New School and Parsons School of Design Adjunct Professors Go on Strike

[Parasaurolophus]

Sometimes the contract specifies the number of hours you're paid for, and that number equals the total number of classroom plus office hours.

My own is like that, in fact. But it generously adds eight hours a year of "professional development" which I have to submit a plan to claim at the beginning of the year, and then prove I used at the end. We're meant to use course prep and publications to justify it. :rolleyes:

(And no, I'm not an adjunct--but we don't have tenure, so we're not much more than adjuncts, either.)

[pondering]

https://twitter.com/TheNewSchool/status/1600305277244346368

Looks like the New School admin are turning the thumbscrews and laying off (or, more accurately - since these are mostly adjuncts - refusing to re-employ) the strikers. It will be interesting to see if this is a bluff, as it's hard to imagine how a university that relies on 90% part-time instructors can run an academic semester without them.

[Wahoo Redux]

Strike Ends at the New School and Parsons School of Design

[downer]

Strike Ends at the New School and Parsons School of Design

Excellent. Congrats to the strikers for their stamina and determinations, and their success. May it be an inspiration for other faculty.

[Langue_doc]

Strike Ends at the New School and Parsons School of Design

Excellent. Congrats to the strikers for their stamina and determinations, and their success. May it be an inspiration for other faculty.

I saw the news last night in the Gothamist and was happy to note that the parents were threatening to sue the school.

The workers began striking nearly a month ago, on Nov. 16, when contract negotiations stalled with the school. The action forced students to sit out of classes for the bulk of the fall semester, and many full-time faculty members joined the strike in solidarity.

Parents of the university's students threatened to sue the school for lost tuition while their kids were out of classes.

A teacher for the school, Marie-Helene Bertino, and Carey both said the pressure worked, and that the teachers got everything they asked for.

https://gothamist.com/news/new-school-teachers-strike-ends-as-nyc-university-agrees-to-first-pay-raises-in-4-years

[simpleSimon]

Part-time faculty members at the New School have agreed to end a grueling three-week strike over pay and benefits after reaching an agreement late Saturday with the university.

The sizable walkout had left the school at a near standstill. Classes were canceled because nearly 90 percent of the faculty is made up of untenured adjunct professors and lecturers. The school had also been facing a lawsuit from irate parents, who had threatened to withhold payment or force their children to transfer to other institutions. Some had called for the school's president, Dwight A. McBride, to resign.... https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/11/nyregion/new-school-nyc-adjunct-strike.html

This truly shocked me.  I never realized that any legitimate institution would operate with such a high number of adjuncts.  Aren't there any accreditation standards around the percentage of adjuncts a school may employ?  Isn't this the sort of thing the Middle States Commission on Higher Education should be policing... and/or the New York State Department of Education?

[dismalist]

Part-time faculty members at the New School have agreed to end a grueling three-week strike over pay and benefits after reaching an agreement late Saturday with the university.

The sizable walkout had left the school at a near standstill. Classes were canceled because nearly 90 percent of the faculty is made up of untenured adjunct professors and lecturers. The school had also been facing a lawsuit from irate parents, who had threatened to withhold payment or force their children to transfer to other institutions. Some had called for the school's president, Dwight A. McBride, to resign.... https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/11/nyregion/new-school-nyc-adjunct-strike.html

This truly shocked me.  I never realized that any legitimate institution would operate with such a high number of adjuncts.  Aren't there any accreditation standards around the percentage of adjuncts a school may employ?  Isn't this the sort of thing the Middle States Commission on Higher Education should be policing... and/or the New York State Department of Education?

Middle States requires quality. There is no law that adjuncts cannot provide quality. The New School got accredited only in 1960, but had built a reputation long before then. [I think they are crazy, by the way, but I want them to survive. It is on private money, after all.]

One objection to guild thinking is that the thinking hurts most of those it is intended to help because the thinking does not extend beyond the first step:

1. Reduce the number of adjuncts.
2. Raise tuition to hire more FT faculty [fewer than the number of former adjuncts, of course].
3. School shrinks. Fewer FT positions + adjuncts than former FT + adjuncts  left over.
4. Many adjuncts stay unemployed.

So, we have fewer employed, but at higher wages. For an adjunct, getting one of those FT jobs is like being sent to Vegas.

[simpleSimon]

Middle States requires quality. There is no law that adjuncts cannot provide quality. The New School got accredited only in 1960, but had built a reputation long before then. [I think they are crazy, by the way, but I want them to survive. It is on private money, after all.]

