“There’s a lack of respect
for our training and for us as
colleagues,” says Sympson. “The
administration acts like adjuncts
are a dime a dozen.”
Sympson’s case is far from
unusual. Non-tenure-track
professors now represent more
than 70 percent of the aca-
demic workforce, according to
the American Association of
University Professors (AAUP).
As tenure-track jobs give way to
what some call higher education’s “adjunctification,” it isn’t
just adjuncts who are suffering.
The trend also has ramifications
for student learning, research and
even academic freedom.
SET UP TO FAIL
While many assume that economic factors are forcing schools
to use adjuncts, the contingent
workforce has grown fastest
during boom times, says AAUP.
Instead of investing in a tenured
workforce, AAUP says, schools
have invested in technology
and facilities. Noting the low
pay, long hours, long commutes,
instability and lack of bene-
fits, professional support and
opportunities for advancement,
a 2014 report by the U.S. House
of Representatives describes
adjuncts as “the working poor.”
What happens when students
are taught by professors strug-
gling to make a living? A 2014
review of the evidence by the
Council for Higher Education
Accreditation cites lower grad-
uation and retention rates and
decreased transfers from two-
year to four-year institutions.
Those outcomes aren’t the fault
of adjuncts but of the last-minute hiring decisions, lack of
office space and other supports
and other working conditions
adjuncts typically face.
That inability to perform
to their highest potential can
weigh heavily on adjuncts, says
Gretchen M. Reevy, PhD, a lecturer in psychology at California
State University, East Bay, who
credits her union for making
adjuncts like her some of the
country’s luckiest.
In a study of non-tenure-track
faculty, Reevy and co-author
Grace Deason, PhD, a University
of Wisconsin La Crosse assistant
psychology professor, found that
adjuncts most committed to their
school were more likely to suffer
stress, anxiety and depression
(Frontiers in Psychology, 2014).
Other risk factors included
low income, inability to find
permanent positions and coping
mechanisms rooted in denial or
giving up.
And being adjuncts renders
faculty less able to influence their
institutions’ administrations,
Career
usie Sympson, PhD, began her career as a grocery store
clerk. When an injury forced her to quit and she returned
to school, she began dreaming of getting a PhD and
becoming a professor. She achieved her goal, earning a
University of Kansas doctorate in clinical psychology
and becoming an academic. ¶ Her dream didn’t turn
out as expected, however. ¶ Sympson has been an adjunct psychology
professor at Johnson County Community College in Overland Park,
Kansas, for the last 11 years. With an annual salary of just $21,000 for
three classes a semester plus one in the summer, she hasn’t put a dent
in the principal of her $500-a-month student loan debt. And with such
low pay, saving anything for retirement has been impossible.
S
