<p>I used to think this trend was unsustainable, but now, who knows?</p>
<p><a href="http://www.startribune.com/local/253061741.html">http://www.startribune.com/local/253061741.html</a></p>
<p>$2700 for a three credit course?!?! That’s a small fraction of what our GSIs get paid! </p>
<p>I’ve looked into teaching a few courses on the side…the only places that I found that paid enough to even make me think about it for more than a second were online courses at for-profit universities. </p>
<p>Yeah, I’m a graduate student and I get paid more than that to teach lab sections.</p>
<p>And yes, it’s clear that the main burden is on administrators here. They do it to save money. Honestly, a lot of people complain about older faculty who don’t retire, but sometimes the reason older faculty hold onto their positions is because they know that the administration won’t replace them with another tenure-track faculty member. Sometimes they try to give as much to the college and students as possible; other times, they stay on so they can try to negotiate a TT replacement for them when they hire. But administrators would rather hire an adjunct or two to teach their classes. Adjuncts don’t get benefits; they don’t even get offices, and they’re low-paid, leaving more money to go into the administrators’ pockets (or build unnecessary stadia and new centers of whatever).</p>
<p>And, as you can see, it’s not just regional state campuses and smaller unknown schools. Macalester is mentioned in the article. My very prestigious, very expensive private university hires adjuncts and graduate students to teach some core classes, including our well-known core curriculum. (Our adjuncts usually hold full-time appointments elsewhere, though, and teach a class for the love of it, which is very different than putting together some to feed yourself.)</p>
<p>What I don’t understand, though, is why they continue to do it. I’m about to finish my PhD and I do intend to pursue an academic career - but I’ve also done corporate non-academic internships and experiences in grad school precisely so that if that doesn’t pan out, I can do something else. Cobbling together $36,000 for teaching 6 classes per semester, with no office, no benefits, and freeway flying between different campuses, is no way to live - much less raise a family.</p>
<p>When I read these articles, none of the adjuncts profiled ever say that they spent months or years looking for other kinds of employment and that they were unable to find anything else to do. I would never say this about low-wage workers - a lot of people who take on low-paid work at McDonald’s or Wal-Mart don’t have a choice. But highly-educated adjunct instructors? I have a suspicion that they do, and it baffles me why they would choose to do this instead. I mean, the woman in the article has presumably been doing this since 1994. 20 years of terrible pay?</p>
<p>She probably should go get a teaching certificate and teach high school history. She would make more money and have benefits. </p>
<p>I was asked to teach a 16 week 3 hour night class across town in rush hour teaching an advanced class to doctoral students. While I wasn’t doing it for the money I simply couldn’t justify it for what they were offering. </p>
<p>I was offered the chance to teach a course at a regional off campus site many years ago. I declined because the drive was about 45 minutes from my home, and it was a night class for three hours as well. The money just wasn’t worth the time.</p>
<p>I will say, my husband had adjuncts at the community college,and he said they were amongst the best teachers he had because they were actually working IN his field. </p>
<p>Adjunct pay at the community college level is even worse.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>The article mentioned adjunct pay of $18,000 to $30,000 per year for a full time teaching schedule.</p>
<p>For comparison, the pay for a TA at the University of Minnesota (where the example adjunct did her PhD study) is $26,644 to $41,514 for full time over 9 months ($35,527 to $55,351 for full time for the year including summer). Using a more typical half time teaching load for PhD students, that would be $13,322 to $20,757 over 9 months or $17,763 to $27,675 over the year. I.e. adjunct pay is probably worse than what PhD students are paid to be TAs.</p>
<p><a href=“Home | University of Minnesota Office of Human Resources”>Home | University of Minnesota Office of Human Resources;
<p>
</p>
<p>You’re an exception to the rule, especially compared with earlier cohorts of grad students in seeking corporate non-academic internships. </p>
<p>Most folks I knew who went onto the PhD track in non-professionally oriented fields…especially humanities, social sciences, and some natural science fields tend to be socialized by their advisors, Profs, and fellow grad students in their department that the only acceptable path is teaching in academia…preferably a t-t position at a research university. Also, it’s easy in such environments to have one’s entire identity wrapped up in being a grad student/budding university/college Prof/instructor. </p>
