Here at Large Urban Community College, our pay is not all that great. But one thing we could count on most years was a boost in the summer. But this year, because of the tanking economy, our system administrators decided that they would reduce our summer pay. They waited to do this until well after people had already made plans based on past course assignments at the previous salary, already putting some people in the lurch.In the past week, things have gone from bad to worse. Some of you may recall our switch last fall to what was billed as The World's Best Registration System. We had an epic disaster that term. Things improved this spring, but we are now in Summer Armageddon. Classes showed up in the wrong terms when students searched for them, so we have students signed up for one summer term who think they are in fact signed up for the other. The financial aid portion is not working right. The admissions staff is so backlogged that we have students who wanted to be admitted for summer who won't even be processed until at least the middle of the term. Mysterious registration errors keep popping up that will not allow students to add or drop classes.
As a result, many students simply gave up. Our summer numbers are the worst ever. Faculty who already took a pay cut are now finding themselves with fewer or even no classes to teach. Because of the economy (ostensibly), we've also been directed to make our classes even larger, resulting in even more sections being canceled. The administration is already saving a ton of money between the initial pay cut and the lowered enrollment. You'd think a class of 15 students would be sufficient to make. You'd be wrong.
I've never seen such low morale. The students are depressed because they can't get the classes they need. The staff is depressed because they can't help the students. The faculty is depressed because they are out looking for summer jobs to make ends meet. Full-timers are borrowing money from family members to meet obligations. Adjuncts who thought they had summer assignments are scrambling to try to pick up assignments at other local colleges. In most cases, the silverbacks are not taking their sections since the administration actually prefers adjuncts in the summer due to their lower salaries. Those sections just didn't make.
At this point I'm afraid we're getting dangerously close either to extreme apathy or anger that's just waiting to boil over. Neither one is good.
Wow, English Doc. I wish I knew where you taught just because it sounds so dreadful that the institution ought to be censured. This one is worth a tip to the AAUP. Or a class action suit.
ReplyDeleteThe IT Director also just got a renewal at six figures.
ReplyDeleteSTRIKE!
ReplyDeleteI invoke and paraphrase the Burger Shack scene from "Harold and Kumar go to White Castle.":
ReplyDelete"[This] just makes me wanna burn this motherfucker down. Come on, let's burn this motherfucker down! Let's burn this motherfucker down! Let's burn it down! Let's burn it!" ... and, scene.
What Dr. Pablito said.
ReplyDeleteLarge Urban Community College is in a right-to-work state, our board is already thinking about removing tenure, and even if we did unionize, policy is that they will refuse to recognize the union for any kind of bargaining purposes. The staff already have a "union," but as far as I can tell its main purpose is socializing.
ReplyDeleteClasses start next week. Departments have canceled hundreds of sections in the past 48 hours. I know this is the venting spot, but my colleagues and I have to start thinking of positive solutions that might actually make a change without costing us our jobs.