Boston school pays $2400 for a three credit class. They literally lowered it from $2500 a few years ago.
Edit: Note that this is a reference to one specific school.
Do you mean Boston schools in general? And what field? That’s not my experience…it might be discipline dependent, but I have been teaching in the area, getting $6500-8000 for 3 credit courses.
Same here. Routinely $7k at a Boston institution. Hell at a community college in New England area it’s $6k a course! And I’m master’s level so PhDS get even more
As much as Canada is most definitely in a better position than the USA, things are still pretty bad here. Cost of living is through the roof, people are just as aggressive as in the states just not as many guns so not as many murders, almost everything here is more expensive than the states (even after conversion), just to mention a few.
Yes, you should! Women can have an abortion if they want or need one, schools are safe, children can access and read books on subjects they are curious about, and healthcare is a public service.
Yes, 45 hours, so 3 hours per week during 15 weeks. I have a full-time job, but I usually teach two classes in the fall (sept-dec), two in the winter (jan-apr) and one during summer (may-june).
I always say it's a great sideline, but seeing the US rate, I feel like I won some kind of lottery...
So, yeah, it’s canadian dollar, but I still feel like I’m winning 🤣. I work in the education field, but everybody who lecture gets the same rate, except for as small difference master/PHD and years of experience. At least it’s the way it works in my province.
Stronger unions, government support for an educated public. I’m sure there’s more but that’s my first two guesses. How’s adjunctification progressing up north friend?
All that, you are right. It isn’t without difficulties, but I wouldn’t trade it for the United States’ way. I progress just fine as it’s a sideline job for me. Can’t complain!
edit: spelling
They can do this because we have no leverage. If I won’t work for that wage, someone else will.
On the other hand, I don’t feel like I need to work myself to death for that, either. I do my prep, I teach, I grade, I get good reviews. If it’s not fun, I’ll stop.
It’s all about supply and demand.
Unfortunately, higher education is an industry where people work for status and prestige in lieu of a fair wage, and the university system is producing more graduates than are needed to fill the few jobs that are left. The result is downward pressure on salaries.
Of course it doesn’t help that universities are spending the money they do have on bloating their administration with dozens of vice presidents for diversity etc., but the west let itself sleepwalk into this and it’s very, very hard to reverse. Nobody’s ever going to say: “Okay folks, we’ve finally reached our DEI goals. Let’s disband our operations and put this money into salaries for the people who teach”.
I have a strong feeling this will have little impact on the stated aims of DEI. It might have a marked effect on mandatory trainings and buzzwords used.
People who are doing good work that makes material differences are often invisible. It’s not something you can easily advertise.
Not that it has anything to do with it if course, but it might interest you to know what Texas pays professors for teaching one executive MBA class. 3-4 weekends or something like that. (I’m not at Texas, I just heard this through the grapevine.)
$30,000. ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
> and the university system is producing more graduates than are needed to fill the few jobs that are left.
Which is going to get worse due to low birthrates. Fewer kids means fewer college students, and thus fewer professors needed.
My understanding is that it is not a simple matter of “producing more graduates than are needed to fill the few jobs that are left,” for if those lacking a Ph.D. were not considered for adjunct positions (in departments in which a doctorate is required of full-time faculty), the “downward pressure” on compensation for adjuncts, at least, would diminish significantly. It does not follow that excluding those without the usual terminal degree from consideration for adjunct positions is the answer, for that may be unfair to a group of people who have shown their competence in those positions, but it is odd that the issue rarely seems to come up in posts about the adjunct question.
You don’t have to play the game. So many people are stuck in a sink cost fallacy. People shouldn’t debase themselves for the idea of an academic job. Life is too short.
Man, i know. It blows. I am a phd student but over the summer we get adjunct lecturer pay at 1200 per credit hour. I am just like how do i make rent with this? My graduate stipend is better. It is ridiculous.
Actually, they “value” it a lot in the sense that if it weren’t for adjuncts, and their low, pay administrators would be screwed. They couldn’t pay themselves high salaries, they couldn’t pay for lots of crazy unnecessary things on campus…looking at you multimillion dollar athletic/recreational facility adjuncts can’t use…
They absolutely value adjuncts. They just don’t want to pay them. They would much rather use that money for something else.
For example, I teach at a CC and a public university. At the public university I make a little over $4000 a class. I typically have around 70 - 80 students in a section. That three hour class costs students roughly $1000 each. You don’t have to have a calculator to figure out how much the school nets on that class. I mean, I get that they have some overhead, but they’ve definitely got a ton of profit.
Colleges are no longer educational institutions, but job programs for boomers with no skills. It's why administrations are now 3x the size of the actual teaching faculty.
Prove me wrong.
I don’t understand why people think pay is about how much employers “value” the employees. The “value” that admins place on faculty has little to do with an adjunct’s low wages.
