumes any time that might otherwise be spent applying for grants, doing research, and presenting papers at conferences. Additionally, many adjuncts are forced to share offices (one adjunct we heard from shared an office with a French professor who gave oral tests during her office hours!), or lack offices altogether, and are not given the resources that full-time faculty receive (such as graders for large classes) that would help free-up more time. Another, less obvious problem, is the simple fact that the library at the school one teaches at may be inadequate for serious research, as Jeffrey Reed notes. Emily Cook agreed: "I live within three hours of a major archive in my field of interest, but cannot even consider taking time to go there. When you teach five courses and commute between two campuses there is little time for anything else." Despite all this, some of the part-timers we heard from were still writing and doing research. Of these, three noted that the research funding that was available for full-time faculty was not available for them, and that they had to pay for their scholarly pursuits out of their own pockets. One adjunct was able to do research only because his spouse was fully employed. Most of the adjuncts we heard from said they felt cut off from their colleagues, notably the full-time professors they worked with. Adjuncts often teach in the evenings when everyone else has gone home, or may have to dash off to another campus to teach, leaving no time to meet with the other faculty members. Many use the Internet to stay in touch; that is how we got in touch with them, after all. Some stressed that they had very good relationships with the faculty with whom they worked. One adjunct mentioned that a full-time faculty member handed him a copy of our posting on the Internet, which is how he got in touch with us. There are signs that the full-timers realize the implications of the over-dependence of adjuncts in America's universities, and are sympathetic of the plight of their underpaid junior colleagues. "Adjuncting Confuses Students" One factor that should not be overlooked is the effect the increasing use of adjunct faculty has on students. What do these peripatetic instructors bring to the classroom? On the one hand, one imagines that adjuncts would be ideal instructors, since they can focus all of their attentions on teaching, and are generally free from the administrative duties and research demands of regular faculty. On the other hand, with limited access to resources, low pay, little or no support services, no job security and no benefits, one can also imagine that teaching would suffer. The people we heard from expressed a variety of opinions on this subject. Most seemed proud to be teachers, and felt their jobs were important. Others felt their teaching suffered under these conditions. "Adjuncting confuses students," Emily Cook says, "especially the freshmen that instructors so often encounter in survey courses. Many don't understand why I am only on campus two days a week, are disgruntled when I explain that I can't be an advisor to some club or group on campus, or feel I have no confidence in them when I suggest that they get some other professor to write their recommendation for an honorary, a job, or a graduate program." She adds that because she teaches on so many campuses that it is difficult to learn the degree and major requirements for each school, and therefore cannot recommend other classes to students with confidence. Another adjunct was much more direct. This person felt that academic excellence naturally suffers since adjuncts by design are not invested in the institutions they work for. Why grow attached to a place you will probably leave after one semester? If you are ABD, why not put your energy into your dissertation rather than your teaching, or into publishing if it might help you get a more permanent job? Why care about students who you may know for only a few short months? Another instructor enjoyed the freedom he had from the administrative burdens of full-time faculty. He adds that "with that freedom I have more time for classroom and subject research which, in turn, allows me to revise courses frequently and keep them fresh and alive not only for students but for me as well." He notes, however, that students sometimes "equate successful teaching to full-time employment," revealing the stigma that is frequently attached to adjunct faculty. Florence Baker also observes that the increased use of adjuncts (and the decreased hiring of full-time faculty) has resulted in "very unbalanced (full-time) faculties" that are composed primarily of "older (50+) men and younger full-time women." Unions in California, she adds, "are putting pressure on institutions to give priority to long-time part-timers when full positions become available," which she believes "creates a bad situation since departments have much to gain from the enthusiasm, fresh outlook, and recent educational experiences of younger people." Solutions To a certain extent, adjuncting in some form may continue to be a desirable process. Part-time teaching as it currently exists may be essential in honing the teaching skills that attract students to history and correspondingly strengthen history departments. Several of the people who contacted us see their adjunct experiences in this light. Mark Howell told us that adjuncting "made me a better teacher because it taught me how to think (and teach) on my feet." Another adjunct said he felt his "C.V. shows more than battle scars, ulcers and lousy pay; I'd like to think it shows versatility, flexibility, and a commitment to my chosen profession." Another, who is ABD, said she appreciated "the chance to teach and earn some money while writing my dissertation." Several others, on the other hand, plan to leave the academy altogether. Others shared their view that the steady expansion of adjunct faculty in higher education was highly undesirable. As Hank Stamm put it, "Increasing reliance on adjuncts and part-timers undermines the credibility of academic institutions. This era of budget cutting basically means that the school administrations look first at monetary concerns without really thinking through the long-term costs of reducing educational effectiveness." Another instructor with two children expressed concern for the quality of education they would receive by the time they went to college, and felt that people in general would be "horrified to learn that (their children) were being taught by people working part-time, without office space, decent pay, health benefits, or any guarantee of continued employment after the current quarter." This person plans to leave in January for another career. Additionally, several others felt that graduate enrollments should be drastically curtailed to reduce the number of people that will only swell the ranks of present perennial adjuncts. This may happen naturally as more people realize that for growing numbers of young scholars, the cost of earning a Ph.D. in history is no longer an investment that pays off. What can be done to improve the present situation? One adjunct suggests pro-rating the pay and benefits "according to full-time salary schedules," which he says "is an honorable alternative to paying part-timers at less than half of the rates received by full-timers." This sentiment is echoed by Paul Murphy (see accompanying article). Travel and research grants could be made available for adjuncts with Ph.D.s who wish to continue writing. Kathryn Kemp suggests creating "a regularly salaried cadre of (part time) instructors who might be hired by the individual department or by the university at large." In this case, she is willing to accept the growing dependence on pools of adjuncts, but only if they are fully employed and have benefits. Furthermore, she suggests that the "criteria for employment should include a terminal degree but need not require extensive publishing, because the emphasis of this position would be on instruction." The growing dependence on adjunct faculty seems inescapable. The course that this trend takes is not, however, unchangeable. The OAH welcomes the comments and suggestions on this issue, as well as other trends that shape the way history is both learned and taught in America. Please contact us at: OAH, 112 North Bryan Street, Bloomington, IN, 47408; or by e-mail at newsletter@oah.org.
The editors would like to thank the following individuals who made this article possible: Jeffrey Reed, who teaches at Grand Valley State University; Kathryn Kemp, who teaches in Atlanta Georgia; Sheila Phipps, who is an ABD at William and Mary and who teaches at Hampton University; Mark Howell, who is a lecturer at Michigan State; Hank Stamm, who is a visiting scholar at Dartmouth; Talisman Ford, who is a lecturer at Vanderbilt; Emily Cook, who teaches in the Norfolk, Virginia area; Sue Schrems, who is an adjunct at Rose State College; William Horrell, who teaches at the College of the Ozarks; Florence Baker, who teaches in the Los Angeles area; and Paul Murphy, who is a graduate student at Indiana University, as well as a teacher in the Indianapolis area. Thanks go as well to the many other people who contacted us but do not appear in this list. |
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