One objection to guild thinking is that the thinking hurts most of those it is intended to help because the thinking does not extend beyond the first step:

1. Reduce the number of adjuncts.
2. Raise tuition to hire more FT faculty [fewer than the number of former adjuncts, of course].
3. School shrinks. Fewer FT positions + adjuncts than former FT + adjuncts  left over.
4. Many adjuncts stay unemployed.

So, we have fewer employed, but at higher wages. For an adjunct, getting one of those FT jobs is like being sent to Vegas.

Just my opinion, but I do not believe you can provide the level of quality a reasonable person would want with 90% adjuncts.  If the teachers are fly by night, temporary, disposable employees with little voice in how the institution operates those are huge red flags (for me).  If the institution is not invested in full time instructors why would those same instructors be invested in the vital work of research and service on behalf of the institution?  When faculty are here this semester and gone the next then they cannot invest in each other... invest in students... write letters for students... leverage professional contacts for students... help to raise money for the institution, etc.  Does this really need to be explained?  I recall reading in another thread that many adjuncts barely know other faculty in their own department much less other departments.  So much for collaboration.

I find it curious that you would point to increasing tuition as the way to hire more faculty.  As the New School is already at the top of the tuition ladder raising fees is clearly not the answer.  It has been widely reported that many universities saw fundraising spike during the pandemic.  I confess I haven't taken the time to view the roster of Board members at the New School, but we all know it's in NYC and if you can't raise money there then you have the wrong Board members and development officers in place.  I am far from a development officer and over the last 10 years I've raised more than $10 million dollars in support of academic programs.  If I can do that with virtually no formal training in fundraising, imagine what a few pros can do?  The board members at my school routinely throw in $10 or 20 million every few years... so why isn't the New School able to raise the kind of money it would take to hire more full time faculty?  They need to hire more full time faculty and raise the money in order to do so.  Period.

[dismalist]

Middle States requires quality. There is no law that adjuncts cannot provide quality. The New School got accredited only in 1960, but had built a reputation long before then. [I think they are crazy, by the way, but I want them to survive. It is on private money, after all.]

One objection to guild thinking is that the thinking hurts most of those it is intended to help because the thinking does not extend beyond the first step:

1. Reduce the number of adjuncts.
2. Raise tuition to hire more FT faculty [fewer than the number of former adjuncts, of course].
3. School shrinks. Fewer FT positions + adjuncts than former FT + adjuncts  left over.
4. Many adjuncts stay unemployed.

So, we have fewer employed, but at higher wages. For an adjunct, getting one of those FT jobs is like being sent to Vegas.

Just my opinion, but I do not believe you can provide the level of quality a reasonable person would want with 90% adjuncts.  If the teachers are fly by night, temporary, disposable employees with little voice in how the institution operates those are huge red flags (for me).  If the institution is not invested in full time instructors why would those same instructors be invested in the vital work of research and service on behalf of the institution?  When faculty are here this semester and gone the next then they cannot invest in each other... invest in students... write letters for students... leverage professional contacts for students... help to raise money for the institution, etc.  Does this really need to be explained?  I recall reading in another thread that many adjuncts barely know other faculty in their own department much less other departments.  So much for collaboration.

I find it curious that you would point to increasing tuition as the way to hire more faculty.  As the New School is already at the top of the tuition ladder raising fees is clearly not the answer.  It has been widely reported that many universities saw fundraising spike during the pandemic.  I confess I haven't taken the time to view the roster of Board members at the New School, but we all know it's in NYC and if you can't raise money there then you have the wrong Board members and development officers in place.  I am far from a development officer and over the last 10 years I've raised more than $10 million dollars in support of academic programs.  If I can do that with virtually no formal training in fundraising, imagine what a few pros can do?  The board members at my school routinely throw in $10 or 20 million every few years... so why isn't the New School able to raise the kind of money it would take to hire more full time faculty?  They need to hire more full time faculty and raise the money in order to do so.  Period.

As I said, The New School has created a reputation for itself. Customers know what they're getting.

Fundraising? It's not about fundraising, it's about additional fundraising. If there were leeway there, it must be true that the school is currently doing a poor job of fundraising! There is no reason to believe that.

But the idea of extra fundraising is illustrative of another fallacy beside "the consider only the first step fallacy": It's the money grows on trees fallacy.