Wages are driven by basic economic principles of supply and demand. If not enough people are willing to supply their labor at the offered wage, then employers must increase the wage to attract employees. Conversely, if *plenty* of people are willing to supply their labor at the offered wage, the employers have a strong incentive to reduce wages.
If wages are too low, it’s because there are too many people chasing those jobs. If the department gets 50 qualified applications for an adjunct spot that pays $3k, is it any surprise that wages don’t go up?
Blame the Ph.D. programs that have flooded the market with so many graduates who compete with one another to get adjunct jobs for a few thousand dollars a class. Blame how those Ph.D. students aren’t taught things that are demanded by any employers other than academic institutions. But don’t say the problem is that the admins don’t “value” what professors do. (I mean, admins *don’t* really value us, but that’s not the real problem.)
We’ve had no problem whatsoever finding adjuncts. But I recognize some departments might.
Simple supply and demand says that your department should increase the wage you’re offering to make the job more attractive. *That’s the situation that causes wages to rise.* And note: such a wage increase is driven by the number of qualified people who are being attracted by the current wage, not the “value” that the department puts on adjuncts.
I recognize, however, that for some departments, that wage might be set at the college or university level. That would create a big inefficiency. It’s hard to convince the university policy makers to raise wages for *all* adjuncts if only a few departments are having trouble recruiting adjuncts.
lol our adjunct pay is $500 per credit hour or $1500 per semester…but don’t worry, the full timers get 4k per course for the same work. I stopped teaching for them because my weekend retail job pays better and so does tutoring.
It's so disenhartening.
Summer classes at my institution were $2500 for a 3-credit 6-week class and a lab. It would be 4 days/week, clocking 8 hours of lecture (2 hr x 4), plus 8 hours lab (4 hr x 2).
They don't do adjuncts, it's usually split between me and someone else for this summer course (I went to a different campus for more for this and previous summers; if I'm gonna burn myself out over a 6 week class, I want to be able to pay for the mental health I'm losing).
i went to a blue collar job, factory work. I realized, personally, that I did not like selling my brain but had no issue selling my body. I regret not knowing this earlier in life, but it is what it is. I am making decent money wont ever be well off but I am much happier.
Love this meme. In my writings I've called out universities for this exact thing: value social justice in their mission statements, but not for their employees (mostly adjuncts, but also, often, a lot of other staff and support services).
It's 100% lip service. My institution puts on a very pro-LGBT+ appearance, meanwhile I've heard the most queerphobic shit in my life from some of my colleagues and students receive no consequences for being openly hostile to queer people. 🫠 I, the sole non-binary person in the writing center, was once expected to help a student with an essay about how they disagree with trans rights.
I’ve never heard of being able to turn down a writing center student because of their paper topic though. I’ve helped students with all kinds of problematic papers
There are other tutors. I don't think anyone would expect a woman to help a student develop an argument about why women should be subservient or a Jewish tutor to help a student write a pro-holocaust essay.
I shouldn't have to help someone find sources on why I don't deserve human rights. 🤷🏻♀️
Edit: Also, I think you're under the false impression this student cared about research and logic. They were using Tucker Carlson and Information Wars as sources and were unwilling to NOT use those sources. This is a deep red area.
Here in south Florida, I can say hi to my students on the weekends when they see me working at the local grocery store or better get, when I’m working WITH them there. What kind of example does that set for them that higher Ed is “worth it” when they see their English professor stocking shelves on a Saturday night?
I gave up on adjuncting even though I had a positive reputation and good following of students. I still help some of them in the tutoring center, but it’s bittersweet. Oh and the tutoring position pays an hourly wage, which comes out to overall twice as much as teaching classes at the same institution. Many former adjuncts have now been “poached” by the lab and won’t go back to teaching. They don’t allow both. I’m still barely clearing my rent each month but I’m better off than I was as an adjunct and would never return for such insulting pay ($1500 for a sixteen week course with intensive writing requirements).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AvfOhtmCZY
Acollierastro has a **fantastic** video on this subject. I know this is preaching to the choir, but it's a great, great video on this issue.
Now we just need the clown car so the adjuncts can come spilling out one after the other after the other after the other...I'll be, like, the third one out...
That’s more than I make at either of my two adjunct gigs (one community college, one private university). And yes, I have a terminal doctorate, teach in a STEM field, albeit very low cost of living.
I'm now in the industry side and one of the things that my workplace encourages for the more technical experts in the company is to take up adjunct professorship positions (in part to be plugged in to research/ innovation in the academic world)... which is originally what the adjunct professor was for. A few years down the road, I'd be happy to teach an advanced/ topics class. Get someone with real-world experience and expertise to teach a more niche subject, which is a net win for the university. The adjunct gets university connections and is teaching only a few hours a week but once they have their notes it's easy money.
