Contingent Faculty and Academic Freedom

Contingent Faculty and Academic Freedom in the Twenty-First Century, by Stephen A. Smith

As we celebrate the centennial of the AAUP’s 1915 Declaration on Academic Freedom and Tenure, those core principles are still essential, but the changing administrative regime of higher education institutions has put them at risk. The dramatic increase in the number and percentage of contingent faculty positions— those on annual or term contracts rather than tenured or tenure-track appoint- ment—undermines academic freedom in teaching, research, and public service. Where academic freedom was once fought and secured against specific charges or external pressures from particular ideological forces, the threat is now more insidious and structural from within the academy as well as outside interests.

It is beyond the scope of this article to detail the forces and circumstances that have led to cuts in public funding for public universities and the growing reliance on private funds with motives and priorities that have often compromised the mission, priorities, and core academic values of the scholarly enterprise of both public and private institutions. The increasingly ubiquitous market-driven education policy and its consequences have been argued quite well by others.1

The point I wish to address is the seismic shift to contingent faculty and the stagnant or reduced number of tenure and tenure-track faculty. The argument is always economic exigence rather than any claim that it improves the quality of education. Administrators resist approving tenure track lines to save money by hiring contingent faculty with lower salaries and reduced benefits. At the same time, this alleged policy of scrimping has done nothing to slow the growth of the number of administrators and their salaries, an obvious point without mentioning the salaries and contracts of athletic coaches. Only faculty salaries and positions seem to be fodder in the losing battle to hold down the cost of tuition and fees for our students.

Contingent appointments have comprised a majority of all faculty positions for more than a decade. While adjuncts, lecturers, instructors, post-docs, and visiting faculty members are valuable, even essential, they are not particularly valued by their institutions, and of this they are well aware.2 They are often hired without a serious search; their lower salaries, inadequate office space, and lack of job security reflect the lack of commitment from the university; and their exclusion from the governance process further undermines their status.

There is no academic freedom without job security. For contingent faculty, this is primarily an issue about freedom to teach in their classes, where they are at risk for non-reappointment on the basis of a single complaint from a student or any- one else. In “at will” employment states, they can be fired on a whim without cause. After being terminated, one adjunct was denied the right to file a formal grievance, since she was no longer an employee.3 Such a precarious position is hardly one that will foster or even allow intellectual creativity in the classroom.

Beyond academic freedom in the classroom, the consequences for the institution are enormous.4 The high turnover of contingent faculty deprives academic depart- ments of their participation in mentoring new colleagues, peer review of scholar- ship, and experience on committees for faculty governance. Assignment to onerous teaching loads makes it difficult for contingent faculty to pursue a long- term research program, contribute to the production of knowledge, and build the professional publication record necessary for promotion or consideration for a tenure-track opening.

The exclusion of contingent faculty from the governing process also has serious consequences for academic freedom. In 1994, the American Association of Univer- sity Professors explicated the integral role of faculty governance for academic free- dom,5 and the American Federation of Teachers argued in 2007 that the “greatest threat to academic freedom today is the subtle removal of many faculty positions from the tenure track and from engagement with institutional power through shared governance structures like faculty senates.”6 Judith Areen skillfully develops the First Amendment perspective and suggests that academic freedom “is not only about faculty research and teaching; it is also about the freedom of faculties to govern their institutions in a way that accords with academic values whether they are approving the curriculum, hiring faculty, or establishing graduation requirements.”7

Whether by design or default, there now exists a clear class division among the faculty, and the resulting conflict is of benefit to neither the contingent nor the tenured faculty. The consequences are real and are realized.8 Dividing the faculty into two ideological classes “with divergent attitudes about teaching and research is a recipe for faculty powerlessness overall.”9

Unless we are prepared to accept that exploited labor and the diminution of academic freedom is now the fundamental nature of higher education, we must strengthen job security for dedicated contingent academics and thereby bolster academic freedom for all faculty. The first approach should be to negotiate renew- able contracts that echo the parameters for academic freedom afforded tenured faculty. That can be done only by individual begging for favors or through collec- tive bargaining for a contract, and I believe the latter to be more effective.

