Adjunct teaching: Ain't it Wonderful!

Universities think I’m disposable, but my non-tenured status makes me a better teacher from Salon
"As an adjunct, I'm in the institution but not of it, an often-invisible loose end; I wouldn't have it any other way."
In academe these days, even the best teachers are easily replaceable.  This author just hasn't been replaced enough times in her career.

Other Measures of Crisis in Higher Ed

Why I Defaulted on My Student Loans (Lee Siegel) from the New York Times 
"I refused to waste my life to pay back a pointless and overbearing debt. ... Moneyed stumbles never seem to have much consequence. Tax fraud, insider trading, almost criminal nepotism — these won’t knock you off the straight and narrow. But if you’re poor and miss a child-support payment, or if you’re middle class and default on your student loans, then God help you. Forty years after I took out my first student loan, and 30 years after getting my last, the Department of Education is still pursuing the unpaid balance. "

U Wisconsin -- Who's Next?

Goodbye, Madison (Josh Marshall) from Talking Points Memo
"As he readies to run for president and grabs whatever low hanging fruit on the conservative agenda tree he can find, Scott Walker is now planning to strip tenure from professors in the University of Wisconsin higher education system."
NO ONE should be surprised by this -- and it would be a mistake to think this was simply the product of a right wing nutcase like Scott Walker. Elected officials and university presidents and administrators alike are beginning to realize that they don't need tenure to attract a very good quality faculty -- and that the savings can be enormous!  A majority of professors teaching college-level humanities courses are already temporary faculty.  

The Cost of an Adjunct

The Cost of an Adjunct (Laura McKenna) from the Atlantic
"The plight of non-tenured professors is widely known, but what about the impact they have on the students they’re hired to instruct?"

EDUCATION BOOK NUGGET!!

Teaching Teaching (Joe Nocera) from the New York Times
"I’m starting to wonder if we’ve entered some kind of golden age of books about education. ... The common belief, held even by many people in the profession, that the best teachers are “natural-born” is wrong, she writes. The common characteristic of her main characters is that they have broken down teaching into certain key skills, which can be taught."

The Problem with Thomas Piketty

“Capital” Destroys Right-wing Lies, but There’s One Solution it Forgets (Thomas Frank) from Salon
"After "Capital," we'll never talk income inequality or meritocratic myths the same way. But we must talk unions."

How to Humiliate an Anti-Gay Bigot

“You’re Leaving? Are You Effing Kidding?” An Anti-Gay Bigot Gets Humiliated from Salon
"Peter LaBarbera came to my college to "expose" the "gay agenda." He wasn't expecting what would happen instead. ... Dozens of people, of their own volition and for myriad reasons, showed him that the tide has turned. It’s just a matter of time. Love will always win."

Would You Like Fries with that Ph.D?

What Can You Do With a Humanities Ph.D., Anyway? (Elizabeth Segran) from Atlantic
"As English professor William Pannapacker put it in Slate a few years back, “a humanities Ph.D. will place you at a disadvantage competing against 22-year-olds for entry-level jobs that barely require a high-school diploma.” His advice to would-be graduate students was simple: Recognize that a humanities Ph.D is now a worthless degree and avoid getting one at all cost. ... Adjuncts have every reason to be angry: Apart from their abysmal pay, they are often treated as second-class citizens by their departments and colleagues. But their fate is not the only option for those who do not land tenure-track positions."