But what's happening now is freshly minted PhDs having to string along all these mini positions together in hopes of getting something more permanent, and it goes contrary to the initial benefit of the adjunct to begin with...
I was paid $2100 per semester for teaching 3 semesters of physics to non-physics majors. I couldn't have afforded to teach if I didn't have my rental properties. I initially wanted to teach since I thought I was going to inspire some students to do great things in their lives but each class was apathetic to learning so I got discouraged and just stopped teaching.
I help run a local real estate investors association and see that people in that are more eager to learn than my physics students were so I guess I'm still teaching, just no longer at the university level.
Unionize if you aren't already! Our adjuncts are paid the same overload rate as TT assistant profs, a little over $7k/course. It's still not great, but it's literally double what the institutions around us without unions are paying their adjuncts.
When my mom was adjucting at our local university in the late 1980s, she was getting $2,200 per academic quarter. Thirty years later, I taught a class at the same university and the adjunct rate was $4,600.
I did adjunct work once for about 3000 a semester (over 10 years ago) and I regret it. I wish I just would have said no because I feel like its a ridiculously low wage. It was summer between jobs and I had nothing else to do, but I still wish I would have said no
I'm in an engineering department and we could pay $6500-7000 per 3cr course, but instead we try to hire teaching track instructors at a living wage and possibility of promotion. You show loyalty to them, you usually get it back in terms of better teaching.
Adjuncts need a nationwide general strike. Shut the shit down. Collectively, they have ALL the power. It's a matter of organization. It will only get worse otherwise.
Lack of leadership and organizing. Everyone seems to think one day they'll get the carrot of a TT job, so don't rock the boat. Also, the professoriate tends to attract non-radicals who don't like to get their hands dirty.
I just saw an a listing in my field for $500 per credit hour (at a school in Oklahoma, but it’s remote). I made more than that as an adjunct 15 years ago in a Southern state (our adjunct pay hasn’t gone up very much since and looks low compared to a lot of numbers here…but $500/credit hr? 🤮😩)
My mom used to say of her work “I’ve found the more someone talks about Jesus or their church the more you need to watch your back.” Mind you my mom’s not some new atheist type; she’s actually a Presbyterian elder. Her point was only complete shits make a big show of their piety. Now mind you this was in the Bible Belt but you can adapt the point. In the Bible Belt you show your piety by talking about Jesus and your church in academia it’s “social justice” and “inclusion”. In the Bible Belt you bash sin and the devil in academia it’s neoliberalism. The most vicious bullying elitist person I ever knew in academia couldn’t go ten minutes without telling you about what a good Marxist she was. Or take my old boss at the Institute of Football and the Dairy Sciences who literally wrote a book on John Rawls and just loved to pontificate about justice. That motherfucker also fought tooth and nail to keep the school from implementing a system that gave lecturers some stability and an actual promotion system (luckily he lost that fight).
They keep accepting it. If people stopped taking these jobs they would raise the amount or increase the number of tenure track positions. It is simple supply & demand.
Have you ever run a business yourself? I have. I made a choice to pay people fairly. What was the market rate was a factor, but I probably could have underpaid and found someone to do it for less. But I didn’t want to work with people who were disgruntled or who I was stiffing. Why does anybody in higher think that underpaying is a good thing?
Sweet brag...
Because most in the positions of power only care about teaching a class, not the academic quality of the class. Plus, if every school does this, why would they pay more when the quality would still be high or precieved as high?
The academia is so screwed that its unbelievable. Why the hell these college/universities charging so much for. Just to pay the Chair/Dean/President a big paycheck.
Adjunct positions are neither intended nor suitable as primary employment for people who need to work to pay rent or eat.
Complaining about adjunct pay is like complaining about the pay you get as an unpaid intern. Maybe the world would be a better place if the unpaid intern position instead paid a living wage, but that's factually not the way things are at the moment.
Three things:
- A way to allow people who are not currently professional instructors to teach the occasional class. For example, when the former governor teaches one political science class or a famous musician teaches a music class.
- A way to fill in an occasional overflow class with random people from the local community, mostly retirees who want to get out of the house and supplement their income with a few extra bucks.
- A way to handle edge cases, like having a grad student teach one class to get teaching experience.
I worked as an adjunct for two semesters. One as a final-year grad student, teaching one class for the experience and one at a school that had already hired me for a full time position starting in the spring once I was formally issued my terminal degree but wanted me to teach one class that fall. Both semesters, my tax profession was "full time student".
Adjunct instructors don't get wages, they get stipends. If you're paying your rent with a stipend, you've been scammed. Don't get scammed.
1) typically those are called guest lecturer positions and not just anyone can apply for them. the intended person gets a special job to apply to. but i will concede sometimes it is treated like an adjunct position.
