This semester the California Faculty Association—the union for the California State University system, where I currently teach—voted to strike for better salaries, more sustainable workloads, paid leave, and in response to ongoing health and safety issues, among them poor conditions for lactating faculty. Many campuses are striking this week. CFA represents almost 30,000 faculty members across 23 campuses. This is the first strike for the CFA since 2016, but in recent years, the adjunct and graduate student labor movement has been growing. Over the past two years, there have been strikes at NYU, Rutgers, New School, UCLA, Yale, and many other campuses. Here is an excellent primer on what’s going on.1
If you’re new to all this, some basics: an adjunct is a contingent faculty member, which means they are hired on a contract, per-class basis. Put simply, they are hired to teach one class, or maybe a couple of classes if they’re lucky, for one semester. Occasionally, there are systems in place that help long-time adjuncts get some staffing preference (like they get offered courses before newer adjuncts), but tenured faculty and college administrators who control course offerings each semester have no obligation to re-hire or accommodate scheduling requests.
More often, classes get cancelled at the last minute due to low enrollment or other issues. An adjunct may lose their income for an entire 16-week semester with no warning after they have potentially declined other work. This means most adjuncts (and even lecturers, who sometimes receive a bit more job security after several years of teaching) often end up teaching classes at multiple campuses. Pre-pandemic, we were often called “freeway flyers,” because rushing from class to class around the city was so common— not only because classes are lost last minute, but because pay for one class averages about $3500, and many adjuncts live below the poverty line.
Despite all this, the number of part-time faculty in US colleges and universities has been growing, and the number of tenured faculty shrinking: In 2021, over 2/3 faculty members in US colleges and universities held contingent appointments; about half were part-time. Adjuncts tend to have the same qualifications as those with full-time appointments (years of experience, advanced degrees, impressive publications and scholarly work, etc); they just get paid much less, have little to no job security, and rarely receive any benefits.
I have been adjuncting since 2009. During that time, I’ve had two children, moved across the country twice, and finished two graduate degrees. I have lost classes, been sent into financial and existential panic. I have also occasionally, mere days before the start of a semester, received news that an extra class was available for me to teach, then restructured my entire life to make it work, sometimes designing whole courses in a matter of days, only to find myself overwhelmed, still panicking about money and professional identity the following semester. I have driven countless miles and pumped breast milk in dusty, dirty closets on college campuses. In the first few years of parenting, I reapplied to the open market for health insurance numerous times a year, as my income fluctuated wildly. For a few years, my kids and I were on and off WIC, even though I was teaching. Don’t even get me started on childcare.
Health insurance was not sponsored by my college employers unless I taught multiple classes a semester for multiple consecutive semesters, a decision that was always out of my control, even when I gained staffing preference after several years of teaching at a community college in California. The most I have been paid for one course is a net of about $5,000. That’s for at least three hours of in-person teaching per week for 16 weeks, in addition to countless hours grading, creating lesson plans, assignments and syllabi, redesigning coursework for various educational platforms, interfacing with students on and offline, and holding office hours, a load that has grown immeasurably in recent years as students struggle more with mental health, finances, the state of the world, and educational disparities. Adjuncts are only payed for in-class hours, so if you really break down the hourly rate, it’s usually about minimum wage. One report found that 1/3 make less than $25,000/year and 25% are on public assistance.
Unsurprisingly, I received no compensation for the three hours round-trip I spent this semester driving to teach, much less mileage, or tax breaks for travel, and I was not given the option to teach online (though many full time faculty teach exclusively online).
Adjuncting can be degrading, infantilizing, and disenfranchising. And, importantly, it is by no means the worst work there is. I truly value my students and teaching is something I feel lucky to do. Classroom discussion and creativity and community are revelatory. But part-time faculty members’ love of the profession is frequently exploited, just as it is for K-12 teachers, and those who work in other public and care sectors.
So when I was offered one class this spring at the public university where I was thrilled to return as a lecturer in person this fall (after losing my lectureship in 2020 in response to pandemic enrollment declines), I said no. I have only turned down classes a handful of times in over ten years of teaching, usually because of scheduling conflicts I couldn’t get around.
But American higher ed is increasingly impacted by bottom-line thinking, which is why colleges and universities have shifted to predominantly cheap adjunct labor. It should come as no surprise that women and scholars of color are those who are most affected by this shift. A fall 2021 report showed that “women and underrepresented minority (URM) faculty members held part-time appointments in greater proportions than men and non-URM faculty members” and “women and URM faculty members held contingent appointments in greater proportions than men and non-URM faculty members.”
Women make up the majority of adjunct positions.
The motherhood penalty frequently converges with the tenure track (a set of professional and intellectual steps new full-time faculty members must complete to get tenure, notoriously designed for men with wives), kicking women off that track during childbearing years—this is in large part due to how the productivity-centered track is structured and it’s absence of flexibility for women who bear children. But even for women without kids, maternal expectations are everywhere: it’s harder for women to say no to free and emotional labor in the academy, workplace climates often push women out. For mothers of color, there are many added challenges, not least of which is the expectation that scholars of color take on more unpaid diversity and inclusion work.
I’ve become increasingly uncomfortable with accepting my fate in such a system.
And yet, one of the primary reasons I was able to say no this time, and to write this essay, is because in January I will begin teaching through Stanford’s continuing education creative writing program— a class at a private university that pays a little better than other adjunct positions I’ve held in the past, and has the flexibility of being held at night and online. This position is still term-to-term and does not make up anywhere near an annual income (it’s only 10 weeks!) and it’s totally contingent, which means, again, no benefits, no guarantees. I could be out of job any time the department faces budget cuts or has enrollment dips.
