Second-class Professors

[mike_c]

30. many lecturers in the CSU make less money than fast food workers are asking for....

Fast food workers are asking for $15/hr in many cities, which is about $30K annually for full time work. If I'm not mistaken, the average salary of CSU lecturers is in the $25K range, with no benefits whatsoever and little job security from one semester to the next. Mind you, many of those folks, if not most, are as academically qualified as their tenure track and tenured colleagues. They are truly second class workplace citizens. I don't think most people understand that the application of corporate administrative models in higher education has reduced the professoriate that students depend upon to a part time, contingent and tenuous work force of desperate wage slaves.

On edit-- I should point out that contingent faculty in the CSU have some of the best contract protections of any such workforce in the nation, but they're STILL second class workers and itinerant academicians, trying to mentor the next generation of educated Americans despite being stressed, exhausted, and desperately underpaid.