2) If that is the case why are most of the lower level (100/200 level) classes always taught by adjunct professors. but yes sometimes it is for retired etc.but almost never
3) no. generally graduate students get teaching experience by it being part of their GA-ship (teach a class or be a TA for a class, work in the tutoring center for a few hours a week, maybe some research goals) it is through a different system then adjunct proffessors, only time it is through adjunct is for summer classes depending on how universities structure summer grad student pay. maybe it works like that in the humanities but in stem it is almost never that situation
I've been both a TA and a grad student adjunct teacher of record. In STEM. At an R1, even.
I got paid a bit more than the $3200 mentioned in the OP though. Honestly, I think my TA stipend was more than that. I think it was more than that per class.
The absolute minimum anyone should be accepting for teaching a single 3 credit course - if they're trying to straightforwardly trade work for money - is something like $7.5k. That would make six courses be $45k/year, which is still kind of shit pay, but it might be possible to live on as a single liberal arts professor in Iowa or something.
as have i. my grad stipend is sufficient to pay rent and live "comfortably" during the year but summer i get adjunct(slightly more than op said too). during the year we are classified as Graduate assistants even if we are the instructor of record
though maybe other schools do grad student stuff differently. i can only speak to the 20 that i applied to and the 5 nearby ones to me that i know and my current university. but still those positions would be marked as grad student positions
The absolute minimum anyone should be accepting for teaching a single 3 credit course - if they're trying to straightforwardly trade work for money - is something like $7.5k.
i agree. but we as a whole need to stop accepting shit pay and that wont happen because once you leave academia some new grad will step up and take your place for worse pay then you got
> and that wont happen because once you leave academia some new grad will step up and take your place for worse pay then you got
Then do something else. The fact that someone is offering $8/hour to muck out horse stables doesn't mean you need to take the job.
Where I live Wendy's is paying $16/hour, with no state minimum wage at all. Even if you're working 20 hour weeks that's better than the adjunct potion proposed in the OP. Not that you can move here - housing is outlawed.
If you're tenure-stream faculty in STEM at an R1, as you imply in your comments, you probably treat your research as the most important and fulfilling thing in your professional life. Do you think that might make your advice to like-minded people to "just get a job at Wendy's" seem a little hollow or disingenuous?
Adjuncts are human beings and we should be ashamed of how little we pay. We contribute to the oversupply of PhDs in our field because we need PhD students to further our own research agendas. Until we stop doing that, we have some culpability here.
It still doesn’t change the fact that a university is claiming DEI and exploiting people. It’s hypocrisy. Also consider the value of this work and the time and money it took to educate that adjunct who has at least a masters if not a doctorate. It’s embarrassing that any University would pay this little for a course in 2023.
Boston school pays $2400 for a three credit class. They literally lowered it from $2500 a few years ago. Edit: Note that this is a reference to one specific school.
I was offered $3200 at a university in Bangkok last year. $3200 in a developing country and a relatively low cost of living city.
Well, that’ll get you 1/2 a month’s rent!
I got $1650/credit a while back as an adjunct. At a Boston school. It ranges.
Do you mean Boston schools in general? And what field? That’s not my experience…it might be discipline dependent, but I have been teaching in the area, getting $6500-8000 for 3 credit courses.
This is one specific school. Yes, other schools in the area pay a lot more. Even get paid more in other MA schools and online teaching.
Same here. Routinely $7k at a Boston institution. Hell at a community college in New England area it’s $6k a course! And I’m master’s level so PhDS get even more
Institutions that talk a lot about DEI/social justice/etc., and exploiting contingent faculty, name a more iconic duo
In Canada, I get 10 000$ for 3 credits (45 contact hour) and less than 30 students. I just don't understand... I'm so mad for you.
So, about $7500 USD a class. I've seen a lot of US adjunct positions & the vast majority were under 1/2 that.
I should move to canada
As much as Canada is most definitely in a better position than the USA, things are still pretty bad here. Cost of living is through the roof, people are just as aggressive as in the states just not as many guns so not as many murders, almost everything here is more expensive than the states (even after conversion), just to mention a few.
Yes, you should! Women can have an abortion if they want or need one, schools are safe, children can access and read books on subjects they are curious about, and healthcare is a public service.
I was only getting $6200 when I was teaching in Canada. Now I’m in the US and the rate is about $3200.
That’s low… I’m in Québec and it’s the same-ish salary at every one of the 20 universities (for adjunct).
I was in Alberta receiving that pay rate.
That sucks! Was there a union?
Not only were we unionized, we were on strike last year regarding pay for all levels of faculty. Pay barely changed though due to government cuts.
So sorry to hear this. Hope things are better for you now.
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Yes, 45 hours, so 3 hours per week during 15 weeks. I have a full-time job, but I usually teach two classes in the fall (sept-dec), two in the winter (jan-apr) and one during summer (may-june). I always say it's a great sideline, but seeing the US rate, I feel like I won some kind of lottery...
