Adjunct professors in North America

In North America, an adjunct professor, also known as an adjunct lecturer or adjunct instructor (collectively, adjunct faculty), is a professor who teaches on a limited-term contract, often for one semester at a time, and who is ineligible for tenure.^[1] Roughly 75% of college faculty are non-tenure-track.^[1][2][3] Non-tenure-track faculty teach college classes at all levels and are "typically tasked with the same instructional responsibilities as tenured faculty, such as assembling syllabi, ordering textbooks, and writing lectures."^[1] Non-tenure-track faculty earn much less than tenure-track professors; median pay per course is $2,700^[1] and average yearly pay is between $20,000 and $25,000;^[1][2] in some surveys, most adjuncts earn less than $20,000 a year.^[4] Many adjuncts earn less than minimum wage^[1] and 25% of adjuncts receive public assistance.^[1]

Increase in adjunct labor

Colleges and universities began to employ greater numbers of non-tenure-track faculty in the 1970s.^[2] In 1975, adjuncts represented roughly 24% of instructional staff at degree-granting institutions, whereas in 2011 they represented over 40% of instructional staff.^[5] In 2015, roughly 75% of college professors were non-tenure-track.^[1][2]

Various explanations have been given for this shift. Some "trace the practice of hiring part-time instructors to a time when most schools didn’t allow women as full professors, and thus adjunct positions were associated with female instructors from the start."^[6] Many non-tenure-track faculty were married to full-time, tenure-track professors, and known as "the housewives of higher education."^[6] The majority of non-tenure-track professors are still women.^[6]

Some have argued that the increase in the use of non-tenured faculty is the result of “financial pressures, administrators’ desire for more flexibility in hiring, firing and changing course offerings, and the growth of community colleges and regional public universities focused on teaching basics and preparing students for jobs.”^[7] Others have argued that while universities hire non-tenure-track faculty to "offset ... administrative bloat with cheaper labor"^[1] to the detriment of students: "while college tuition surged from 2003 to 2013 by 94 percent at public institutions and 74 percent at private, nonprofit schools, and student debt has climbed to over $1.2 trillion, much of that money has been going to ensure higher pay for a burgeoning legion of bureaucrats."^[6]

Colleges and universities such as Florida Atlantic University and the University of Vermont have instituted hiring freezes while paying substantial bonuses to presidents and administrators.^[8] Studies have shown that both student debt and low-wage faculty labor rises the fastest at colleges and universities whose presidents are paid the most^[9] and "[a]t state schools with the highest-paid presidents, permanent faculty declined dramatically as a percentage of all faculty."^[9] As colleges and universities hire more administrators, they hire comparatively fewer educators;^[1][8] "while keeping funding for instruction relatively flat, universities increased the number of administrator positions by 60 percent between 1993 and 2009, 10 times the rate at which they added tenured positions."^[6]

Paying some instructors less than others for the same teaching duties may be illegal.^[6]

Compensation and academic use

In past decades, adjunct faculty helped universities and colleges expand the range of their course offerings to prospective and existing students. In this respect, adjuncts can also be a way to inform the predominantly theoretical, and therefore somewhat limited, focus of full-time academics with the more pragmatic perspective of those who actually practice a given discipline in business, government or nonprofit organizations. For instance, as of the early 1990s Marvin Kaye, a prolific fiction author, editor and anthologist, also worked as part-time adjunct faculty of creative writing at New York University^[10] Another example is Edward H. Shortliffe, a pioneer in medical informatics, who was an adjunct faculty member at Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons circa 2011.^[11] Marilyn Milian, a retired Florida judge and star of The People's Court, taught litigation skills as an adjunct faculty at the University of Miami as of 2013;^[12] and musician Wayne Horvitz has worked as adjunct faculty teaching composition at Cornish College of the Arts.^[13]

Since the 1980s and '90's, however, colleges and universities have increasingly utilized adjunct labor, whether full-time or part-time, simply to save money, giving them core undergraduate courses to teach (e.g., introductory math, or freshman-level English composition). Due to the much lower salaries of adjunct faculty, many American universities have significantly reduced their hiring of tenure-track (i.e., full-time, career) professors, in favor of recruiting more adjuncts as part-time, contract/temporary workers. As of 2007, such "contingent faculty" (non-tenure-track faculty) made up more than half of all faculty positions in the United States.^[14] Some college English departments are now staffed by a majority of adjunct educators, instead of tenure-track professors. A 2014 Congressional review found that although only "an estimated 18.5 percent of college professors worked as part-time faculty members" in 1969, as of 2011 contingent faculty made up "75.5 percent of the college teaching workforce, or more than 1.3 million people."^[15] In 2014, a national news story described the situation of adjuncts as "Juggling multiple part-time jobs, earning little-to-no benefits, depending on public assistance: This is the financial reality for many adjunct professors across the nation."^[16]

