Warning: heavy linkage ahead.
Dean Dad calls attention to Josh Boldt's post and a crowd-sourced Google spreadsheet of per-course payment at a number of institutions. The numbers might surprise anyone who hasn't worked as an adjunct. They sure didn't surprise me, because I have.
They would certainly surprise that Columbia philosophy professor (can't recall his name) who a few years ago caused an uproar by helpfully saying that if adjuncts didn't like getting paid ONLY $6-7,000 per course, why, they ought to go out and get themselves a tenure-track job. He also suggested that maybe we should just let students major in whatever is this year's trend ("water" was one of the disciplines, as I recall). Well, it was better than this, but you get the idea.
Anyway. This is part of MLA President Michael Berube's call for real change in treatment and pay for the new faculty majority: "Adjunct, contingent faculty members now make up over 1 million of the 1.5 million people teaching in American colleges and universities." The MLA has talked about this for a long time, including in its 2009 report, but there seems to be a new seriousness and urgency about it, as there should be; you can read more at New Faculty Majority. (For the record, the places I've taught have really worked hard to ensure long-term contracts, health benefits, and other issues of fairness for contingent faculty.) Somehow this new energy on the part of the MLA makes me think, or hope, that these are steps in the right direction.
The debate seems to have spilled over into the "I've got tenure--how depressing" thread over at the Chronicle, too. As I've said before, "post-tenure depression" frankly baffles me, but then, everyone has different stress or depression points. The comments over at the Chronicle break down into two categories: (1) "I felt the same way, too" or (2) "You have a full-time job! How DARE you complain?" [Note: Dr. Virago has a good take on this in the comments.]
9 comments:
I was happy to note that our uni seems to pay its adjuncts pretty well by comparison to other schools, always provide offices, and apparently provides benefits to some. That is possibly because the supply of PhDs isn't as high as it is in less rural areas.
I'll let you know if I feel depressed next year. Of course, we never seem to do anything by halves... we can't seem to start a new phase of life without starting another new phase of life at the same time... whether it be marriage + grad school or job + new baby... or in this case, tenure + new baby. Hopefully we won't start looking for divorce or anything 'cuz I think we're going to be out of new babies should there be another big change.
On top of that, I do still feel like there are new mountains to conquer. I have an outside reputation to support!
On the post-tenure depression, I got it -- and got it bad at one point -- and yet I did not go straight to grad school from the BA, did work other, much worse jobs, and did adjunct for a year before getting the TT job. Don't confuse depression with justified sadness -- they're too different things. Depression isn't rational. It just is.
Er, *two* different things
nicoleandmaggie-Those are a lot of changes all at once! I think that the "outside mountains" idea is a good way to think about it.
Dr. Virago--thanks for making that distinction between depression and sadness. I think that my post, in confusing the two, may make the same error that the commenters at the Chronicle did: the columnist was expressing *depression,* but the commenters took it as UNjustified sadness.
And, Dr. V., I want to apologize for being insensitive about those very real feelings. I know what it's like to have depression dismissed, and I didn't mean to do it in the post. Sorry.
"Just an observation: I wonder how many of those who feel depressed by tenure are people who shot straight from undergrad to grad to a t-t job, meeting goal after goal after goal with laserlike focus and intensity, and then feel deflated after reaching tenure because that was the Mother of All Goals."
Most academics I've met are more grown up than this - have more of a sense of self than this - even as undergraduates, let alone as faculty.
Z, you're right about this cognitive maturity; no one would consciously think this way. After Dr. Virago's comment, I'm thinking of this feeling more as something that can't be controlled even if you can rationally tell yourself that you've made it.
All--you've convinced me. I took out the last paragraph but am including it here just for context. Just an observation: I wonder how many of those who feel depressed by tenure are people who shot straight from undergrad to grad to a t-t job, meeting goal after goal after goal with laserlike focus and intensity, and then feel deflated after reaching tenure because that was the Mother of All Goals. Like Alexander the Great, maybe they're depressed because they have no more worlds to conquer. I wonder, too, how many people who get a t-t job and tenure after being on the adjunct track for a few years feel that same deflation.
The adjunct thread is interesting. I'm of course for abolishing the adjuncts and turning them tenure track.
I'm not sure what to think about post tenure depression but I think it might have to do with having certain realities revealed to one. I was immune to that already, being aware, but some aren't.
Also, I think a lot of depression has to do with internalizing or justifying mistreatment, of which there's a lot on the tenure track - people can come out on the other end feeling pretty beat up. They "should" be happy and don't feel it, which is confusing, which is depressing.
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