BY NICOLE BRAUN

A few weeks ago, I participated virtually in the very first Higher Ed Labor Summit: Building a Movement to Transform U.S. Higher Education. It was a fabulous, inspiring, stimulating and visionary experience.

During the conference, we were put into small focus groups to explore the question of power, how to obtain power, how to embody power, what makes us feel we have power, etc., etc.

The depressing reality is that as an adjunct instructor for over two decades, I do not feel I have power at all.  The economic and health realities I face at age 54 terrify me. As some examples: my university/college employers have never provided health insurance and thus, my health has taken a real hit, which is creeping up on me as I age. I am renting because I could not get a mortgage to buy even a small home—my student loans make it impossible—so I am forced to pay high rent while being at the mercy of a landlord who has a very different value system than my own. I acquired the student loans as a young single mom who believed that the way to “escape” poverty was through higher education and hard work, but life did not work out according to plan. I faced and fought many barriers to obtain my degrees because I believed that if I invested in higher education, it would pay off in a myriad of ways; most importantly: I would be able to transcend my “lot in life” to move my son and myself to a healthier and more economically stable place.  That never happened. I have devoted my entire life to higher education, but I have nothing to show for it. That reality has really been eating at me and has reached a breaking point.

I know I am not alone.

Many of my adjunct comrades face impossible daily situations with the constant feeling that there is no light at the end of the tunnel year after year after year.

Higher education has rampant and extreme inequalities built into its structure and reproduces inequality at every turn. The rhetoric of equality and justice in the university is not the reality at all. All we have to do is look at the fact that almost 75 percent of professors in the US currently are contingent workers to know that something is very wrong and the opposite of socially just and equal.

But back to the question of power. Because I did not want to perpetuate the feeling of powerlessness at the empowering Labor Summit, I tried to think of an example of power from my own experience that I could contribute authentically to the group.

And then, I remembered what was in the process of happening right now at one of the colleges I work for!

Two words, and one keystroke is all it took for Power to emerge: “Reply All.”

***

A brave adjunct at one of the colleges I teach for started it. She wanted to know if adjuncts qualified for the Catastrophic Leave Funds designed for full time faculty. ^[1]

And because adjuncts are invisible, no one bothered to even respond to her question.

After waiting for someone to answer her question for two whole weeks, she got tired of waiting.  So, she hit Reply All and asked her question again, to everyone.

“Can part time faculty participate in the catastrophic leave bank? I asked on 7/1 and never got a response.  Thank you.”

When I saw her email come through, I knew I needed to Reply All in solidarity as another exploited and invisible adjunct professor, so I did.

Then, more Reply Alls started coming in. And a few people even wrote that the treatment and attitude towards adjuncts was shameful. On and on it went, and it was glorious to watch it all unfold.

Some examples and excerpts:

“Does ’Any College, USA’^[2] no longer have an HR department to answer this question? This seems very disrespectful to our very valued part-time faculty.”

“I wanted to let you know that I have followed-up with the following individuals on our behalf to see if we can get some answers. Although I believe this is a workplace environment issue, I find that I also voice our concerns that we are not being communicated with to the appropriate individuals.”

“I forwarded our concerns with the Deans as I have had a few issues with HR myself recently. I find it necessary to speak up on behalf of my part-time faculty. “

“It’s not right that we are not being answered and simply ignored. I apologize to any of you who feel this way.”

“Finally, I’m going to respond to the emails as well. I have always heard the saying, ‘the squeaky wheel gets the oil.’  Well, I think it’s time that we do more than squeak. ”

***

As a result, an adjunct group is now formed. We are talking about the issues we face and doing research and making plans. I have a feeling more Reply Alls are on the horizon…

In fact, as I complete writing this piece, this morning, another adjunct email came through to our newly formed adjunct group that was born out of our Reply Alls.

This adjunct wrote, “Also, I’d like to point out an ongoing irony: floods of emails for new non-faculty positions, many of them full-time and benefited, while our part-time faculty ranks have crept up to this absurd percentage. Just sayin’. It’s only a matter of time before I see yet another one of those and reply all, by the beard of Zeus.”

Indeed.

***

To be continued…

Nicole Braun has been teaching sociology as an exploited adjunct at numerous colleges for over two decades and is pretty tired in a lot of ways but hopeful for a more socially just world in the very near future.

^[1] As many of us in academia know, the language around “full time” and “part time” is problematic—i.e., many adjuncts work more than full time, just at multiple colleges and universities all at the same time.

^[2] I was not sure how to handle the name of the college (which I can’t divulge, obviously, because I’m an adjunct), so I asked for ideas for pseudonyms from a number of adjunct and social-justice-minded friends.  Some also gave explanations as to why they chose the name they did.  Here are a few of their responses:

• Ekmetalefs
• St. Joseph’s
• Fancy Place
• “I name fake schools after people in history who have run Ponzi schemes”
• Gotham University
• American Colleges and Universities
• Boot Hill College of Hypothetical Dreams
• University Just About a Mile from the OK Corral
• Marygrove
• McUniversity
• University College
• Mythos College
• Hard Knox U