Category Archives: Higher Ed

April 14, 2014 · 3:43 pm

The Plight of the Adjuncts (Part 2): Maligned by the Media?

Hey, there! Before you go further, have you read my disclaimer? Just checking.

This is not what I had planned as Part 2 of my adjunct series, but this morning Anne Kress, President of Monroe Community College, tweeted about a recent NY Times Op-Ed piece:

anne kress tweet

Color me interested. So I looked up the piece she referenced. And she’s right: Ugh.

We do have a problem with adjunct faculty in colleges.  I think I already made that clear. But this is not the problem:

“The colleges expect little of these teachers. Not surprisingly, they often act accordingly. They spend significantly less time than full-time teachers preparing for class, advising students or giving written or oral feedback. And they are far less likely to participate in instructional activities — like tutoring, academic goal setting or developing community-based projects — that can benefit students.”

First of all, I don’t know which colleges the authors of this piece are referring to in that first line, but it’s not any college with which I am personally familiar. But in my ten years of experience in the community college system, I have found that adjuncts are expected to do a great deal.  I would go so far as to say that they are basically expected to everything their full-time counterparts do–and then some–with fewer resources, less time, and virtually no compensation.  With so many of our courses being taught by adjunct faculty, the responsibility for student success, persistence, retention, graduation rates (or whatever the popular metric du jour is), rests squarely on their overburdened, under- compensated shoulders.

Second, most of the adjuncts I know accept that responsibility willingly–not because they are compensated for anything beyond the time they spend in the classroom but because they actually care about our students and their learning.  To be perfectly blunt, the assertion that adjunct faculty spend less time “preparing for class, advising students or giving written or oral feedback” is a crock. I have to wonder, again, what adjuncts these writers have worked with, spoken to, or observed (oh, right, I don’t think they have; I think they just skimmed the new CCSSE report.).  I have only my own experience to draw on, but in that experience, I have found that adjunct faculty spend just as much time as–if not more time than–full-time faculty on these activities. We have adjunct faculty actively engaged in advising students every day.  We have adjunct faculty who collaborate to create service-learning projects for students.  We have adjunct faculty who are on campus from 8:00 AM to 10:00 PM–and that time isn’t all spent in class.  We have adjunct faculty who are tutoring students in the hallway because they have no office space.  We have adjunct faculty meeting students in the library in their free time to give them a little extra help. We have adjunct faculty developing and designing entire curriculums.  And we have adjunct faculty who attend every possible professional development opportunity offered them.

The NY Times Editorial Board ought to be ashamed of themselves. Yes, there’s a problem, and yes it needs to be fixed.  But instead of maligning adjunct faculty in a call for “more money for higher salaries and professional development,” let’s try pointing to to good, selfless work they do every day–let’s recognize their efforts, and let’s make a call to reward those efforts appropriately. Because this call to action is where they have it right: we have to do better by our adjunct faculty.  The way we treat them does not encourage excellence–but they give it to us in spite of that–which the NY Times piece ignores. So for our part we need to stop marginalizing them and start embracing, encouraging, respecting, and rewarding them for their efforts–efforts that do make all the difference to our students.

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April 8, 2014 · 10:33 am

The Plight of the Adjuncts: Office Space (Part 1)

Stop! Have you read my Disclaimer?

Nationwide, contingent faculty (aka adjuncts)  teach 58 percent of community college courses, according to a new report from the Center for Community College Student Engagement. Part-time faculty teach more than half (53 percent) of students at two-year institutions. 75% of developmental education students (those most likely to struggle academically) are taught by adjunct faculty. In one division of our college nearly 70% of classes are taught by adjunct faculty.  In some areas, adjunct faculty are actually serving as program coordinators–bearing nearly all the responsibility for running their respective programs–something for which they are not compensated any more than other adjunct faculty.

Although they teach the majority of our classes and the majority of our students depend on their instruction, adjunct faculty are often treated as second-class (if not third-class) citizens in the institutions of higher education in which they toil away every day.

In the way they now employ (rely on) adjunct instructors at low wages with no benefits in part-time, temporary positions with no job security, higher education institutions are much like Wal-Mart.  Noam Chomsky makes this comparison, explaining, “It’s a part of a corporate business model designed to reduce labor costs and to increase labor servility.” In short, it’s just one more part of the “corporatization” of the community college (and, no doubt, even our 4-year sister institutions).