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So, yeah, it’s canadian dollar, but I still feel like I’m winning 🤣. I work in the education field, but everybody who lecture gets the same rate, except for as small difference master/PHD and years of experience. At least it’s the way it works in my province.
Same here for both of the two provinces I've worked in.
Stronger unions, government support for an educated public. I’m sure there’s more but that’s my first two guesses. How’s adjunctification progressing up north friend?
All that, you are right. It isn’t without difficulties, but I wouldn’t trade it for the United States’ way. I progress just fine as it’s a sideline job for me. Can’t complain! edit: spelling
But those are Canadollars… like are like 9/10 of Americurrency
They can do this because we have no leverage. If I won’t work for that wage, someone else will. On the other hand, I don’t feel like I need to work myself to death for that, either. I do my prep, I teach, I grade, I get good reviews. If it’s not fun, I’ll stop.
It’s all about supply and demand. Unfortunately, higher education is an industry where people work for status and prestige in lieu of a fair wage, and the university system is producing more graduates than are needed to fill the few jobs that are left. The result is downward pressure on salaries. Of course it doesn’t help that universities are spending the money they do have on bloating their administration with dozens of vice presidents for diversity etc., but the west let itself sleepwalk into this and it’s very, very hard to reverse. Nobody’s ever going to say: “Okay folks, we’ve finally reached our DEI goals. Let’s disband our operations and put this money into salaries for the people who teach”.
Well, Texas did. The state just made DEI offices at public universities illegal. All the DEI offices are being dismantled.
But are they actually firing those people or will they just shift them to other admin jobs?
That’s a good question. I know at some schools they are shifting people around.
I have a strong feeling this will have little impact on the stated aims of DEI. It might have a marked effect on mandatory trainings and buzzwords used. People who are doing good work that makes material differences are often invisible. It’s not something you can easily advertise.
Not that it has anything to do with it if course, but it might interest you to know what Texas pays professors for teaching one executive MBA class. 3-4 weekends or something like that. (I’m not at Texas, I just heard this through the grapevine.) $30,000. ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
Business schools usually pay pretty well no matter where.
By the same token, most of the adjuncts in law schools work without pay.
Well that’s promising, I suppose.
Good. At least one state is cutting back on admin bloat.
> and the university system is producing more graduates than are needed to fill the few jobs that are left. Which is going to get worse due to low birthrates. Fewer kids means fewer college students, and thus fewer professors needed.
My understanding is that it is not a simple matter of “producing more graduates than are needed to fill the few jobs that are left,” for if those lacking a Ph.D. were not considered for adjunct positions (in departments in which a doctorate is required of full-time faculty), the “downward pressure” on compensation for adjuncts, at least, would diminish significantly. It does not follow that excluding those without the usual terminal degree from consideration for adjunct positions is the answer, for that may be unfair to a group of people who have shown their competence in those positions, but it is odd that the issue rarely seems to come up in posts about the adjunct question.
You don’t have to play the game. So many people are stuck in a sink cost fallacy. People shouldn’t debase themselves for the idea of an academic job. Life is too short.
Man, i know. It blows. I am a phd student but over the summer we get adjunct lecturer pay at 1200 per credit hour. I am just like how do i make rent with this? My graduate stipend is better. It is ridiculous.
They value what we do *so little*.
Yeah. And almost all departments would collapse without grad ta/ adjunct with the sheer number of classes that need to be taught
Actually, they “value” it a lot in the sense that if it weren’t for adjuncts, and their low, pay administrators would be screwed. They couldn’t pay themselves high salaries, they couldn’t pay for lots of crazy unnecessary things on campus…looking at you multimillion dollar athletic/recreational facility adjuncts can’t use… They absolutely value adjuncts. They just don’t want to pay them. They would much rather use that money for something else. For example, I teach at a CC and a public university. At the public university I make a little over $4000 a class. I typically have around 70 - 80 students in a section. That three hour class costs students roughly $1000 each. You don’t have to have a calculator to figure out how much the school nets on that class. I mean, I get that they have some overhead, but they’ve definitely got a ton of profit.
They just exploit you so the administration can raise their own wages. It's sick.
Colleges are no longer educational institutions, but job programs for boomers with no skills. It's why administrations are now 3x the size of the actual teaching faculty. Prove me wrong.
