Was just offered $1100 a class to teach as an adjunct

[JCMach1]

I started my own business when I returned to the states (it's going fine). However, I find myself in need of cash, so I started checking the market for adjunct instructors.

I did find a position, but they freaking pay $1100 a class...

When you add in the time you work, that works out to about $5.00 an hour without any tips.

I made significantly more each semester as a TA in 1992 for crisssssake...

Also, when you start subtracting for taxes, FICA, Medicare, gas for the commute etc. it drops to around 800 or so. That makes it a whopping $3.63 per hour.

[MiddleFingerMom]

1. "I'm taking you out to dinner & thanks to my new job." leans back, puts thumbs under suspenders...

.
.
.
... "you can supersize it, baby!!!"
.
.
.

[petronius]

2. It's an absolute travesty, the way lecturers and adjuncts are treated

And not just in the matter of pay, but across the board in terms of support and respect...

[JCMach1]

6. Seriously...

I can make more donating blood most likely (not much of an exaggeration.

[mrmpa]

3. Adjuncts at..........

Duquesne University (Catholic University in Pittsburgh) are attempting to organize under the auspices of the United Steel Workers. I laughed my ass off when the University tried to argue with the National Labor Relations Board, that as a Catholic University they were exempt from having unionized employees and it was also against their Catholic beliefs to have union workers on their campus.

[KoKo]

4. Are you still in Nairobi, Kenya as your Bio Says? I thought you were

in UAI's...last I heard teaching.

What's been going on with you. It would be fascinating how you ended up in Nairobi, Kenya...and how are you getting taxed in USA Dollars for as you say in OP:


Also, when you start subtracting for taxes, FICA, Medicare, gas for the commute etc. it drops to around 800 or so. That makes it a whopping $3.63 per hour.

I haven't kept up with you..since your UIA's stay...do forgive me for asking but your bio says Kenya.

[JCMach1]

5. No back in the states... UAE and Nairobi would pay significantly more

[KoKo]

20. Ahh...thanks...!

I wondered why you left UAI and back to the States...with that long travail.

You have been here on DU long time like myself. So, that's why I was curious. And, maybe you've posted about it and I just need to do the "DU Search" if you don't want to reply in this thread.

Anyway...it was interesting to know you were back here.

[mysuzuki2]

7. I was paid that amount 30 years ago at UMass, Dartmouth.

I couldn't survive on that so I got out of college teaching. I would tell them to fuck off if I was you!

[JCMach1]

8. Pretty much decided not to take it for all of those reasons...

Probably can take in that much cash by doing a few festivals and things with my small business.

[davidpdx]

9. I have a friend who I met while teaching at a university here in Korea

She went back home for awhile and taught as an adjunct and said the same thing. After a year she came back and made better money here full time. She started working on her Phd and returned to the US about a year ago as she is working on her dissertation. Hopefully that will work out better.

I have taught in Korea (and China) for many years at all levels including four years at the university level. Teaching ESL at the university level is getting too competitive so I ended up going back for a DBA (I already have an MBA) and am hoping to get a position teaching Business full-time while doing adjunct online.

The only decent positions in universities there are if you have or are on tenure track.

[RedCloud]

10. Blatant exploitation.

Probably one or two students pay that much just to take the class. So the rest they are scamming,

[Bucky]

11. I was paid more as an adjunct in Houston in the mid-90s... with only a bachelor's degree

But maybe colleges have to pay less due to instructors to the way they've been slashing tuition costs over the past 20 years.



oh, wait a minute...

[JCMach1]

12. Seriously, seems like slave labor... sent them an email back today letting them know what I thought

of their business model.

Students there pay 300 something per credit hr. which works out to something like a $1000+ per course. Multiply that x 25 and you get what each class makes...

Probably goes without saying... for profit colleges are a very big scam for all involved.

[kiva]

13. For 3 credits?

Damn, that's ridiculous.

[JCMach1]

14. yes 3!!!

[Crabby Appleton]

15. Death of an adjunct

Margaret Mary Vojtko, an adjunct professor of French for 25 years, died underpaid and underappreciated at age 83

On Sept. 1, Margaret Mary Vojtko, an adjunct professor who had taught French at Duquesne University for 25 years, passed away at the age of 83. She died as the result of a massive heart attack she suffered two weeks before. As it turned out, I may have been the last person she talked to.

On Aug. 16, I received a call from a very upset Margaret Mary. She told me that she was under an incredible amount of stress. She was receiving radiation therapy for the cancer that had just returned to her, she was living nearly homeless because she could not afford the upkeep on her home, which was literally falling in on itself, and now, she explained, she had received another indignity -- a letter from Adult Protective Services telling her that someone had referred her case to them saying that she needed assistance in taking care of herself. The letter said that if she did not meet with the caseworker the following Monday, her case would be turned over to Orphans' Court.


http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/opinion/perspectives/death-of-an-adjunct-703773/#ixzz2fFjyUCaT

[LWolf]

16. And I've been hearing

about how professors make too much money, and that's why tuition is out of reach.

[raccoon]

17. One reason tuition is going up, at state colleges anyway, is that the states are giving them MUCH

less money than they used to.

[LWolf]

19. That makes sense.

I'm so tired of all the bullshit that gets put out there about teachers at all levels with short days, high pay, etc., etc., etc..

[Locut0s]

18. I remember talking to an adjunct professor at school some years back...

He may have been a quarter time lecturer and not adjunct now that i think of it but it is basically the same thing pay wise. He was a nice guy and a good teacher. Somehow we got onto the subject of pay and I was shocked how little he was being paid, he was having trouble making rent and car payments. I was paid better as an assistant manager at 7-11 and this guy was teaching 3rd term calculus classes at university. Sad.

[No Vested Interest]

21. Can you negotiate?

Do they need someone to teach that course, or do they have their pick of many?

Tell them what you think you should be paid and see where it goes.

[JCMach1]

23. non-negotiable...

There should really be adjunct (part-time) education work laws in all states... i.e. establish a definition/conversion for credit hours and hours of work.

i.e. 2 course should equal 20hr. per week and the minimum paid should AT LEAST reflect that.

[Art_from_Ark]

22. As they told me when I did adjunct teaching in Japan,

"O-kane yori, meiyo desu". Meaning, "It's more for the honor than for the money". I really had to keep that in mind when I received my roughly $24 per lesson (based on one hour of class time, and two hours preparation time per lesson).

[Gidney N Cloyd]

24. 1100 is roughly what our college pays adjuncts __per credit hour.__

And we're about par for the area.

[JCMach1]

25. That's much more acceptable than $1100 for 3 hrs.... at least that would be close to minimum wage...