Various problems result from this turn to economic expediency by university administrators: a decline in the quality of instruction (because adjuncts are not funded to maintain their expertise); a decline in student-faculty interaction (adjuncts are not usually on a campus before or after the classes they teach); a decline in university identity (adjuncts are rarely loyal to the institutions that employ them); a general reduction in the amount of research produced by the overall faculty; departmental administration duties spread among an ever-decreasing number of full-time faculty; less resources for faculty participation in campus governance; and a reduction in academic freedom, due to adjuncts' generally precarious job security. It has also raised the competition among PhDs, especially in the humanities, to find tenure-track assistant professorships (see above); many of them are unable to do so, raising ethical questions about the universities which produced and continue to produce these underemployed academics.

Though adjuncts hold at least a master's degree, if not a PhD, the salary for these positions is relatively low. Many adjuncts must work at several schools at once in order to earn a living in academia. Adjunct pay in state and community colleges varies; however, it can be as little as US$1,400 for a 3-credit hour lecture-based course. At many private institutions on the East Coast, payment for a 3-credit hour course hovers around US$3,000–4,000, with average pay nationwide as of 2014 estimated at around US$2,000–3,000.^[17] By contrast, tenure-track faculty at many major universities often only teach two or three 3-credit-hour courses per semester, while earning vastly higher salaries. (However, at many institutions, tenure-track faculty are also typically required to produce a wide array of research; represent the school by attending academic conferences and presenting their research; mentor and supervise graduate students; obtain grants and other funding for the school; perform administrative duties; and other responsibilities that adjunct faculty do not have.)

English professor William Pannapacker notes that adjunct faculty often earn less than minimum wage, when factoring in hours spent on classroom teaching, lesson preparation, office hours, grading of assignments, and other duties.^[18] One former adjunct in a dual-income family commented: "In the early years of my daughter’s life, I was really only covering childcare, which meant that the return on labor made my work essentially charity work."^[19] A.G. Monaco, head of human resources for the University of Akron, has declared that "Walmart is a more honest employer of part-time employees than are most colleges and universities."^[20] Economist Thomas Sowell has placed some of the blame for the increasing number of adjuncts on tenured professors who use "temporary 'gypsy faculty' who teach introductory courses that the academic stars consider too boring to teach." ^[21]

It is commonly thought that if the university makes a good faith offer to an adjunct faculty member of teaching during the following semester (depending on enrollment levels), the adjunct—generally—is rendered unable to file for unemployment benefits during inter-semester breaks. However, this situation varies from state-to-state. In California, as a result of the 1989 Cervisi decision, adjunct faculty who do not have "reasonable assurance" of returning to work, can receive unemployment compensation during breaks in employment. Virtually all appointment offers to adjunct faculty are contingent upon meeting minimum enrollment and departmental funding levels, or, continuation of the academic program under which they have been teaching. The 1989 Cervisi decision confirmed that such contingent offers do not constitute "reasonable assurance" of re-employment, as defined in state unemployment code.

Adjunct faculty have remained with the same employer for as long as 25 years without receiving health insurance or retirement benefits.^[22] In 2014, a homeless female professor conducted a protest on the steps of the New York State Education Department Building.^[23]

Groups supporting the efforts of adjuncts to organize for improved wages and working conditions include the Service Employees International Union, the United Steelworkers, and the New Faculty Majority Foundation.^[17][24][25]

Unionization efforts

Increasingly, non-tenure-track faculty are turning to unions, including the American Federation of Teachers, the Service Employees International Union, and United Autoworkers, to improve their wages and working conditions.^[6] Adjunct faculty have successfully pushed for contracts at American University, Georgetown University, George Washington University, Howard University, Montgomery College, and Trinity Washington University.^[6] At other colleges and universities, such as Boston University, Lesley University, Northeastern University, and Tufts University, adjuncts have voted to unionize.^[26]

References