Recent publications re: Adjuncts

The Chronicle of Higher Education has recently published several articles related to adjunct instructors. In "We're not your colleagues" a former full-time faculty member and administrator returns to campus life as an adjunct and sees things diferently; and, "The Price of Gas Fuels Tough Choices for adjuncts" brings up a perhaps unforeseen effect of rising gas prices. See also:

• Inside Higher Ed "Will Adjuncts Pay to be Certified?"
• Inside Higher Ed "For Adjuncts, Progress and Complexities"
  
• Allyn Bacon "adjunct online links library"
  

Also, when asked what advice they had for new part-time teachers, a collection of veteran adjuncts from several departments offered the following:

1. go to in-services and departmental meetings, to get key information
2. seek out your dean and communicate - if you plan a field trip, trip to the library or move/reschedule class for any reason, let your dean know.
   
3. give every student a syllabus on the first day
   
4. read the KCKCC "Adjunct faculty handbook"

Gearing up: Resources and Suggestions

On syllabi, include your name, the textbook title, and dates of exams and activities. The master syllabi templates aren’t finished products – they need specific info. Check out Dave Knopp's insightful 1 page paper re: student vs. faculty expectations of a syllabus. .

Email students ASAP. Sending a mass email is easy.Your class "group" has already been created in Groupwise. Go to the address book and enter the 4 letter abbr. for your department and scroll to your class. Attach syllabus or other materials.

Get to know the Academic Resource Center (ARC).Tutoring isn’t just for struggling students. Bookmark these links and share them - repeatedly, in email, on syllabus, and every chance you get:

• The Reading and Writing Center
• The Math Tutoring Center
  

Learn where the library is and plan a tour ASAP: Contact the main desk at 7650.

Make an effort to break the ice, build community and establish trust. If you’re interested in fresh ideas re: icebreakers, check out one of KCKCC’s first wikis. Build community throughout the semester.

adjuncts: support and development

One recurring theme of this blog is the support of adjunct instructors. Several times I've supported myself and others exclusively through adjunct work at multiple locations, logging as many as 700 miles a week. That's what got me hooked on audio books. Here , in the fall of 2007, as many as 43.7% of classes were taught by adjunct faculty who aren't otherwise employed on campus.

When you consider that adjuncts teach fewer classes - that's a lot of people who work out of their cars, make due with limited, communal, office spaces and spread their commitments across several schools or businesses. Several sources note that the price of gas has already steered startling numbers of students toward online classes, and experts predict these classes will be taught predominantly by adjuncts. These aren't the only challenges facing adjuncts.

Support for adjunct faculty development.
We have significant resources for adjunct faculty, that many don't know about. The Faculty- Staff Development (FSD) site is a great place to find resources. From there, and additionally:

• adjuncts can present symposia and there is a stipend (200$?).
• Funds (up to 375$) are available to attend conferences. (note: be willing to share what you learn. Perhaps write for this blog or interviewing for the audio podcast)
• the FSD adjunct page has the adjunct handbook and several newsletters from different adjunct support organizations.
• FSD sponsors Dine & Design and TechTALK presentations where we share strategies, activies (we don't like the term "lesson plans" but you get the idea), and theory.
  
• you can download Softchalk Software for creating cool interactive online quizzes and instructional material (it's in Angel Support materials). We will have to discuss the benefits of Angel in a future post.
  

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What do you need to know and / or want to talk about? How can we better support adjunct faculty? Post to the comments section of this article.

The importance of humor in teaching

Several unrelated events conspired to inspire the topic today: humor and teaching. A math instructor remarked on the role jokes play in keeping students engaged, and an article on challenges facing adjuncts inadvertently got me thinking about the importance of a sense of humor for teachers.

There are many sources for cartoons for educational purposes online. Cartoons on the web can often be embedded without violating copyright – since 1) it doesn’t technically exist on our site 2) we don't sell it and 3) it's for educational purposes. Images may look better on wiki pages, but... for example from http://xkcd.com/:

Taylor Mali, a teacher turned Slam Poet, has great teaching material on YouTube. Experiencing his poetry (more stand up/ spoken word with a hip hop feel) is hilarious, and he treats math, history and of course language arts. See a collection of links . He’s featured in the video to your right. I particularly like his piece on “The Impotence of Proofreading,” but his rant on “what a teacher really makes” lifts your spirits and provides perspective.

The Faculty Staff Development Library has humorous resources for teaching: books by Al Franken and Bill Cosby, books on topics such as games for instruction, and videos like “what’s so funny about work,” and more.

Victor Borge’s a phonetic punctuation system can lighten up a grammar discussion and teach mechanics. And for me it's practical; living in multilingual environments, I sometimes speak out punctuation to clarify meaning.

additional links:

• How can I use humor effectively in class?
  
• Mali video on rhetoric and the loss of voice in contemporary culture (great video quality)
  
• A list of math cartoons
  
• A list of geography cartoons