I’m not really “business-minded,” so you’ll have to forgive me here: I think that if the majority of our students are being taught by adjunct faculty–faculty who are, in some cases, teaching more classes and even teaching better than full-time faculty–we ought to be providing them with the respect, the compensation, and the support to help them help our students succeed. (As it turns out, deep down somewhere, I still have a little idealism that bubbles up from some unknown place.)

If only.

In reality, although we (collective–not a specific we) know that supporting our adjunct faculty would only increase student success, we continually ignore them in favor of other endeavors to increase student success, retention, persistence (or whatever the word of the day is).

This post is, I hope, one in a series that will become a part of the ongoing dialogue about the role (and the plight) of adjunct faculty in institutions of higher education.  As a Department Head, I rely heavily on adjunct faculty. I also have some of the best adjunct faculty ever. I have dedicated instructors who give their all even when we give them next-to-nothing. I do the best I can by them, but there is only so much I can do.

One thing I can do is lend my voice to their cause–help shed light on the world in which they live–the obstacles they face–the good, hard work they do every day and the impact it has on our students.

So this is part 1: Office Space.

One of the ways in which adjuncts are relegated to second or third-class citizenship is through office space–or, more accurately, the lack thereof.

In preparation for this post, I asked adjuncts via Twitter to send me photos of their “offices” to help illustrate my point.  One adjunct responded, “ I have a pic, but it’s not of an office, because I don’t have an office.” Instead he sent me this picture, which really captures the experience of a large number of adjunct faculty, who work “on the go:”

One adjunct’s “office” picture

This is an example of an adjunct “office” on my own campus. It’s a cart with wheels, filled with student work, files, and even supplies like a stapler, index cards, scissors, and writing utensils. The adjunct rolls it (up a giant hill, over steps) up to the building from his/her car and into the building…and across campus…and from classroom to classroom; then, back to the car and home:

 

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Even when adjuncts are afforded physical office space on campus, it’s seriously inadequate. They don’t have doors that lock, which means they cannot leave anything of consequence when they leave for the day. All books, tests, essays, gradebooks must travel with them. They squeeze into spaces the size of closets; they share that space with 5, 10, 20 of their colleagues. Meeting privately with students to discuss grades, provide one-on-one tutoring, or advising is a joke. They may get one computer to share. Yet, we stress to them how important using technology today is. They better just have their own personal devices to use to do it. They may get some filing cabinets to store things–as long as those things are not confidential–because nothing confidential can be left unlocked–and adjuncts don’t usually get keys–to doors or cabinets.

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And because these physical space limitations exists, many adjuncts work from their homes, their cars, or on the go:

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Recently, I read this article in which an adjunct faculty member explains how she is both employed by a university and simultaneously homeless.

My Twitter request for pictures yielded this picture:

Screen Shot 2014-04-08 at 9.58.55 PM

Tweeting back to this adjunct yielded this response: “I was sleeping on kind friends’ air mattresses/sofas/spare mattresses/beanbags the night before – good times.”

Glamorous, no? What you think when you think “professor?” Right. But this is the reality for the professors who teach well over half of our classes–well over half of our students.

So think about this: we know that engaging one-on-one with faculty is one of the keys to success. But for over half of our students, engaging one-on-one with faculty (adjuncts) can be next to impossible; after all, they’ve got nowhere to engage with them.

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February 19, 2014 · 1:06 pm

Florida’s new law & student success

Florida’s new legislation lets students self-select in or out of developmental-level classes.  At Miami-Dade, 60% of students who placed into developmental-level courses elected to enroll in college-level classes.

This creates a predicament for instructors.  As one notes, “A lot of discussion among English faculty is how to keep standards high…Students ask me what a paragraph is now. What’s next? Maybe, what’s a sentence?” Writing paragraphs is not college-level work, but what happens if students aren’t required to take needed developmental coursework while we are simultaneously being pushed to increase completion rates?

It’s a little hard to see how standards could remain the same…

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February 3, 2014 · 2:58 pm

Ch-ch-ch-changes…a helpful reminder

As higher education professionals, we change lives. That may sound arrogant or even impossible, but make no mistake—it’s our business.   Sometimes the changes are small, sometimes they’re big. Often, they’re unrecognized—by us, by administrators, by the State or the US Dept. of Education, or even by the students themselves.