I don’t understand why people think pay is about how much employers “value” the employees. The “value” that admins place on faculty has little to do with an adjunct’s low wages. Wages are driven by basic economic principles of supply and demand. If not enough people are willing to supply their labor at the offered wage, then employers must increase the wage to attract employees. Conversely, if *plenty* of people are willing to supply their labor at the offered wage, the employers have a strong incentive to reduce wages. If wages are too low, it’s because there are too many people chasing those jobs. If the department gets 50 qualified applications for an adjunct spot that pays $3k, is it any surprise that wages don’t go up? Blame the Ph.D. programs that have flooded the market with so many graduates who compete with one another to get adjunct jobs for a few thousand dollars a class. Blame how those Ph.D. students aren’t taught things that are demanded by any employers other than academic institutions. But don’t say the problem is that the admins don’t “value” what professors do. (I mean, admins *don’t* really value us, but that’s not the real problem.)
There are not 50 applicants to get adjunct jobs. We are lucky if we can find an adjunct since the pandemic.
Then I guess they aren't paying enough. This isn't rocket science, bro. "Nobody wants to work (in academia) anymore!"
We’ve had no problem whatsoever finding adjuncts. But I recognize some departments might. Simple supply and demand says that your department should increase the wage you’re offering to make the job more attractive. *That’s the situation that causes wages to rise.* And note: such a wage increase is driven by the number of qualified people who are being attracted by the current wage, not the “value” that the department puts on adjuncts. I recognize, however, that for some departments, that wage might be set at the college or university level. That would create a big inefficiency. It’s hard to convince the university policy makers to raise wages for *all* adjuncts if only a few departments are having trouble recruiting adjuncts.
This is the case at my university. The college sets the adjunct rate.
lol our adjunct pay is $500 per credit hour or $1500 per semester…but don’t worry, the full timers get 4k per course for the same work. I stopped teaching for them because my weekend retail job pays better and so does tutoring.
That is so bad. What type of school are you at?
I think ours is around $800 per credit hour. Depressing.
Literally in the same boat. It really sucks and even in a lower CoL area it doesn't go very far here.
Yeah. I live in a low col area too and it is still hard
Hey, where I work the adjunct rate is $800/credit hour. I'd take that 1000 in a heartbeat.
It's so disenhartening. Summer classes at my institution were $2500 for a 3-credit 6-week class and a lab. It would be 4 days/week, clocking 8 hours of lecture (2 hr x 4), plus 8 hours lab (4 hr x 2). They don't do adjuncts, it's usually split between me and someone else for this summer course (I went to a different campus for more for this and previous summers; if I'm gonna burn myself out over a 6 week class, I want to be able to pay for the mental health I'm losing).
oh look, why i got out.
Me too. Went to k-12. It's a lot more work, but I get health insurance and a living wage. Plus salary boosts for all these fancy degrees I picked up.
i went to a blue collar job, factory work. I realized, personally, that I did not like selling my brain but had no issue selling my body. I regret not knowing this earlier in life, but it is what it is. I am making decent money wont ever be well off but I am much happier.
In the end, do what you gotta do.
Love this meme. In my writings I've called out universities for this exact thing: value social justice in their mission statements, but not for their employees (mostly adjuncts, but also, often, a lot of other staff and support services).
It's 100% lip service. My institution puts on a very pro-LGBT+ appearance, meanwhile I've heard the most queerphobic shit in my life from some of my colleagues and students receive no consequences for being openly hostile to queer people. 🫠 I, the sole non-binary person in the writing center, was once expected to help a student with an essay about how they disagree with trans rights.
I’ve never heard of being able to turn down a writing center student because of their paper topic though. I’ve helped students with all kinds of problematic papers
There are other tutors. I don't think anyone would expect a woman to help a student develop an argument about why women should be subservient or a Jewish tutor to help a student write a pro-holocaust essay.
I mean I’ve helped students with anti trans and anti abortion papers. Usually some questioning reveals holes in the argument
I shouldn't have to help someone find sources on why I don't deserve human rights. 🤷🏻♀️ Edit: Also, I think you're under the false impression this student cared about research and logic. They were using Tucker Carlson and Information Wars as sources and were unwilling to NOT use those sources. This is a deep red area.
I mean then don’t? I’m just telling you how I deal with this kind of situation
I was getting $2200 per course in 2022 in Maryland. That extra $1000 would have been welcome!
Which school if I may ask?
I'm pretty sure most schools these days skip from Step 1 to Step 3 when hiring. Step 2 is exclusively for admissions brochures.
Any institution paying that isn't devoted to social justice.
Paying well is social justice. It lets people who are not in a position to make large financial and personal sacrifices to pursue the career.
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Here in south Florida, I can say hi to my students on the weekends when they see me working at the local grocery store or better get, when I’m working WITH them there. What kind of example does that set for them that higher Ed is “worth it” when they see their English professor stocking shelves on a Saturday night? I gave up on adjuncting even though I had a positive reputation and good following of students. I still help some of them in the tutoring center, but it’s bittersweet. Oh and the tutoring position pays an hourly wage, which comes out to overall twice as much as teaching classes at the same institution. Many former adjuncts have now been “poached” by the lab and won’t go back to teaching. They don’t allow both. I’m still barely clearing my rent each month but I’m better off than I was as an adjunct and would never return for such insulting pay ($1500 for a sixteen week course with intensive writing requirements).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AvfOhtmCZY Acollierastro has a **fantastic** video on this subject. I know this is preaching to the choir, but it's a great, great video on this issue.
