The Adjunct Advocate

Manage my account

ARCHIVE: November 2007

November 30th 2007

The Untouchables of Academe

On the 20th of November, the New York Times ran a piece titled "Decline of Tenure Track Raises Concerns." In that piece, Keith Holler, an adjunct activist from Washington State, is quoted as describing adjuncts thusly, “It’s a caste system, and we are the untouchables of academia.”

Keith has written for Adjunct Advocate and we profiled Keith, as well, in our January/February 2007 issue. I have immense respect for the work Keith has done over the past years on behalf of the part-time faculty in his state, as well as part-time faculty throughout the United States. Google Keith's name, and you will come away with a long list of accomplishments.

In the New York Times piece, Keith's quote touches on something very troubling to me, the description of part-time faculty using the language of oppression. I have heard part-time faculty described as "slave labor" and "migrant workers." I realize these are attempts to make comparative analyses for people wholly unfamiliar with how higher education works. However, and I have said this many, many times, part-time faculty are women and men with graduate degrees, not slaves, migrant workers or untouchables. Part-time faculty are free to leave their jobs to pursue employment wherever they choose. Slaves, migrant workers and untouchables are victims of race, culture and, perhaps, even religion.

The college-educated women and men who teach part-time in the United States (only about 11 percent of Americans hold graduate degrees) are victims of their own choices.

Listen to my blog entry here.

Posted By Patricia L. at 3:33 PM

Comments

Add comment

November 15th 2007

Welcome

Welcome to Lesko blog, my new blog. Here, I'll have an opportunity to speak directly to our readers about publishing the Adjunct Advocate. I also want to listen, carefully, to your thoughts and opinions. Let me know what you think of Adjunct Advocate, what you like, what works and what doesn't. Let's dialogue about the magazine, its content, its writers and the role Adjunct Advocate plays in your professional life. And so, without further ado....

I just received my September issue of Folio. It's the magazine for magazine management, or so the masthead says. In that issue, the lead story is titled: "PRINT: NOT DEAD BUT NOT ENOUGH." This is either purely prophetic or a total load of composted horse manure. I'm still trying to decide.

In any case, two years ago, I decided to offer online access and PDF version subscriptions to the Adjunct Advocate. I also decided to index those sub. prices. I did this in response to The Chronicle of Higher Education which, at the time, I'd decided to subscribe to online. I ended up feeling royally irked by the fact that an online access subscription to The Chronicle was the same price ($82.50) as a print sub. I am all too aware that the cost of printing, paper and postage (the Three Ps of publishing) have risen dramatically, but I remember thinking that at least some of the savings realized by The Chronicle should be passed on to the customer. Crickey! I was saving them money on printing and postage, after all

I also indexed the prices of our electronic sub. types because I am very, very aware that, for some part-time faculty, $35 for a print subscription is more money than they can afford. So, today, about 15 percent of our subscribers read the magazine in electronic format. I expect that number to grow, as electronic delivery is very popular. I'm not quite sure where we'll level off in terms of the composition of our subscribers. Eventually, will 20 percent of our readers go electronic? 30 percent? 50 percent? My guess is that we'll reach the 30 percent level in another year or two.

If you're interested in an electronic access subscription to the Adjunct Advocate, check 'em out here. Oh yes, have a look at our e-newsletters, as well. They're free.

P.D. Lesko

Posted By Patricia L. at 3:55 PM