Not long ago, I had a student in my Freshman Seminar class who had missed several meetings in a row.  I didn’t have much hope that she’d be returning, and I was actually surprised to see her when she finally did show up.  Our lesson on that day was on the connection between Self-Awareness and Self-Management.  After class, I pulled her aside to speak to her one-on-one about her absences. She said, “This. Today. This is what I needed to hear. I was really having second thoughts about college, about whether or not I could do it. I was having a lot of self-doubt. This is exactly what I needed. I’m glad I came back. I won’t be missing like that again.” She didn’t. It’s not like I planned that—I couldn’t have.  Sometimes we set the stage for success, and the students just aren’t yet ready.  And sometimes they are. Sometimes, the timing is just right.

Often, we don’t appreciate the impact we’re having on students’ lives. We don’t see immediate results from a lot of our endeavors.  We never hear back from that student who failed 3 classes 6 ½ years ago. We often don’t see the difference we make. But that doesn’t mean we don’t make a difference.

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January 27, 2014 · 6:48 pm

Setting the Stage for Success

Today was the start of the third week of school. A student withdrew from my class last night. So there’s the first blemish on my student success record this year. Bleh.

I’ve talked before about student success and the College Completion Agenda <insert eye roll here>.  And one of the things I’ve said time and again is that learning–real learning–is not measured by completion or graduation. It may not truly be measurable at all. And yet, increasingly in Higher Ed completion and graduation are the means by which we are being judged. More graduates = more success. Right?

Wrong. Of course, there’s not much we can do about that.  When the government ties Financial Aid to numbers, we have to give them numbers.  And the numbers they want are completion, graduation, and now, more ever than before, employability.

A former student came to visit me today.  Six and a  half years after I first taught him. We talked and laughed–particularly over the part where he failed one of my classes.  Correction: 2 of my…no…3 of my classes. He failed 3 of my classes. And today he invited me to his graduation at the 4-year university down the street.  He’s been accepted to law school. And he wanted me to know that–despite failing multiple classes and, admittedly hating me for a time, he had come to appreciate what I’d tried to do for him when he was in my classes.  He hated me because I pushed him and made him work. And he didn’t want to do that then. Clearly, he was capable. But he wasn’t ready.

I tell my Freshman Seminar students that the most important thing they will have to learn to embrace in order to succeed in college and life is personal responsibility. It is until that happens–until they accept that they are in control of their learning, their education, their lives–that they will ever get anything out of the college experience.  That maturation in thinking is what college is all about.

And you can’t measure it. And it takes time.

That student who withdrew form my class last night? It might just not be her time. Maybe she’s not ready.  But that doesn’t mean that I failed. It doesn’t mean we failed as an institution. It just means she wasn’t ready. But like the student who came back to see me today, she may be ready a little further down the road.

There’s a lot we can do to help set the stage for students to succeed. But ultimately, they’re the actors in their own plays, and if they’re not ready to take the stage and give it their all, well…they’re just not yet ready. That’s all.

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December 28, 2013 · 5:30 pm

Do You Have A Minute?

So I finished my week of Powering Down and Unplugging. I was on vacation, so I can’t really say I was more productive without being constantly connected, but it was more relaxing, and I honestly (despite being a social media addict) didn’t miss it that much.

But speaking of productivity, I did pick up a brilliant idea from my father-in-law that I intend to implement upon returning to work in January.  I lose all sorts of valuable time at work when people just drop in, and ask “Do you have a minute?”

As my FIL concurred, these people always require more than a minute, and I am distracted from whatever task I was working on before the interruption. This, obviously, decreases my productivity during my time in my office. Case in point: this semester when we hit the end-of-the-semester grading crunch, I actually had to take a sick day to finish grading all my students’ projects from home because I couldn’t get anything done in my office. I often end up working from home, after hours to finish stuff I should have been able to complete in the office during regular business hours–had I only not had all those extra minutes stolen from me.