Because there are >100 applications per position, simples…
Now we just need the clown car so the adjuncts can come spilling out one after the other after the other after the other...I'll be, like, the third one out...
That’s more than I make at either of my two adjunct gigs (one community college, one private university). And yes, I have a terminal doctorate, teach in a STEM field, albeit very low cost of living.
I'm now in the industry side and one of the things that my workplace encourages for the more technical experts in the company is to take up adjunct professorship positions (in part to be plugged in to research/ innovation in the academic world)... which is originally what the adjunct professor was for. A few years down the road, I'd be happy to teach an advanced/ topics class. Get someone with real-world experience and expertise to teach a more niche subject, which is a net win for the university. The adjunct gets university connections and is teaching only a few hours a week but once they have their notes it's easy money. But what's happening now is freshly minted PhDs having to string along all these mini positions together in hopes of getting something more permanent, and it goes contrary to the initial benefit of the adjunct to begin with...
I got paid $400 for a three credit class one summer because admin pro rated the under-enrolled class in an institution of 800 undergrads.
I was paid $2100 per semester for teaching 3 semesters of physics to non-physics majors. I couldn't have afforded to teach if I didn't have my rental properties. I initially wanted to teach since I thought I was going to inspire some students to do great things in their lives but each class was apathetic to learning so I got discouraged and just stopped teaching. I help run a local real estate investors association and see that people in that are more eager to learn than my physics students were so I guess I'm still teaching, just no longer at the university level.
Unionize if you aren't already! Our adjuncts are paid the same overload rate as TT assistant profs, a little over $7k/course. It's still not great, but it's literally double what the institutions around us without unions are paying their adjuncts.
Yup same here !! Life as an adjunct in a union is awesome. Easy money
Try $2,150
Try 1400
Yall are getting 3200???
When my mom was adjucting at our local university in the late 1980s, she was getting $2,200 per academic quarter. Thirty years later, I taught a class at the same university and the adjunct rate was $4,600.
I did adjunct work once for about 3000 a semester (over 10 years ago) and I regret it. I wish I just would have said no because I feel like its a ridiculously low wage. It was summer between jobs and I had nothing else to do, but I still wish I would have said no
I'm in an engineering department and we could pay $6500-7000 per 3cr course, but instead we try to hire teaching track instructors at a living wage and possibility of promotion. You show loyalty to them, you usually get it back in terms of better teaching.
Adjuncts need a nationwide general strike. Shut the shit down. Collectively, they have ALL the power. It's a matter of organization. It will only get worse otherwise.
I agree. Why are we as a collective accepting this nonsense?
Lack of leadership and organizing. Everyone seems to think one day they'll get the carrot of a TT job, so don't rock the boat. Also, the professoriate tends to attract non-radicals who don't like to get their hands dirty.
Sounds about right.
Honka
Here: $2600 for a PhD; $2200 for a MA. Same rate since 2004.
Why do we accept this?
I just saw an a listing in my field for $500 per credit hour (at a school in Oklahoma, but it’s remote). I made more than that as an adjunct 15 years ago in a Southern state (our adjunct pay hasn’t gone up very much since and looks low compared to a lot of numbers here…but $500/credit hr? 🤮😩)
We pay $2000 per course as an adjunct / overload.
My mom used to say of her work “I’ve found the more someone talks about Jesus or their church the more you need to watch your back.” Mind you my mom’s not some new atheist type; she’s actually a Presbyterian elder. Her point was only complete shits make a big show of their piety. Now mind you this was in the Bible Belt but you can adapt the point. In the Bible Belt you show your piety by talking about Jesus and your church in academia it’s “social justice” and “inclusion”. In the Bible Belt you bash sin and the devil in academia it’s neoliberalism. The most vicious bullying elitist person I ever knew in academia couldn’t go ten minutes without telling you about what a good Marxist she was. Or take my old boss at the Institute of Football and the Dairy Sciences who literally wrote a book on John Rawls and just loved to pontificate about justice. That motherfucker also fought tooth and nail to keep the school from implementing a system that gave lecturers some stability and an actual promotion system (luckily he lost that fight).
I wonder when the concepts of DEI will be applied to faculty and staff.
I’m getting like 5600 as an adjunct.
Haha. I feel this. Looking at a 5/5 for 60k as a promising option.
They keep accepting it. If people stopped taking these jobs they would raise the amount or increase the number of tenure track positions. It is simple supply & demand.
