When Should/Can An Adjunct Speak Out?

[mahagonny]

I am conflicted. I say never, but mahagonny says anytime.

Second question: what does  this (answer to #1) do to you, your life, your self image, your identity, your relationships?

One answer that's easy is, in our current political climate of everyone fighting, the questions are more urgent than ever.

Good piece: https://quillette.com/2020/10/08/for-some-adjunct-professors-its-speak-your-mind-versus-keep-your-job/

The crux of it is this:

"The tenuousness of the adjunct's contractual claim against the university and her frequent invisibility to peers create persistent risk of violations of academic freedom. The adjunct professor's supervisor can simply decide not to renew the adjunct contract because, in that supervisor's opinion, the course is not needed or can be taught better by another... Thus, it is easy for the supervisor to dump someone who criticized a colleague's work in class or argued for social policy against the interests of a school benefactor. Even when this discretion is exercised with appropriate regard for the values of academic freedom, as no doubt it generally is, the structure itself ex ante will encourage faculty to avoid controversy."

I would go even further into the argument. STFU'ing is often not enough to insure your survival, so it pays to actively align yourself politically with the people who decide how much work they're going to dole out your way, next term, with certain supervisors.

on edit: I could have placed this thread opener in 'Teaching' or 'General Academic Discussion' but it is also pertinent to the State of Higher Ed because we are supposed to be working in an environment with a diversity of views. Therefore, if 3/4 of the faculty feel the need to STFU most all of the time, it affects everybody. By not affecting them.

[polly_mer]

What is the question in one sentence?

Is it:

* Should a professional speak within that professional's expertise regarding the safety of working conditions or ability to do the job to an acceptable level, even if it means losing the next term assignment?  The ethics board in my professions would state a firm yes.  The obligation of a professional is to ensure that the work can be done within the resources available or to turn down the contract as being unacceptable.

* Should a loosely affiliated, very limited term contract person speak outside their direct expertise in an effort to redirect the institutional long-term planning?  No, not unless that's part of their duties as assigned in the specific contract.  If the working conditions are unacceptable, then the limited term person should let the term expire and seek other work.

* Should someone choose against their conscience to remain at a given place of employment?  No, not in modern US by college educated people.  While some human settlements at some points in human history have had the only real options be die on the spot or fake it to remain alive, that's not the current state of the US and anyone who truly believes that at this moment needs to stop consuming so much social media and get out into the fresh air.  A graduate-degreed person may not like their next job, but outside of academia is a different political atmosphere than inside academia.  One way I know that's true is how the general vote was about 50% against Trump and about 50% for Trump.  If everyone were on the Most Woke Olympics Team as is true in some parts of academia, then Trump would have have within rounding of zero votes.

[Caracal]

The tricky part is that there is no clear way to separate out questions of academic freedom from questions of teaching effectiveness. On the far extremes, it is easy enough, but its the middle that gets messy.

I think most of us could agree that a math professor who incorporated extensive discussions of whether transgender rights should be respected into his classes and then faced student complaints isn't doing a very good job. If students complain and he doesn't get offered courses the next semester, that isn't a violation of academic freedom. Presumably the chair just decided that he'd like to have the students learn more statistics and spend less time getting offended by things that have little to do with the course.

On the other extreme, I commonly assign 19th century pieces arguing that racial slavery is the best possible way to organize a society. These don't come out of the blue, they are in the context of classes exploring historical issues of the time period. I've never had any complaints, students understand the value of reading this stuff.

The problem is that between those poles is a huge range of things that are less clear. Usually when one of these cases comes up involving a professor saying something in class, the details make me question the person's professional and personal judgement. I'm not a big fan of deliberately provocative teaching, and I think people often end up in these situations because they don't create an environment in which students think they can come talk about concerns.

I used to assign a contemporary "controversial" opinion piece involving issues of sexual assault. I think the article is pretty awful and offensive, but the particular ways it is awful and offensive really did intersect with class themes in interesting ways that often provoked some good discussions. I had a few useful and interesting discussions with students who didn't think it was a good idea for me to assign the article. They weren't threatening to escalate, they just had some strong and reasonable ideas about why they thought assigning the article was a mistake.. I had some good and very respectful discussions about the trade offs involved. I'd like to think this involved smart and pleasant conversations with students about tricky issues rather than meetings with the dean because I managed to create an environment in which students believed I was receptive to their concerns and ideas.

However, not all students are acting in good faith and there's always the possibility for misunderstandings and bad actors when you teach a bunch of classes with a lot of students. This semester I had to forward a few emails to my chair from a student who was convinced that I was giving them bad grades because I didn't like her politics. I doubt anything will come of it, but I wanted to get out ahead of things in case the chair or dean gets an email at the end of the semester from this person.

I might have done that regardless of my status, but the problem with being an adjunct is that you don't even have to be fired. That means there isn't even any formalized process of evaluation, which is really the issue.

[dinomom]

I work in a department with a lot of adjuncts and NTT faculty on continuing contracts. Lately it has become a huge problem that these people won't speak up, but also they won't speak up because of fear of retaliation. I'm not sure what the prescriptive is, here, and most of this speaking up or lack thereof is around curriculum, which is an area in which most of these people have a right to weigh in. I guess my answer is that it depends a lot on department culture. I know departments on my campus where input from lecturers is highly valued and counted on, but I also know departments where even continuing lecturers don't attend meetings.

[Sun_Worshiper]

What kind of speaking out are you talking about here? You mean speaking out about the treatment of adjuncts in the academy, or speaking out about race or some other controversial social topic? Do you mean speaking out in the classroom, in faculty meetings, or in the public sphere?