I’d like to be able to unplug more than once a year. After work or on the weekends would be a great time for that–except I can’t because I’m usuallyconnected for work. The number of e-mails I write, read, and respond to after hours or on the weekend is absurd. I’m hoping that implementing my FIL’s idea will help.  Here’s what he shared:

He used to have this sand timer he would keep in his office. And when someone would walk in and say “Do you have a minute,” he would flip the timer and say, “I can give you two.” I need a sand timer…because this is brilliant in its simplicity. If people can’t get what they need in two minutes, they should schedule an appointment. Really.

Note: This applies to the administrative part of my job. Obviously, on the teaching side, regularly scheduled office hours are specifically for student drop-ins.

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November 25, 2013 · 6:38 pm

Is this wrong? Yes.

So today on my ride into work, there was a discussion on the radio about this letter a teacher in NY sent home with her pre-K students.  The question offered to listeners/callers was this: “Is this wrong?”  The answer is yes.

The letter in question attempted to address the personal hygiene (or lack thereof) of children in the class. Here is a photo of the letter:smelly letter

If I were a parent who received this letter, I would write a letter back, and it would look something like this:

Dear Teacher,

I am writing this letter to inform you that you have failed–both as a teacher and a human being.  Allow me to explain why using a traditional scale: U = Unacceptable; NI = Needs Improvement; A = Acceptable; E = Exceeds. I have organized this from least important to most important for your benefit.

Professionalism: U

Did you hand write this with a marker and mimeograph it down the hall? How am I supposed to take you seriously? My (hypothetical) 4-year-old can use an iPad. You can’t use a computer? It’s 2013; if you’d like me to read something, type it up, print it out, and then send it me. I refuse to read scribble from anyone other than my child who just learned to spell his name.

Grammar: U

Unkept? You’re talking about my child, not my lawn. The word you’re looking for is unkempt. Also, you use a comma before a coordinating conjunction when it’s used to combine two independent clauses. You missed two of those. And one more–please proofread and edit before you send me or my child anything else. I really don’t want him picking up bad writing habits. (FYI: If you’d typed your document in Microsoft Word, spell and grammar checker would have helped you with your struggles to appropriately use Standard American English.) Also, periods. Enough said.

Communication: U

Did you really need to send this out to everyone (Consider reading my post on Bcc and Reply All and apply to this situation if you have the critical thinking skills to do so, which based on this evidence, I doubt.)? Don’t you think it might have been more effective to have targeted your message to a specific audience?  And is a generic handwritten letter really your best device for getting your message across? A more appropriate method of communicating to parents of children you think stink would have been a personal phone call. Furthermore, watch your language! “Enough said?” Really? Your tone is…self righteous and arrogant and…all around negative. It’s like you were hoping to start a fight, not resolve an actual problem. Also, for the record, despite the all-caps title, this is not actually an urgent notice. An urgent notice (!!!) would be something like, “There’s black mold and asbestos in our classroom, please only send your child to school tomorrow if he has a Hazmat suit!” An offense to your olfactory perception is not urgent.

Empathy: U

Empathy, since you seem to have none, is the ability to put yourself in someone else’s (like a 3-year-old’s) shoes and understand how they likely feel and then behave accordingly. Did you even stop for a second to consider how these supposedly dirty and stinky kids might feel upon discovering that their teacher doesn’t even want to be near them? Or how their parents might feel upon receiving your letter? You should know this, but I’ll go ahead and make sure it’s clear: sometimes people do the best they can with limited resources. I read that 30% of the population in your area lives below the poverty line. Maybe they’re doing the best they can. You should at least consider the possibility.

Social Responsibility: U

Look, if some of the children in class are really a health and safety concern, you might consider that the appropriate action to take is reporting a case of possible neglect. Sending a letter like this home to an abusive and neglectful parent could actually make things worse for the child in question.  If you are that concerned, call DSS and let them know.  Had someone done that for my foster kids, they would have been removed from their abusive home years before they were. Speak up–you may be the only voice those children have, so instead of marginalizing (and dare I suggest bullying) them, be an advocate for them. Be a friend to them. Be a role model. It’s your responsibility as a teacher and a human being.

Enough has not been said here, but I feel like this might be a good starting point. I encourage you to reflect on your behavior, consider the ways in which you may have better addressed this issue, and make a commitment to do better in the future. Accept that this was a BIG mistake and make a plan to better yourself. In short, take this as a a teachable moment. Learn. Grow. And then maybe you’ll be able to rise from Unacceptable to Exceeds (or at least Acceptable).  Let me know if I can help.

