The Adjunct and the Chancellor

by Lee Shainen

SOUND LIKE THE scenario for an educational drama a la “The
Odd Couple?” (Well, one of us can afford more expensive clothes.)
Nope, it’s just the two of us putting our heads together over
dinner to come up with a more equitable system of paying faculty
at community colleges. We figured that if we can find the
spot where the view from the top and the view from the bottom
converged, we might have something map-worthy.

Let’s start with the obvious: plenty of part-timers want
full-time jobs, or at least more pay and benefits. Certainly,
faculty unions have been arguing for the creation of more
full-time positions. But, here’s the deal: the pot isn’t going
to get significantly larger in the foreseeable future. So,
how can we make the best out of the resources we currently
have?

For starters, let’s get honest about what we’re paying for.
Starting with the classroom: students register for classes
with the expectation of receiving quality instruction, regardless
of who is teaching the class. They, and the taxpayers, are
paying for competent and trained instructors, and access to
them through office hours. There should be no difference between
the full-timer and the part-timer in this regard. They each
need the same amount of time to prepare for a class and should
be just as available to the student out of class. So, on a
pro rata basis, their instructional pay should be the same.

Now, here’s where it gets messy. The primary difference between
full-timers and part-timers is that the full-timers are expected
to participate in various college-wide and department functions.
How many do, though, and to what extent? Often it seems that
it is the same active minority of faculty doing a majority
of this work. Is this equitable?

Let’s face it: not everybody wants to serve on screening
committees or accreditation task forces. Fine. Don’t do it.
But, don’t expect to get paid for not doing it. Perhaps you
could teach more classes to keep up your standard of living.
Remember, there is only so much money in the kitty, and dividing
it up fairly is our objective here. We suspect that there
would be faculty who would be relieved to hear they had an
option regarding their out-of-classroom obligations.Many already
say they would rather just teach. Perhaps there are also those
who would like to teach less and participate more in governance,
at least from time to time. Having such flexibility could
be a win-win for everybody.

But consider, especially, what it might mean for the adjunct.
For numbers’ sake, say that the average full-timer at a community
college earns $40,000 per year and teaches fifteen credit
hours each semester. That’s fifteen hours in the classroom,
five for office hours, and, say, another five for preparation.
(The amounts would differ from discipline to discipline.)
That’s twenty-five hours a week of instructional pay. The
remaining fifteen hours are what is owed to the college for
various committee and governance processes. This is the part
of the pie where, theoretically, greater accountability is
possible.

Don’t forget, we’re recommending that adjuncts be paid the
same amount for instructional pay as full-timers, and that
money has to come from somewhere. So, using this formula,
we can say that roughly 60 percent of a full-timer’s salary,
or $24,000 per year, is for instructional pay. By this figuring,
on a pro rata basis, adjuncts should be receiving $800 per
credit hour, or $2,400 for a three-credit-hour class. That’s
a far cry better than the $500-$600 per credit hour tens of
thousands of part-timers are currently earning!

Of course, these numbers will vary from institution to institution,
but the principle is sound. The truth is, we both wish that
all faculty–full and part-time–could do what they most love
to do and make a decent living doing it. In even a slightly
more perfect world, education would be better funded and we
wouldn’t be here trying to figure out how to divvy up what
we’ve got.

“By the way, Bob, whose turn is it to pay for dinner?”

“I believe it’s yours, Lee.”

“Gee whiz! I’m only making more money in theory here.”

“Hey, fair is fair.”

“Oh, come on.”