Potential Texts for Discussing Adjunct/Contingent Faculty
Prepared by Non Tenure Track Arizona (NTT AZ)
Purpose: These texts are meant to provide context to undergraduates for National
Adjunct Walkout Day and issues surrounding adjunct, contingent, NTT faculty across
the United States. Although these texts are envisioned for use in composition
classrooms, they could be adapted to be used in many different disciplines. For example:
social geography, history, politics, business, etc.
Ways to use in the composition classroom: Rhetorical Analysis, Visual Textual Analysis,
Public Argument, Controversy Analysis, Research, Compare/Contrast, Personal Narrative.
Mediums: The texts are broken down into categories which are: visual texts (cartoons,
videos), print texts (personal essays, articles), audio texts (news stories/features), etc.
All sources attributed where that information was available.
Compilation of News Stories on Adjuncts from The New Faculty Majority:
http://www.newfacultymajority.info/media-2/adjuncts-in-the-news/
VISUAL TEXTS
Cartoons:
original publication unknown (perhaps that can be worked in in discussion of credibility)
from marquettewire.org
Ideas: Impact of tuition increases on students; the promise that education will result in
good jobs; where is that extra income going if not to instruction?
Carol Simpson Cartoon above; Idea: Connecting Adjunct Labor issues to GAT/Teaching Assistant Labor
issues
Graphic Novel/Memoir:
Nathan Holic’s graphic adaptation of Fight for Your Long Day.
Film/News Reports:
Is academia suffering from ‘adjunctivitis’? Low-paid adjunct professors struggle to make
ends meet from PBS News Hour, February 6, 2014
Union Jacked: Daily Show story on Right to Work in Michigan, December 11, 2012
Adjuncts and Tenure on Chicago Tonight
The Adjunct film on vimeo (The film re-imagines adjunct labor as day labor, with
instructors standing on street corners hoping to pick up a teaching gig for the day, and
follows one such adjunct through his day.)
Video with stats (specific to Colorado) that talks about differences between TT and NTT
(This is a music video for spreading the word about Colorado's legislation (HB14-1154)
for establishing "equal pay for equal work" at our community colleges. Useful for those
not in Colorado in that it breaks down differences between adjuncts and TT profs.
Open letter from adjunct professor
(great for talking about rhetoric)
Websites:
The Adjunct Project
Adjunct Action
Social Media:
Article on #notyouradjunctsidekick
AUDIO TEXTS
Radio Stories:
The Growing Reliance on Adjunct Professors on The Diane Rehm Show April 16, 2014
Part-Time Professors Demand Higher Pay; Will Colleges Listen? NPR, February 3, 2014
The Sad Death Of An Adjunct Professor Sparks A Labor Debate NPR, September 23,
2013
Commentary: An Adjunct Professor's Life NPR, June 16, 2003 (given that this is an
older story, might be useful to talk about the evolution of adjunct labor over time,
how things have gotten worse, etc.)
WRITTEN TEXTS:
Essays by Adjuncts/Academics:
*The Teaching Class on Guernica
*Love in the Time of Adjuncting in The Chronicle of Higher Ed September 8, 2014 by
our own Joel Smith and Alison McCabe
The Adjunct Crisis is Everyone’s Problem on Vitae
Quitting an Adjunct Career on Inside Higher Ed
How to Treat Adjuncts on Inside Higher Ed
In the Basement of the Ivory Tower in The Atlantic 2008
Talking with students about being an adjunct (blog)
Not a scarlet letter from Inside Higher Ed
About why adjuncts matter to students: Students hold adjuncts close to heart from
student newspaper of College at Brockport
Plan A or Don’t Call me an Adjunct Higher Ed Hub Philly
News Stories/Features:
The Adjunct Revolt: How Poor Professors Are Fighting Back in The Atlantic April 28, 2014
9 Reasons Why Being an Adjunct Faculty Member is Terrible on The Huffington Post, November
11, 2013
Higher Education is NOT “Hire” Education…(blog by adjunct utilizing stats from other
sources) The Homeless Adjunct, January 12, 2011
16 Shocking Facts About Student Debt And The Great College Education Scam
(Business Insider)
December 26, 2010
Colleges should pay administrators like they pay adjuncts (blog) Feb 2015
Professors on Food Stamps: The shocking true story of academia in 2014 on Salon.com
No Country for Old Adjuncts from Inside Higher Ed September 24, 2014
Students press for adjunct faculty union at Boston University from The Daily Free Press
at BU October 8, 2014
15K per course? on Inside Higher Ed February 9, 2015
Adjunct professors in dire straits with low pay, lack of full-time jobs on Al Jazeera
America, October 15, 2013
A Day Without Adjuncts piece on Inside Higher Ed, January 27, 2015
Adjuncts Are Underpaid, And This Group Wants To Help Cover Their Bills
(Precaricorps), January 23, 2015
The Wal-Mart-ization of higher education: How young professors are gettingscrewed on
salon.com February 16, 2014
This College Professor has a master’s and is living in poverty on Alternet
Blogs:
Adjunct Voices on The Chronicle for Higher Ed.