ARGH!!!It is I, Ancillary Adjunct, with an update….okay, who am I kidding? I don’t have the suaveness of Yaro! (Who does?)
When last you all saw me, I’d landed two CC jobs, and life appeared to be good. After that, I had even picked up a uni job…but of course, now one of the CC jobs just had to go and dry up. Seems snowflakes don’t want to get out of bed early. The bakery/bagel shop near me that currently has another adjunct on payroll is looking better and better. Pity the second of three syllabi that needed to be completed was for that now defunct class. So, I have to soldier on to complete one more syllabus. Yay. I think I will be scooping myself a larger serving of frozen yogurt today…..too scared and too broke to take up drinking.
I am happy for Burnt, may you stay shiny for a good part of this semester! EMH, you make me laugh…and wince in sympathy. As always, I love all our brave writers who produce the haikus. Yaro, you are in my thoughts: congrats on deciding to retire! I wish I could have had you as a prof in my sweetly naïve undergraduate days! Oh, and Gordon—can we please donate a portion of the proceeds of the Yaro pajamas on the ad sidebar to his retirement fund? Please? I am seriously considering buying a set when the yard sale I am holding in a few weeks (with almost all my earthly possessions) provides me some discretionary funding! LONG LIVE YARO!
You can get the little bottles of vodka for like $1 here.
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry things didn't pick up for that third class. Adjuncts also took it on the chin at my CC this term. This is the first time ever we have not had to hire new ones in most departments (nursing and pre-nursing disciplines being the exception). Administration increased all our class sizes. Class minimums for makes went up by two students. Class maximums also went up by two students, so many sections that would have been fine even last term were killed. It broke my heart to see some of the greatest teachers we have lose their entire load or go down to just one class. If we hadn't had some retirements in my department, I think we would have had just a few adjuncts working at all!
ReplyDeleteI hated the uncertainty when I was an adjunct (and there was much less uncertainty then than there is now). If you have to write a syllabus, they really ought to compensate you for that (say by treating your semester as beginning a week before classes do, and paying you for that week whether a class "makes" or not). But I fear that would lead to more pressure for mandated/common syllabi, which I, for one, would hate.
ReplyDeleteReally, the bakery/bagel shop sounds pretty good to me, too, as long as it's not so close to a campus that it experiences seasonal variations in demand. Several of the eating places in our student center just opened up after a summer hiatus this week, and the staff (most of whom are, not surprisingly, new, since who can do without a job for 3 months of the year) are not very efficient yet, leading to long lines. At least the students seemed to be understanding; at least I didn't hear much grumbling. It may help that we've got a population with a significant number of students who have worked in similar setting themselves, and/or have parents who have done so. Of course, they're probably still under the impression that having a B.A., let alone an M.A. or Ph.D., will forever protect them from such a fate. Ah, well; if your students come into the bakery, they'll learn something new.
On the plus side, the syllabus writing did get me a promise from the chair that he will be calling later on this semester for next semester, so there was a consolation prize there....the bakery/bagel shop is not too close to either campus I work at, so the students may not find me....
ReplyDeleteCassandra, I love your perspective, wish I could meet you at a cafe and chat!
EMH---only $1 for a small bottle of vodka? Very tempting my friend. Right after the yard sale, when I have some discretionary funding, I will buy the Yaro pajamas, and then several small bottles and live life to the fullest!
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