Sincerely,

Parent of (a hypothetical) child in your class.

PS: Finally, please sign below indicating you have read this report in its entirety and understand its contents.

___________________________

(Bad Teacher)

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October 31, 2013 · 8:30 pm

Class of the Living Dead?

Last I blogged, I was trying to decide which horror film to play for my Reel Success class today in honor of Halloween.  So…after careful consideration, I decided to go with Romero’s Night of the Living Dead. None of them had seen it, and they got really excited about it. They also all stayed awake, and there was no texting (a few gasps and chuckles, though)–either because they were entertained enough by it or because I hopped them up on candy–or both. But luckily, they were not a class of the living dead this Halloween. So that’s a win.

Of course, I pointed out to them that the film is notable for having introduced the concept of the modern zombie, and I gave them some other relevant background. I also gave them some questions ahead of time to think about as they watched the film.  We’ll be discussing these questions next class:

  1. Consider this movie in historical context. What was going on in the world in this time period that might have influenced the film?
  2. This movie was made almost 10 years after the last film we watched (12 Angry Men). Do you notice any similarities? Differences?
  3. It was possible to create color films in 1968, but Romero chose to go with the grainy black & white 35mm instead. One reason was cost.  But why else do you think the director may have made this choice?
  4. Many people think the film serves as a metaphor. What do you think it might represent? Remember that, prior to this film, zombies did not exist as we know them today. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead zombies are the first. What might they symbolize?
  5. Consider the 8 choices of successful students. Do you see the characters embracing any of these choices? What about the opposite—the choices of struggling students? Who in the film exhibits which characteristics? Be able to give examples.
  6. What Creator choices do characters make in the movie? Explain. What Victim choices do they make? Explain.
  7. What life lesson(s) might you take away from this movie?

Hopefully, in addition to being entertaining, the movie will spark some critical thinking and analysis and some good discussion related to student success.

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October 8, 2013 · 5:23 pm

Operation: Appreciation

Boosting morale is not as hard as it seems. It starts with recognizing employees for their hard work & rewarding them for accomplishments.

And I haven’t been doing the best job at that lately. I could pass the buck on this one easy enough. After all, morale is influenced from the top down, and I’m not exactly at the top of anything. But I do currently serve as the leader for a team of 30 people, give or take. So instead, I recognize that I lost sight of that goal somewhere in the last several months, and I came up with a plan of action, which I am (only in my head and to you, special internet friends) calling Operation Appreciation. It’s a one-woman mission–with a title that rhymes, which pretty much guarantees its success, no?

Step 1: Stop. And take a minute to consider each person and what they contribute to the department and/or to our students. It’s not like I don’t appreciate what people do, but it’s important, I think, to take a time-out to really think about it.

Step 2: Write a handwritten note to each team member specifically pointing out that contribution and that/why it’s valued (not a generic “thanks for everything you do!” but a meaningful recognition of something specific). Again, I see the great things people in my department do every day. But putting it in writing to let them know is, I think, important.

Step 3: Develop and implement “The Great Idea Giveaway!” (Sounds awesome, doesn’t it? In my head, it does…I’ll let you know how it works out in reality. The purpose of this is to encourage people to share their great ideas…and to recognize those great ideas. In exchange for sharing, they enter a drawing to win cool prizes at the end-of-semester get-together (mentioned below). That’s not only incentive to participate–it’s also kind of fun–because who doesn’t like to win things??

Step 4: Plan an end-of-semester get-together to show appreciate for a semester’s worth of hard work and to celebrate achievement (like honoring the two adjuncts who are submitting their first-ever conference proposals this semester!).

So last week I started on step 1. This week, I’m working my way through step 2. I’ve set a date for #4, and with the help of my trusty sidekick (aka our secretary), we’re working on invitations to go out closer to Thanksgiving. I also started the work for Step 3 with plans to announce it to the faculty next week.

I’m feeling pretty good about my plan and having started it. I hope everyone else will feel good about it, too. That’s kind of the point after all.

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September 26, 2013 · 7:12 pm

Why I Want to Cry for the Millenials

Don’t get me wrong–sometimes I want to wring their necks.