[Langue_doc]

Students are now demanding "A"s for all their courses.

https://jonathanturley.org/2022/12/17/a-is-for-audacity-new-school-students-demand-as-for-all-courses-regardless-of-attendance-after-protests/

[Wahoo Redux]

Middle States requires quality. There is no law that adjuncts cannot provide quality. The New School got accredited only in 1960, but had built a reputation long before then. [I think they are crazy, by the way, but I want them to survive. It is on private money, after all.]

One objection to guild thinking is that the thinking hurts most of those it is intended to help because the thinking does not extend beyond the first step:

1. Reduce the number of adjuncts.
2. Raise tuition to hire more FT faculty [fewer than the number of former adjuncts, of course].
3. School shrinks. Fewer FT positions + adjuncts than former FT + adjuncts  left over.
4. Many adjuncts stay unemployed.

So, we have fewer employed, but at higher wages. For an adjunct, getting one of those FT jobs is like being sent to Vegas.

Just my opinion, but I do not believe you can provide the level of quality a reasonable person would want with 90% adjuncts.  If the teachers are fly by night, temporary, disposable employees with little voice in how the institution operates those are huge red flags (for me).  If the institution is not invested in full time instructors why would those same instructors be invested in the vital work of research and service on behalf of the institution?  When faculty are here this semester and gone the next then they cannot invest in each other... invest in students... write letters for students... leverage professional contacts for students... help to raise money for the institution, etc.  Does this really need to be explained?  I recall reading in another thread that many adjuncts barely know other faculty in their own department much less other departments.  So much for collaboration.

I find it curious that you would point to increasing tuition as the way to hire more faculty.  As the New School is already at the top of the tuition ladder raising fees is clearly not the answer.  It has been widely reported that many universities saw fundraising spike during the pandemic.  I confess I haven't taken the time to view the roster of Board members at the New School, but we all know it's in NYC and if you can't raise money there then you have the wrong Board members and development officers in place.  I am far from a development officer and over the last 10 years I've raised more than $10 million dollars in support of academic programs.  If I can do that with virtually no formal training in fundraising, imagine what a few pros can do?  The board members at my school routinely throw in $10 or 20 million every few years... so why isn't the New School able to raise the kind of money it would take to hire more full time faculty?  They need to hire more full time faculty and raise the money in order to do so.  Period.

As I said, The New School has created a reputation for itself. Customers know what they're getting.

Fundraising? It's not about fundraising, it's about additional fundraising. If there were leeway there, it must be true that the school is currently doing a poor job of fundraising! There is no reason to believe that.

But the idea of extra fundraising is illustrative of another fallacy beside "the consider only the first step fallacy": It's the money grows on trees fallacy.

I started that thread about knowing one's adjunct colleagues.  I also think the various anecdotes about empty floors and departments is partly because of the Internet, but it is also a result of fly-by-night instructors who only teach a class or two and then are gone.  Sometimes it seems that we no longer have departments, just independent contractors.

It seems to me that higher ed is really failing on many fronts, the adjunct army in particular.  And, as Big-D points out, there is no real fix for it.  America has the wealth (look at how much the new B-21 stealth bomber costs), it just wants to lowball education and then blame colleges for the rising costs of doing business. 

Time to let the weak parts collapse and then rebuild with something cheaper and less worthwhile.

[marshwiggle]

Time to let the weak parts collapse and then rebuild with something cheaper and less worthwhile.

At least some of the rebuilding is bound to be better than the weak parts that collapse.

[Wahoo Redux]

Time to let the weak parts collapse and then rebuild with something cheaper and less worthwhile.

At least some of the rebuilding is bound to be better than the weak parts that collapse.

Actually, many of the "weak parts" are doing quite well in all criteria except for enrollment.  We will have trade schools or the equivalent instead of universities, and perhaps that is for the best.

[marshwiggle]

Time to let the weak parts collapse and then rebuild with something cheaper and less worthwhile.

At least some of the rebuilding is bound to be better than the weak parts that collapse.

Actually, many of the "weak parts" are doing quite well in all criteria except for enrollment.  We will have trade schools or the equivalent instead of universities, and perhaps that is for the best.

The patient is in great health, other than being dead.

[apl68]

Students are now demanding "A"s for all their courses.

https://jonathanturley.org/2022/12/17/a-is-for-audacity-new-school-students-demand-as-for-all-courses-regardless-of-attendance-after-protests/

Student activism lives!  I guess New School hasn't entirely lost touch with its roots after all.