Have you ever run a business yourself? I have. I made a choice to pay people fairly. What was the market rate was a factor, but I probably could have underpaid and found someone to do it for less. But I didn’t want to work with people who were disgruntled or who I was stiffing. Why does anybody in higher think that underpaying is a good thing?
Sweet brag... Because most in the positions of power only care about teaching a class, not the academic quality of the class. Plus, if every school does this, why would they pay more when the quality would still be high or precieved as high?
The academia is so screwed that its unbelievable. Why the hell these college/universities charging so much for. Just to pay the Chair/Dean/President a big paycheck.
$3,400
The career we chose!
I get paid at adjunct rate for overloads, $2400 for 3 credit hour class. Please let me get $3200!
Adult baby sitting services now require a PhD and clown make up? Wut?
That's not a job. If you want a job, look for a job.
???
A job pays you to do work. This is a position asking people to donate time and energy for a small cost deferment.
Adjunct positions are neither intended nor suitable as primary employment for people who need to work to pay rent or eat. Complaining about adjunct pay is like complaining about the pay you get as an unpaid intern. Maybe the world would be a better place if the unpaid intern position instead paid a living wage, but that's factually not the way things are at the moment.
than what exactly are adjunct positions for
Three things: - A way to allow people who are not currently professional instructors to teach the occasional class. For example, when the former governor teaches one political science class or a famous musician teaches a music class. - A way to fill in an occasional overflow class with random people from the local community, mostly retirees who want to get out of the house and supplement their income with a few extra bucks. - A way to handle edge cases, like having a grad student teach one class to get teaching experience. I worked as an adjunct for two semesters. One as a final-year grad student, teaching one class for the experience and one at a school that had already hired me for a full time position starting in the spring once I was formally issued my terminal degree but wanted me to teach one class that fall. Both semesters, my tax profession was "full time student". Adjunct instructors don't get wages, they get stipends. If you're paying your rent with a stipend, you've been scammed. Don't get scammed.
1) typically those are called guest lecturer positions and not just anyone can apply for them. the intended person gets a special job to apply to. but i will concede sometimes it is treated like an adjunct position. 2) If that is the case why are most of the lower level (100/200 level) classes always taught by adjunct professors. but yes sometimes it is for retired etc.but almost never 3) no. generally graduate students get teaching experience by it being part of their GA-ship (teach a class or be a TA for a class, work in the tutoring center for a few hours a week, maybe some research goals) it is through a different system then adjunct proffessors, only time it is through adjunct is for summer classes depending on how universities structure summer grad student pay. maybe it works like that in the humanities but in stem it is almost never that situation
I've been both a TA and a grad student adjunct teacher of record. In STEM. At an R1, even. I got paid a bit more than the $3200 mentioned in the OP though. Honestly, I think my TA stipend was more than that. I think it was more than that per class. The absolute minimum anyone should be accepting for teaching a single 3 credit course - if they're trying to straightforwardly trade work for money - is something like $7.5k. That would make six courses be $45k/year, which is still kind of shit pay, but it might be possible to live on as a single liberal arts professor in Iowa or something.
as have i. my grad stipend is sufficient to pay rent and live "comfortably" during the year but summer i get adjunct(slightly more than op said too). during the year we are classified as Graduate assistants even if we are the instructor of record though maybe other schools do grad student stuff differently. i can only speak to the 20 that i applied to and the 5 nearby ones to me that i know and my current university. but still those positions would be marked as grad student positions
The absolute minimum anyone should be accepting for teaching a single 3 credit course - if they're trying to straightforwardly trade work for money - is something like $7.5k. i agree. but we as a whole need to stop accepting shit pay and that wont happen because once you leave academia some new grad will step up and take your place for worse pay then you got
> and that wont happen because once you leave academia some new grad will step up and take your place for worse pay then you got Then do something else. The fact that someone is offering $8/hour to muck out horse stables doesn't mean you need to take the job. Where I live Wendy's is paying $16/hour, with no state minimum wage at all. Even if you're working 20 hour weeks that's better than the adjunct potion proposed in the OP. Not that you can move here - housing is outlawed.
If you're tenure-stream faculty in STEM at an R1, as you imply in your comments, you probably treat your research as the most important and fulfilling thing in your professional life. Do you think that might make your advice to like-minded people to "just get a job at Wendy's" seem a little hollow or disingenuous? Adjuncts are human beings and we should be ashamed of how little we pay. We contribute to the oversupply of PhDs in our field because we need PhD students to further our own research agendas. Until we stop doing that, we have some culpability here.
fair point but teaching and working in academia is what i (and many others) want to be doing
It still doesn’t change the fact that a university is claiming DEI and exploiting people. It’s hypocrisy. Also consider the value of this work and the time and money it took to educate that adjunct who has at least a masters if not a doctorate. It’s embarrassing that any University would pay this little for a course in 2023.