<p>Why didn’t the family intervene? What did the union do before her end? And why did she fear social services? We won’t get these answers.</p>
<p>Xiggi, my issue is when a gauntlet is flung down. When words and style seemingly point to only one “inevitable conclusion.”
…</p>
<p>Adjuncts are not full time profs. They are contract labor. I value them. I’ve had brilliant classes from them in business, engineering and the arts. DH’s school uses them for classes they want to offer, where the class augments, but where there is no need for a full time hire. And they pay more than 2k, sometimes much more. At a level, there are part-timer benefits and a voice in faculty matters.</p>
<p>Just on Friday I met an 80-year-old still teaching. He clearly loves it, and has been at the same college for the past 20 years. He told me all the great things about his school, the fact it had no large lecture halls so all the class had to be small, etc. I don’t know if he’s adjunct or full time, but clearly it is something he enjoys.</p>
<p>I agree that there seem to be some missing pieces to this story, but the larger issue is still worth discussing.</p>
<p>To me, there are two problems here. I do find it disgraceful that many universities - many of whom somehow seem to be able to come up with money for high administrative salaries and state of the art facilities - don’t compensate adjuncts reasonably. This is true in the case of the adjunct being paid paltry sums to teach one course, and it is true in the case of the adjunct who teaches 5 courses but is still paid per course as a way to avoid creating a full time position with benefits and a yearly salary. </p>
<p>HOWEVER, the reason universities can get away with doing this is because too many PhDs, especially in the humanities, have an academia or bust mentality and won’t consider leaving the field when it becomes evident that the stable(ish) academic job isn’t forthcoming. I know that a PhD is hardly a ticket to great non-academic employment either, but I have to believe that within a few years of graduation, a highly educated person would at least have a good shot at securing a job that offered benefits and a living wage. High-school teaching is one obvious option, but if the alternative is a salary level that qualifies you for welfare and/or food stamps, even doing a one year course in something like medical billing and getting a job in that field would be preferable. An adjunct position is something you should take while you are looking for a job, not the permanent job itself. </p>
<p>I may well adjunct during my final year in graduate school if I can’t get enough teaching at my home institution to keep my stipend (most people in my program stay at least one year past the point at which the stipend is guaranteed). But if I don’t get an academic job by a certain point in that final year, I’m going to begin applying for non-academic jobs as well. I wish more people would do the same.</p>
<p>*please note that Miss Vojtko was the beloved aunt of six nieces and nephews. *</p>
<p>Well, if many of us had a beloved aunt, she wouldn’t die in abject poverty. One of us would have taken her in…even if it had to be on a rotation basis. At a minimum, we would have provided her food and basics. How do you let a beloved anything live impoverished?</p>
<p>Even if a PHD holder would want to teach at the HS level (and most won’t because of the reputation for unruliness on the part of students and excessive paperwork on the part of administration), a PhD in and of itself doesn’t qualify anyone for teaching at the HS level. Moving into K-12 education means that the instructor has to go through a whole bunch of hoops for the state board of ed, and at age 58 (if that is when she began her career) this woman would have had very little time to get through those hoops, get a job, and build up any kind of retirement money. That is if she could have found a school district to hire her as a new teacher at age 58 - those jobs probably would have gone to other beginning teachers who were less than half her age.</p>
<p>I have examined the K-12 certification issue myself, and have opted to take the night-school adjunct instructor route instead. My students are adults who want to be in class. Yes there is paperwork, but nothing like my colleagues who work in K-12. And my salary is lousy, but it is better than nothing, and I don’t have to spend any of my hard-earned money on getting certified in my state.</p>
<p>^ All fair, happymomofone, but presumably, you aren’t impoverished, and have the luxury of following your preference.</p>
<p>Private schools frequently hire without certification. Even if someone needs to go through the hoops of getting public certification, I don’t see why a person can’t adjunct while taking classes toward a K-12 teaching license (or any other practical qualification), rather than adjuncting while waiting for the tenure-track job that may never be coming. </p>
<p>Of course, this depends on making this choice well before the age of 58. Without knowing more about this woman’s circumstances, I don’t know why she was in this position.</p>
<p>Oh, I entirely agree! Adjuncting while studying something else can make perfect sense. However if this woman’s career began at 58, she may well have made a rational choice between pursuing K-12 certification at that age, and taking an adjunct position that was more to her liking. At that age she surely knew that there never would be a tenure-track position for her anyway. If she wanted to work in a university environment, her only real option would have been to take an adjunct position.</p>
<p>Well, whatever anyone thinks of the merits of the case, or of the personal choice people make to work for so little, you all should be down on your knees thanking them, as they’re keeping your college tuition bills down. Just imagine if you had to cover real salaries with actual benefits.</p>
<p>I don’t believe that adjuncts are making noble, personal sacrifices solely to benefit my child. I don’t thank people for doing the job they are paid to do. I also have never once in my life asked someone to give up their day job to be an adjunct professor to teach my children.</p>
<p>I appreciate it when people who are established in their careers choose to teach the next generation and don’t demand a ton of money to do it. </p>
<p>I don’t see anybody thanking me for my sacrifice of working long, grueling hours at a Fortune 500 company to produce & deliver products people need.</p>
<p>I get personal satisfaction from what I do and derive my joy from doing excellent work which is acknowledged by the millions who use my company’s products.</p>
<p>Dare I say it that I believe that most adjunct professors chose to do the job because they get some kind of financial, intellectual or emotional satisfaction from it and that there is not one iota of personal sacrifice on behalf of my kids.</p>
<p>Personal satisfaction versus personal sacrifice. </p>
<p>If people are so altruistic as to make lifelong personal financial sacrifices for my children which are unknown to them, I say please stop. I’ll take care of my own kids and don’t owe anybody a thank you or a dime. I’ll also say that what you are doing is pretty creepy.</p>
<p>Adjuncting is a great part-time, mom job. The people who are trying to live off of being an adjunct are running in circles working at three or four different colleges, which is possible in this region. However, it takes a year or two to figure out that it is not something to do long-term.</p>
<p>What the hell does production at a " fortune 500 company" have to do with anything?
Are you that if someone doesn’t have a job that can afford to pay benefits, that they just should find another job?</p>
<p>Totally missed my point. I’m not adjuncting for the good of the world, though it is a worthwhile job.</p>
<p>I’m simply pointing out that if this system changed, you’d pay. A lot more. So appreciate the fact that this system, which is transient, unregulated and solely existing for the bottom line, may or may not be the best system of higher education, but you benefit economically.</p>
<p>Unless your kid goes to a school with no adjuncts (rare), that’s just a fact. So everyone saying “well, that’s your choice” better be glad someone’s making that choice or you’d be paying a lot more.</p>
<p>There’s a sense of entitlement among those of u who argue that by virtue of being smart enough, and by simply having invested the time to achieve it, PhD’s should be well-compensated. </p>
<p>I notice the article doesn’t mention what subject she was teaching.</p>
<p>Again–these are the folks your kids’ colleges have decided are competent to teach them. If that’s not what your tuition dollars are going to, what are they paying for?</p>
<p>FWIW, I had a great uncle who was an emeritus prof, through his 90s at our flagship U, teaching economics and playing doubles tennis. He did it because he loved it, NOT for $$$. One of my board members is a prof at that same U in his late 70s, still teaching, writing books and articles. I don’t believe we have any mandatory retirement age.</p>
<p>This is exactly the sort of case where social services should fill a need, come assess and determine. The author called them. He writes poignantly that she begged him to call them off. Then what? </p>
<p>This seems a chance to take another shot at the U. In our culture, we pick our heroes and our villains. Big Bad U.</p>