In any case, you don't have real academic freedom without tenure (even as an assistant I stfu unless I feel strongly), so you take some risk by speaking out. Whether it is worth risking your adjunct position is a question for each individual. I tend to agree with Polly that you should not stick with an adjunct position in which you feel stifled, since the pay and benefits are so lousy, but that's again up to each individual to decide.

[mahagonny]

What kind of speaking out are you talking about here? You mean speaking out about the treatment of adjuncts in the academy, or speaking out about race or some other controversial social topic? Do you mean speaking out in the classroom, in faculty meetings, or in the public sphere?

Good question, thank you.
Any and all. But I should have explained: I'm interested in hearing from current adjunct faculty who are not on the tenure track. And most definitely not administrators or former administrators. IOW, not when/if other people think we should feel it's OK, not OK, or both OK and necessary, to speak out. This is hoped to be an inquiry into how current, not former, adjunct faculty think and feel at the workplace and beyond. What our day to day experience is. Whereas the value to those not specifically invited to participate is to be a fly on the wall. 'You can observe a lot by watching.' (Thanks, Yogi).

[Caracal]

I work in a department with a lot of adjuncts and NTT faculty on continuing contracts. Lately it has become a huge problem that these people won't speak up, but also they won't speak up because of fear of retaliation. I'm not sure what the prescriptive is, here, and most of this speaking up or lack thereof is around curriculum, which is an area in which most of these people have a right to weigh in. I guess my answer is that it depends a lot on department culture. I know departments on my campus where input from lecturers is highly valued and counted on, but I also know departments where even continuing lecturers don't attend meetings.

I can't say I have any desire to attend department meetings as an adjunct. I'm being paid by the course. I'm not being paid to go to meetings or participate in discussions about curriculum.  If the department wanted me to do those things, they would need to give me a salaried position.

[Larimar]

I can't say I have any desire to attend department meetings as an adjunct. I'm being paid by the course. I'm not being paid to go to meetings or participate in discussions about curriculum.  If the department wanted me to do those things, they would need to give me a salaried position.

+1. I do enough unpaid trainings and class prep to make me not want to volunteer for more.


Larimar

[downer]

I can't say I have any desire to attend department meetings as an adjunct. I'm being paid by the course. I'm not being paid to go to meetings or participate in discussions about curriculum.  If the department wanted me to do those things, they would need to give me a salaried position.

+1. I do enough unpaid trainings and class prep to make me not want to volunteer for more.


Larimar

Sometimes promotion for adjuncts either requires or is easier when adjunct faculty do some departmental service, such as participating in some department meetings.

[little bongo]

Downer describes the double-bind. Yes, sometimes it pays off for an adjunct to be visible in terms of service, and sometimes a department will look at their adjuncts when it comes time for a new TT hire.

And sometimes it doesn't.

My story as an adjunct was that I didn't have time to be the can-do kid at any of my part-time gigs, simply because I was usually on my way to another part-time gig. I had to luck into a full-time temporary spot to have the luxury of saying "yes" to various levels of service.

But as for "speaking out"? No, not so much.

[Ruralguy]

We have a promotion opportunity for long-time adjuncts. Service and research are not necessary for either the promotion or
keeping up the new title. Our T&P committee has debated on whether  this means one *may* take service and research into account.
It probably wouldn't hurt.

[mahagonny]

Some interesting answers thus far.
Common areas hangouts: do you ever walk in on a conversation about national politics in which your views would, let's just say, not blend with the mood in the room? Or, worse still, does that ever happen and then you hear what you consider to be an uninformed view that echoes around the room? What would you do, say hello politely and move on? Sometimes I feel like saying nothing when that happens. Because saying hello is like giving approval to their takeover of the common area. This happens to me at college A where common areas are truly common areas.

College B has a 'lounge' specifically for adjunct faculty but several of the full time faculty use it, for some reason. Well, it has computers in it, though they aren't maintained. Adjunct and tenure track hanging out together? Not that I know of. If I find full timers there I leave, because our department does not have a lot of love in it.

This doesn't have to be a discussion about how faculty designated as full time or administrators might ostracize you for your views, although that can happen. Adjunct faculty do it to each other too.

Social media: do you avoid co-workers, mingle with them if it happens by chance, or seek them out? That's another minefield, potentially. These days. Or an opportunity.

My experience as an adjunct has never involved preparing for a go at tenure track. We are already well qualified, and we continue to do more and more in our field, but how much you will be rehired and why is largely a guess. So social things loom large, especially in these times.

[mahagonny]

con't

It may well be that there are only a handful of adjuncts who read this forum.

[Caracal]

We have a promotion opportunity for long-time adjuncts. Service and research are not necessary for either the promotion or
keeping up the new title. Our T&P committee has debated on whether  this means one *may* take service and research into account.
It probably wouldn't hurt.

I try to be a good citizen and I've done things like speak to student groups or be a judge in high school competitions a colleague organized. If I was asked to give input or be part of a committee involving some aspect of teaching, I'd do it. However, I think there's something fairly icky about evaluating people on how much unpaid work they do. Research is a bit different.

[Caracal]

College B has a 'lounge' specifically for adjunct faculty but several of the full time faculty use it, for some reason. Well, it has computers in it, though they aren't maintained. Adjunct and tenure track hanging out together? Not that I know of. If I find full timers there I leave, because our department does not have a lot of love in it.

Fortunately, I've never had to deal with that kind of environment. I think the fact that I have an office that is mine on my teaching days makes a big difference. I'd consider the person two doors down from me a friend, and the relationship is mostly built on the kind of chatting that wouldn't really happen if we weren't office neighbors.