We talk a lot about millenials in my profession because they’re a big chunk of our constituency. Now, I’m aware and sensitive to the fact that not everyone born between 1982 and 2004 (SN: What’s the generation after 2004 called?) embodies ALL of the characteristics ascribed to the millenial generation. We are, after all, all unique individuals. And, of course, there’s some wiggle room on the start and end years. As a Gen-Xer, I share some characteristics of the millenial generation (i.e. obsessed with social media). And my husband is technically a millenial by birth year, but he probably resembles those kids less than I do (of course, he may or may not also believe he was meant to born 10 years earlier). You need only spend some time in our classrooms, though, to realize that many of them do share some of the traits associated with their generation by the experts. And many of them are not complimentary…and are the kinds of things that make me want to wring their necks. However, sometimes I just want to cry for them. Here’s 5 reasons why:

1. They are so stressed out! And I say this as a person who suffers from an anxiety disorder. Even when we think they’re exhibiting a “devil-may-care” attitude about their studies, a lot of these kids are straight freaking out on the inside. Because of the nature of the courses I teach and my particular teaching style, students often open up to me about more personal things–like their anxiety. This is an example of what I heard or read from students this week:

  • What if I choose the wrong career? What if I’m not good enough?
  • I’m pretty sure I’m going to fail this class just because I can’t get organized! I’m trying not to let anyone down. But I’m letting everyone down!
  • I’m not going to early advising because I won’t be back in the Spring. I already failed at college. And life. [note: it’s only MIDTERM of the first semester]

Wow. Breathe, kids, breathe. It’s college. You’re not supposed to have it all figured out, yet. You’re supposed to have time to mess up a little. It’s how you learn! This is the period in which you find yourself, figure out who you are as an adult. I can’t imagine what this stress is doing to them or how it will affect them long-term. But I do not envy them this level of constant anxiety, this constant fear of failure.

2. The American Dream is (maybe) dead. I’m not talking about the in-debt-up-to-my-eyeballs with a fancy car and McMansion dream (because some of them still seem to be “achieving that,” temporary though it may be). I’m talking about the real American Dream: to be able to move up in social class, to work hard and earn money and own a home and save for retirement. I’m talking about striving and succeeding at achieving a life better than that of your parents. I don’t think that these kids will achieve upward social mobility through hard work. I think they will work hard and scrape by. They will be no better off than their parents. They, in fact, may be worse off than their parents (with whom so many of them are back to living). Maybe there’s still hope. I don’t know. But I do know that they don’t feel that hope today…not in the way we did. Maybe that’s why they’re so stressed–they keep being told to work hard, that if they do, it’ll pay off. And all around them, they see evidence to the contrary. Maybe that makes them feel like they aren’t good enough. I don’t know, but I do know it’s sad.

3. They do not know a world in which they’re not constantly “plugged in.” They’re constantly connected. And again, I say this as a person with a social media management system on her phone, Android tablet, and iPad (auto schedule is the best thing ever). But think about this: they live in a world in which work is never just 8 hours a day. It’s 24 hours a day. 7 days a week. And it always has been. It always will be. It’s expected of them at this point. That makes me want to cry because it stresses me out for them.

4. They have never lived in a world in which a war was not on TV–in real-time. Seriously. Think back. And then think about our 24/7 news cycle. It’s just sad. And I have to wonder how that desensitizes them to violence.

5. Speaking of which, school shootings (and other mass murders by automatic weaponry)! Have always been a thing. Remember when school was a safe place? Where getting mowed down by an AR-15 after math class was not something that would EVER cross your mind? Yeah, my students don’t. And that? Makes me want to cry.

They get a lot of flak. And they seriously drive me bananas sometimes (and by “drive me bananas,” I mean “make me want to shake them until common sense settles in”). But I also feel for them in a lot of ways. I try to imagine what it would be like to have grown up like they did. To be in college now. To be job-hunting for the first time now. It’s easy to judge them for their sense of entitlement, for thinking they’re special & the rules don’t apply to them, for having been so sheltered they now seem incapable of functioning in the real world.

We want them to be like us. We want them to do it our way. But doing it our way isn’t going to get them anywhere. They’re going to have to find a way to do it their way.

 

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