The AU adjuncts want to organize. A number have been in discussions with a local union, claiming they deserve more job security, better pay and other faculty benefits such as office space.
While The Eagle is hesitant to fully embrace an adjunct professor union, we do think University officials should give the issue its due attention — much more than they are now giving it. The AU community needs to have this debate.
Some might say adjunct professors are the unheralded sixth man of AU, if we’re going to use sports metaphors. They provide excellent instruction and real world experience to supplement teaching classes for which tenured and assistant professors are unavailable.
However, the more one looks at the statistics, the more it is clear that adjuncts are all-star players. An astonishing 47 percent of college professors nationwide are adjuncts, and it is estimated that AU employs a similar proportion.
Far from teaching a small share of classes, they directly impact the number of students AU can handle. Higher student capacity in tandem with steady instructional quality means more tuition dollars for the University.
Despite the clear financial benefit adjuncts pose to the University, AU hardly gives them the royal treatment.
The University doesn’t keep average adjunct salaries, but individual information demonstrates the disparity between adjunct pay and University benefit. AU adjunct Professor Bob Lehrman says he is paid $4,000 to $5,000 a semester. Yet he calculated that each of his courses produce over $25,000 in tuition money.
That’s a huge margin. Especially considering that these adjuncts are given very little in terms of teaching support. No office. No benefits. No job security.
This last point is especially important. Employing adjuncts gives the University a lot of flexibility in hiring professors last minute, as they’re needed. Yet this also means they can be let go with equal ease, with virtually no warning.
Some may not understand why adjunct professors would need either benefits or extended contracts. Isn’t this a second job for these professors? Doesn’t their original profession provide heath, life and dental?
Indeed, this is the case for many adjuncts. However, a significant proportion of these professors — nearly 28 percent, according to Lehrman — depend on multiple adjunct positions as a vital part of their income. Job volatility can significantly affect this group, and options for benefits and respectable contracts seem to be clear solutions.
Clearly, the University needs to reexamine its policy toward adjuncts. At the most basic level, lack of transparency from the administration on the issue has been discouraging. All salary information for AU professors is public — except for adjuncts. When asked about his position on the issue, President Kerwin offered a curt “no comment,” claiming that he had heard no official demands from adjuncts. Other administrators were equally reluctant to offer straightforward answers.
Only Dean of Academic Affairs Phyllis Peres offered a clear “no” to the idea of an adjunct union. Unfortunately, she explained her position only by offering that her opinion was only that a union was unnecessary. Surely, we can have a greater exchange of ideas than this.
Hopefully after both this editorial and increased pressure from organized adjunct professors, AU will be more willing to explain its opposition to a union. Only then can we have the open and thought-provoking debate that the issue deserves.
This potential debate could provide the information needed to make an informed decision on the issue. Without this information, The Eagle hesitates to fully endorse an adjunct union just yet.
The use of adjuncts as a cost saver for the University cannot be underestimated. At a time when AU students average the most student debt in the D.C. region, AU should make relative tuition stability a priority. Should the union and organized adjuncts demonstrate that a union would not lead to skyrocketing tuition fees, then The Eagle would be the union’s biggest supporter. Until then, we will remain watching and waiting.
So, let’s have this debate so we can hear the arguments from both sides. It’s time for AU to listen to the adjuncts’ case, and make a transparent and coherent response. ? E