<p>Going off to teach high school or worse, to corporate America is viewed as one “having failed” or in the latter case, “selling out”. Lost count of how many times I’ve heard the same accounts on this theme from grad students/PhD graduates…including some former instructors who managed to ignore all that noise and now are working outside academia. Even the latter group admits this transition can be difficult…especially if one went straight into grad school from undergrad with little-no work experience. </p>
<p>Many TAs also get benefits with their TA position. Adjuncts get nada!</p>
<p>Adjunct here! Hi!!! I teach four courses a semester, divided between two schools. I make about 27000 per year. I left a full time 12 month job for this. Why? summers off, much longer summers than my HS teacher H has, plus public school teaching has become a nightmare–I don’t deal with the universal contempt that H does, also I hated the office environment of the admin position, and I like students. Yes, I am exploited. Yes, I am underpaid for what I do. But I do work in supportive programs. Luckily my H has benefits.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Purely anecdotal here, but I never got that at all. When I left academia for a corporate research position, many of my peers and even one or two of the tenured junior faculty members were VERY interested in how I made the transition from academic to applied social science as a possibility for themselves. Maybe because it was in the middle of a recession and I left for a starting salary that was higher than that of tenured faculty members with many more years of experience than I had at the time. If anything, the focus on careers in applied social sciences has increased in the decades since, and I’ve often been asked to serve on committees and run seminars in applied sociology or serve as a resource for graduate students who looking beyond academia in terms of future careers. </p>
<p>
That is complete and utter Bullhockey. People have great respect for those who choose to go into education. The world is not made up of all these negative creatures with negative attitudes, cobrat. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Only if by education…you mean teaching higher education. </p>
<p>K-12, not so much…especially considering the amount of disrespect and snobbing I’ve seen and heard grad students from Arts & Science and professional schools heap towards their ed-school counterparts. </p>
<p>Still, if you had read my post more carefully, you’d notice it’s still considered more respectable than going off to the corporate world. </p>
<p>Oh please. There are folks who enter teaching as a second career…some coming out of corporate America. </p>
<p>And there are educators from all levels who enter into corporate positions.</p>
<p>Nothing shameful about these options at all.</p>
<p>
It depends on WHY they are choosing that route. I have been an adjunct off and on for 18 years. I have raised 2 kids and finished a Master’s degree and a PhD in that time. I have summers off, a long break in December/January, spring break, and can say no to any teaching offer. I don’t spend my days in a cubicle farm and I don’t miss that. I’m able to work around my health issues. My current position even has some benefits (a first!). The money’s not great, but the alternatives are even less inviting.</p>
<p>UCB, I’m sorry- I have no idea what you’re talking about.
The article said the adjunct gets paid an average of $2700 for a 3 credit class. At U of M, a grad student GSI-ing for a 3 credit class, generally a .5 employment, gets $9,300 + tuition + health insurance. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Which is what I said… </p>
<p>I wish I remember where I found it, but during the most intense period of anxiety and research over college options for D2 last year, I managed to track down percentages of tenured vs non-tenured faculty for all of her colleges. I put them in our tracking spreadsheet – like I said, can’t recall the source, but here are some examples. This is % tenure track/%non-tenure track instructors.</p>
<p>Carleton - 65% tenured/35% not
U of Chicago - 40% /60% (this is the one that really struck me)
Harvey Mudd - 81% /19%
Kenyon - 85%/15%
Lawrence - 59%/41%
Macalester - 61%/39%
Mount Holyoke - 56%/44%
Swarthmore - 71%/29%</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Was just putting down some numbers for people to compare. Not disagreeing with what you wrote.</p>
<p>To add another variable, there may also be non-tenure-track faculty who are regular continuing employees, not adjuncts, at least at some schools.</p>