|
Articles Conference Reviews |
2008C5VieDoing the Right Thing: The Realities of the Untenured Professor I must admit that I was expecting a different kind of session based on the title. When I read “the realities of the untenured professor,” I was expecting to see a session that discussed the realities of life on the tenure track; that is, I had hoped to hear about what to do as an untenured (but tenure track) assistant professor. However, I was pleasantly surprised by the panel “Doing the Right Thing,” which discussed the realities of life as a non-tenure track professional, particularly at Kennesaw State University in Georgia, where the panelists work. Our small group sat in a circle to listen to the presenters, then broke into discussion at the end of the panel. The discussion was a useful one for anyone who works at an institution where there is a mixture of contingent and full-time tenure-track faculty—which is to say almost any institution. Letizia Guglielmo Guglielmo began by citing Barbara McKenna's “The Myth of the Tenured Faculty,” ([http://www.aft.org/pubs-reports/on_campus/marapr07/feature.htm]) noting that only 30% of the academic workforce is tenured, full time on the tenure track, or on full time renewable contracts. Because approximately 70% of the academic workforce is then on part-time/adjunct contracts, McKenna notes, the research capacity and productivity of faculty is threatened. Shifts in this area (whether TT or non-TT) is not, as often rumored, a result of lowered enrollments. McKenna's piece discusses some of the other reasons why so much of the academic workforce labors under contingent contracts. Guglielmo describes how women are more strongly represented in these part-time contracts and details some of the potential effects of contingent contracts: decreased student learning, loss of academic freedom, issues of equity among academic colleagues, and lowered integrity of faculty work. For example, under “decreased student learning,” Guglielmo showed how part-time faculty are sometimes discouraged to interact with students outside of class, leading to fewer opportunities for student learning outside of the classroom. As a result, Guglielmo argued, programs should follow the Wyoming Resolution, which stated that “programs should not rely on more than 10% of contingent faculty.”1 She then turned to Kennesaw State University in Georgia as a potential case study of a school that “needed a dedicated teaching corps for general education” and created in 2001 twenty full-time MA-level instructorships to meet that need. These instructors were full members of the department with the rights and privileges associated, such as voting; carried a 5/5 teaching load; and were given professional development monies to attend conferences, be trained at the Digital Media and Composition Institute ([http://dmp.osu.edu/dmac/]), etc. As one of the instructors hired under this initiative, Guglielmo spoke to its successes, but also pointed out that Kennesaw has neglected to hire any additional instructors under this program, instead hiring more part-time faculty. Thus, the future of the full-time instructorship program remains unknown, but has a proven background of success (many of the instructors have been granted promotion to assistant professor with tenure after their nine-year probationary period). Linda Stewart: Doing the Right Thing: Innovations in Faculty Development Stewart first showed a short video on her laptop from Yvonne, an instructor at Kennesaw who did not receive professional development monies to attend CCCC. Stewart then used the Spike Lee film Do The Right Thing as a framework for discussing responsibilities for contingent faculty, which unfortunately could not be considered as easily as a one-size-fits-all “right thing” to do. Instead, Stewart argued, we must look at the “realities hidden, ignored, not acted upon” to consider what “the right thing” in situations with contingent faculty might be. Drawing on Eileen Schell's Gypsy Academics and Mother-Teachers: Gender, Contingent Labor, and Writing Instruction, Stewart described how she wanted to, in essence, “slide a kitchen table” into the traditional parlor we often use as a metaphor for discourse. One of the ways to do this is to offer in-house conferences for professional development of contingent faculty; this allows us to reverse the flow of knowledge (lore strongly influencing theory and not vice versa) and offer an opportunity just like a real conference, but at the local institution. One Kennesaw in-house conference tackled teaching with technology, and Stewart provided a handout that detailed the invitation for faculty to present at the conference (held in Fall 2006). The conference was such a success, Stewart said, that not only contingent faculty applied to present, but full time and tenure track faculty did as well. Stewart closed with another short clip from Yvonne discussing how the opportunities presented at the in-house conference made her more confident about her abilities using technology in the classroom but also her abilities as a researcher. Laura Davis: Composing New Realities for Research and Scholarship Davis closed the presentation by discussing opportunities to encourage contingent faculty to participate in research and scholarship, using the metaphor of a bookshelf at one's institution empty of scholarship from contingent faculty and full of books written by associate and full professors: “We are only 30% of what we could be” if we allow that to happen. Davis began by questioning why part-timers and contingent faculty are not encouraged to publish, even though that activity can potentially enhance their scholarship and their teaching. She notes that often administrators wish to protect these faculty out of concerns for their heavy teaching loads and time constraints; however, Davis noted that other part-time faculty have been described as not wanting to publish because stereotypical views of many female contingent faculty (i.e. “all they want to do is just teach and be moms”). Davis described how her project, an edited collection that grew out of the in-house conference Stewart discussed in her presentation. She explained that composing this text was an opportunity for faculty to write about teaching with technology, participate in a peer review process, and publish even while teaching 4/4 or 5/5 loads. A piece about the process of working with the collection and conference will appear in Pedagogy ([http://www.dukeupress.edu/pedagogy/]). 1 Robertson, Linda R., Sharon Crowley, and Frank Lentricchia. “The Wyoming Conference Resolution Opposing Unfair Salaries and Working Conditions for Post-Secondary Teachers of Writing.” College English 49 (1987): 274-80. |