I've already posted today, but this was brought to my attention, and it just has a serious flavor to me. Perhaps the mods will forgive me. In fact, I may need Strelnikov for this one!You may recall from one of my earlier posts that part-timers at my SLAC are not allowed to send out group emails to other part-timers. Supposedly somebody abused that privilege in the past and now it's up to the Dean to send out group emails on our behalf. Of course, he never cooperates.
On a seemingly unrelated note, I needed to contact a colleague whom I shall refer to as Dale from King of the Hill (for reasons only I shall know). Dale is very intelligent when it comes to navigating government bs. I'm just going to leave it at that.
Then I remembered, oh my crap, I don't have his email. Well, that's fine, I'll just look him up on the directory.
So, I checked again and guess what. I'm not there either! In fact, none of the part-timers are there! However, the directory is filled with full-time faculty. Hmm...
I seem to remember, when speaking with a former military friend, that one technique of warfare is to keep the POWs separated so they don't communicate and plot their escape. Perhaps that is happening here?
Perhaps they don't want us to form our own Part-Time Faculty Association.
Somehow, this would not surprise me in. the. slightest.
ReplyDeleteThe more "generous" interpretation is that the college just doesn't think the adjunct faculty are a "real" part of the college and so omit them without thinking about it.
DeleteWhat happened to prisoners of war changed from war to war, but the classic "one man, one cell, let out for short stretches each day" situation happened in North Vietnam to shot-down American pilots, either USAF, USN, or USMC (if the Marines were unlucky enough to cross the De-Militarized Zone.) These pilots were being punished for bombing the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North); they were also holding them until they could trade them for something....all living pilots were returned to the US in 1973, no matter what Bo Gritz has to say.
ReplyDeleteOur SLAC doesn't include part timers in the official printed directory because they change from quarter to quarter and the directory is printed once a year. The contingent faculty don't appear online on the department page, either. They do, however, have email, and anyone (including students) can plunk their name into the email system to find their email addresses.
ReplyDeleteIt was his email I was after.
DeleteAnd judging by your search for yourself, you don't exist, either. OMG, you really ARE a hologram. :o) Yeah, we have some people who have taught for years, but never make it into the directory. They can be found on email, though. Heck, people who quit or retired 10 years ago are still in the email system.
DeleteEMH, ouch! That is really insidious, that neither of you exist in the email system....you think after setting up your email, the IT Department would take the extra 5 minutes to put you in the email directory (and I'm surprised that upon completion of set up it doesn't just update automatically as part of the process).
ReplyDeleteAs Contemplative said, you must really be a hologram!
You need a union...but oops, you don't even know the names of the people who might join. Coincidence?
ReplyDeleteDoesn't your institution use a naming convention for emails?
ReplyDeleteIf so, couldn't you deduce Dale's email address if you know his not-Dale name? Or find it in the class schedule? If it's not there, where do students get it, assuming it is an online class (most likely a bad assumption)?
I suppose they get is when they log into his section of ANGEL and then RTFS.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteNever attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity. - Hanlon's Razor
DeleteHere's what i tried just now:
DeleteI had to make a "guess" (ala Spock) as to how his email address would appear. When I type his name into the address space, his email does not pop up like it would for the full-timers.
So, either the message will go through or it won't.
But I'm really starting to suspect that somebody deliberately made this a pain in the ass.
This is exactly how Big Online Forprofit works. We're all in the directory, but listed alphabetically, not be field, and with no contact information. All communication is "public" in the sense that it goes through university faculty forums and such.
ReplyDeleteI sent an e-mail out to about a dozen colleagues I had figured out to be fellow adjuncts asking them if they were happy with their positions, our pay, etc. - not ONE bothered to answer.
We are intentionally kept isolated from each other. I think the reason is to prevent us banding together to express our discontent. And it works. We're all scared and nobody ever seriously questions anything when policy after policy rains down from on high and pay falls. It's a brilliant scheme. It isn't necessarily malice. It's just business and a good way to keep us cheap and compliant.
Dude, that is the precise definition of malice in my book.
DeleteHow about this ...
ReplyDeleteAt an public SLAC which established as a distance program utilizing majority contingent faculty (which IS unionized), they sent out a mass e-mail asking everyone to update their directory listing.
I dutifully complied only to be informed that the online only directory is reserved for permanent faculty.
Nothing like building a program on the backs of contingent faculty but then ignoring identifying them as actual members of said program.
I regularly get emails about various sorts of in-house fellowships which, when I open the attachment, turn out to be available only to TT faculty. Often, these emails have been sent to the contingent faculty list. When that's the case, I email back to ask if there's a mistake, only to get a confirmation that TT faculty only are eligible, but no apology or acknowledgment of the mistake. I'm pretty sure they're not deliberately taunting us, but. . . .
DeleteIt's been a while since I was a part-timer myself, but I've never worked at a place where there wasn't at least an effort to make everybody's university email address available, or where I couldn't have asked someone in the department office for another faculty member's email address and received it, no questions asked,if the list hadn't been updated yet (which does happen). Of course, in many places I had no problem contacting my fellow adjuncts because a dozen of us were sharing three desks in an office designed for one, and all of our contact info was up on the door (with very little of the original surface showing, at least at eye level).
ReplyDeleteYes, something is fishy here. You should be able to contact each other, for any number of reasons, including but not limited to sharing assignments, impressions, etc., *and*, if you choose, organizing around common issues. And how do they expect students to ask you for a recommendation two or three semesters from now, when the course has left the LMS? Don't tell me they think students save syllabi. Or maybe they're willing to give out instructor addresses to students?
Oh no, they don't share addresses or phone numbers with anyone. In fact, I needed to contact one of the other admins about a matter and the Dean had to call the guy to get his permission to have his phone number given to me.
DeleteOur university system is inter-connected so the account you need to do a million things (grading, online course websites, payroll, etc) is also tied into the online phone book. Students, faculty, staff...pretty much everyone at the university...is included with their name, position, and email address.
ReplyDeleteReading everyone's comments, I feel a little less effed over in general. Like the phonebook available to me is in some small way the universe saying "here's a freebie".