1) Everyone left before summer having a full load of classes set for Fall.
2) People returned in the Fall to find classes cancelled due to the numbers game.
3) At the first full meeting we were introduced to new instructors hired to fill new sections in the same area where classes were cancelled.
4) When classes are given for Winter term there are not enough classes to go around and everyone is short.
5) Complaints turn into formal grievances that go nowhere.
6) As some people who lost classes must have six in a year, all Spring classes are taken before even being shown to the full department. If you did not qualify for one, too damn bad.
7) Instructors must have private meetings with department head regarding performance.
The end game is simple. We are now the Best Buy of departments. Those instructors with the lowest evaluations (sales if you will) every quarter are not going to get contracts. Some of the silverbacks may fight it, but it will only take one bad evaluation to put them on the bottom.
Something certainly sounds fishy here, but I'm a bit confused (or maybe I'm just channeling Hiram today):
ReplyDelete--am I correct in assuming that all of the people affected, including those you refer to as "silverbacks," are non-tenure-track? (I tend to think of "silverback" as a term reserved for the tenured, because it implies a degree of status and power, but I realize others' usage may differ).
--even if no one has tenure, is there any formal system of seniority or guaranteed/expected renewal in place here (one the one hand, it sounds like this is a group of semester-to-semester employees; on the other hand, you refer to a formal grievance procedure and to needing 3 classes per semester, which sounds more like a system of contracts that extend for at least a year, and possibly longer).
--Are there any other factors in play (e.g. does pay rise with experience)?
This certainly sounds like a case of pitting instructors against each other, in the name of "quality," or with the hidden agenda of cost savings, or quite possibly one masking another. It also sounds like a very good argument against the increasing adjunctification of the professoriat, and a reminder that contingent employment really is contingent -- on a number of factors, not just the quality of the contingent employee's instruction, however measured. But I'd need to know more to hazard any guess beyond that.
For clarity, there are contracts that range from a semester to five years for adjuncts. However, there is now a way to end contracts early and seniority is gone. The full time bunch are worried about their positions as it is not cost effective to have them around. Yep ... it's all about money and how cheap a newbie is.
DeleteUgh. I can't say I'm surprised, but ugh nevertheless. Also, if your department head is going along with this treatment of effective longtime employees, rather than fighting it tooth and nail, (s)he is a significant part of the problem. Tenure (assuming (s)he has tenure) has its privileges, but also, and increasingly in this climate, its responsibilities, and one of those responsibilities is standing up for the idea that instructors with experience (both in the classroom in general and with a particular student population) are often (though of course not always) better than inexperienced ones, whatever the student evals say.
DeleteP.S. Any institution with instructors on 5-year non-tenure-track contracts (which includes mine) should be looking into contingent-to-tenure-track conversion, or at least into creating tenure-track teaching-intensive lines. The argument for hiring people on a contingent basis is always "flexibility" (never the hidden and more significant one, cost), but in the course of 5 years there will be enough retirements, resignations, moves to administration, and/or deaths to create any flexibility the department truly needs.
DeleteSorry to say CC, but in over a decade, I have only seen one adjunct become tenure track in my department. "After all", as one person said, "if someone is good then they would never take an adjunct position."
DeleteWell, look. We all know how to tweak our classes to get good evals, and that's to drop standards and cater to the bullshit that snowflakes bring to the table. So, if you are getting a clear message to throw academic rigour out the window, show up next class with cupcakes and As for everyone.
ReplyDeleteYep. Feed them on eval day. ;)
DeleteI'm not sure I'm getting it: Full-time, tenured teachers with employment contracts (which is what "full-time, tenured" means) are not getting full workloads?
ReplyDeleteYou have to rethink what tenure means when the annual tenure review results in tenure being revoked.
DeleteIf these people are actually supposed to be tenured (as opposed to having renewable contracts of various lengths), then it's time to call the AAUP. Their tenure-fixation can make them less than completely useful to contingent faculty, but it can also come in handy for those who really are supposed to be tenured.
DeleteIf multi-year (or even one-year) contracts are being canceled mid-year for reasons not allowed for in the contract (and/or a faculty handbook, which is often part of a contract), then it's time to talk to an employment lawyer, the university ombudsperson (if any), and/or your elected rep (if it's a state school). It's also worth trying the AAUP, especially if it can be spun as an attack on tenure, actual or implied (see tenure-fixation, above).
Your department chair is a shithead.
ReplyDeleteWhy yes, yes he is. Of course, given his extremely visible minority, the fact that you have pointed it out means you will be meeting with the Human Rights Officer tomorrow. Thank you, come again.
DeleteThat was a typo! I meant "genius." Why do you always hafta count off for speling and grammer?
DeleteThe end game is the complete commodification of education and knowledge. Nobody directly involved in teaching likes any of this, but there are voices at the top and outside education who cheer for it. It is the result of politics and decisions by identifiable actors. Nonetheless, from down here in the trenches it manifests itself as a force of nature, an inevitable shift against which we are powerless.
ReplyDelete