The impetus for improved contracts must begin on each campus. Unless the contingent faculty are motivated, dedicated, and articulate in their demands for a fair contract, success is unlikely. Organizing contingent faculty is not easy. Some have no interest in securing permanent or full-time employment and are satisfied with their current annual contract; some have health or retirement benefits from a second job; many will be fearful about the possibility of being fired for union activity or blacklisted for other jobs. You can count on organized and well- financed opposition from the administration. For those reasons and others, it is imperative that the tenured faculty be concerned and involved in supporting the organizing efforts of the contingent faculty.10

The freedom to organize and bargain collectively is a First Amendment right that must be both exercised and defended. A number of academic associations and unions are invested in helping provide the tools to develop an organizing campaign, providing model contract language, and suggesting bargaining strategies. These include the AAUP One Faculty campaign; Service Employees International Union (SEIU); United Auto Workers (UAW); American Federation of Teachers (AFT), Newspaper Guild/Communications Workers (CWA); National Education Association (NEA); United Steelworkers (USW); American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), and others have all had some success in organizing and representing faculty, both adjunct and tenured. An affiliation with one of these groups will be very helpful and perhaps necessary. With current adjunct organizing campaigns in 24 states and the District of Columbia,11 get involved, get experience, get organized, and get a fair contract that protects academic freedom.

Notes

• [1]  Stanley Aronowitz, The Knowledge Factory: Dismantling the Corporate University and Creat- ing True Higher Learning (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 2000); Derek Curtis Bok, Universities in the Marketplace: The Commercialization of Higher Education (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003); Christopher Newfield, Unmaking the Public University: The Forty- Year Assault on The Middle Class (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011); Henry A. Giroux, Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education (Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2014).

• [2]  Jennifer McGaha, “Bah, Humbug: 14 Facts Everyone Should Know About College Adjuncts,” Huffington Post, December 16, 2014.http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jennifer- mcgaha/bah-humbug-14-facts-every_b_6328028.html

• [3]  Robin Wilson, “Adjuncts Fight Back Over Academic Freedom,” The Chronicle of Higher Education 55.6 (2008): A1.

• [4]  American Association of University Professors, “Contingent Appointments and the Academic Profession,” AAUP Policy Document and Reports, 11th ed. (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2014).

• [5]  American Association of University Professors, “On the Relationship of Faculty Governance to Academic Freedom,” AAUP Policy Document and Reports, 11th ed. (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2014).

• [6]  Scott Jaschick, “No University Is an Island: Interview with Cary Nelson,” Inside Higher Education, December 17, 2009. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/12/17/nelson

• [7]  Judith C. Areen, “Government as Educator: A New Understanding of First Amendment Protection of Academic Freedom and Governance,” Georgetown Law Journal 97 (2009): 945–1000, 947.

• [8]  John Warner, “Just Visiting: ASU and Non-tenured Human Shields,” Inside Higher Education, December 16, 2014. https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/just-visiting/asu- and-non-tenured-human-shields

• [9]  Scott Jaschick, “Redefining Academic Freedom,” Inside Higher Education, April 2, 2007. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/04/02/adjuncts

• [10]  Cary Nelson, No University is an Island: Saving Academic Freedom (New York, NY: New York University Press, 2010).

• [11]  Joe Berry and Helena Worthen, “Wave of Contingent-Faculty Organizing Sweeps onto Campuses.” LaborNotes, October 8, 2014.http://www.labornotes.org/blogs/2014/10/wave- contingent-faculty-organizing-sweeps-campuses

Stephen Smith (Ph.D., Northwestern) is Professor of Communication at the University of Arkansas. He is a past President of ACFSME Local 965 and of the Northwest Arkansas Central Labor Council (AFL-CIO). Correspondence to: Stephen Smith, Department of Communication, University of Arkansas, 417 Kimpel Hall, Fayetteville, AR 72701, USA. E-mail: [email protected]. 

 First Amendment Studies, 2015. Vol. 49, No. 1, 27–30, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/21689725.2015.1016362. Downloaded by [University of Arkansas Libraries - Fayetteville] at 11:13 23 March 2015 

Reposted from Joe Berry's COCAL Updates, published March 28, 2015 to email subscription list, various listservs and social media groups and publicly to H-Adjunct