I’ll continue to do guest lectures and speaking engagements and other classes that pay me what I feel my time is worth, and I am not yet ruling out applying to full-time positions in the academy in the future because every year is a struggle to piece together a full-time income that will support my family. In higher ed, we often call the process of looking for tenure-track jobs “going on the market”— like we are sacks of meat hanging ourselves in a window. It’s hard for me to rule out this option entirely and forever, as some have done in essays like these. I’ve spent a few seasons “on the market,” most of them disrupted by the pandemic. I remain entirely too anxious and uncertain about how I will continue to support my family to definitively rule out anything.
But for the time being, I will be turning my focus more fully to the work I do here, to my next book, to occasional freelance writing assignments, and to teaching creative writing.
Another reason I am able to do this, and to experience it as something like a choice, is because I have found other contingent teaching jobs through a variety of creative writing organizations. These organizations do take a big cut from student tuition fees before paying out instructors (I earn about half what you pay for a class of mine if it’s hosted by another organization), and they also don’t provide me with health insurance or other benefits— but these small arts organization are less able to do that than major colleges and universities who pay administrators six-figure salaries. These arts organizations also promote the offerings they host, which has connected me with some truly incredible writers, many of whom I still work with today.
Another reason I can do this though: I have insurance through my spouse, who teaches for a public high school that has a solid union. I have no wealthy partner bankrolling my writing, but I do have that.
And if you’re wondering whether I made money off my recent book— hahahaha!
I have, however, been slowly growing a partial income from my writing over the years, the bulk of which comes from subscribers who pay for the work I do here.
I began teaching, to be honest, because I wanted to write and never imagined making a living off my writing. I wasn’t trained as a journalist, but as a literary writer in two experimental writing graduate programs. I understood the adjunct hustle as my fate. Or maybe I could land a tenure-track job in a state I didn’t want to live in, or a so-called “alt-ac” career like nonprofit administration (which, honestly, what literature PhD is actually trained for this work?)!
I was not given the tools to succeed as a writer in either of the graduate programs I attended (which I’m still paying off and probably will be for the rest of my life). Higher education and the publishing industry have also changed so much over the years. I’ve had to learn how to make a writing life myself, and while yes, absolutely, having two degrees did prepare me in other ways to be a working writer, and surely helped me to get my foot in the door many places and be taken seriously, most of the people who have helped me find my way in recent years were total strangers to me in 2019, when I finished my PhD. I found them by reaching out and forging connections, and some of them also found me. I am forever grateful to everyone who has lifted my work up, who gave me nuggets of advice, who took a moment to investigate who I was and what I was up to, and who is here.
Over the decade plus that I’ve been doing this hustle, I have absolutely developed a love of teaching that is central to who I am and how I contribute to the communities of which I am part. I don’t ever want to stop, and I will be trying to bring more of that work here, too, to this space, in the coming year.
I am also well aware that we are living in an era in which writing has become a kind of multi-level marketing scheme, in which writers sell each other the dream of authorship. I don’t believe everyone can or should be a writer, and I know there are many structural factors and privileges that shape who is able to get their work read and published, much less generate an income off their writing, especially in an age in which the lines between art and content creation and public identity are so blurred. But I do believe that, as Silvia Federici wrote, creativity should be a “mass condition.” I believe art is important! I want everyone to make art! I hope I can help you make art!
I am going to miss my undergraduate students. I hope someday I can teach them again. There is simply nothing like teaching fresh adults—encouraging them to trust their own voices, to ask questions, to talk to each other about difficult subjects. It’s chills and tears work. They’ve taught me so much. For many undergraduate students, the writing classroom may be the first time in their lives they’ve been invited to share what they think or want to know about a subject, and to admit that while they do not know everything, they still have a unique voice.
And I believe fundamentally in public education. As Lidia Yuknavitch writes, “I have many teaching colleagues who are fighting the good fight as I write this, and I feel both solidarity as well as heartache when I listen to their concerns. Most of them love teaching. I loved teaching. Teaching can be more than one thing […] And I am not co-signing onto our current wave of idiotic fascistic attacks on critical thinking, higher education, critical race theory, that ever-morphing thing we call feminism(S), queer theory, or any other weaponized movement against imagination and creative will. Rather, we need more alternatives at the edges.”
I have big plans for expanding this space in the new year, not only to bring more of my teaching work to this space, but to grow our community here in other fun ways.
There are now over 6,000 of you here and counting. About 5% of you are paid subscribers, which is amazing. And: if just 10% more of you become paid subscribers, that’s about the equivalent, for me, of teaching a couple of classes all year, except I get to spend those many hours here. If you regularly read and engage with this newsletter, as so many of you do, and if you are able, paid subscriptions really are the best way to support this work.
And, if you want all of next year at a discounted rate… okay!
You’ll get (more details on all this soon!):
extra essays and features, threads, and outtakes from writing I do for other publications, like this reflection on talking hope with Angela Garbes and this excerpt from my interview with Melissa Febos; in 2024, as just one example, you’ll get all the cutting room floor research on a big piece I’m working on about marriage
weekly digests of links and roundups of what I’m reading, watching, writing, and teaching, along with a community space to share what you’re consuming
full access to the archive and commenting privileges
a growing catalog of community offerings for writers and artists and creative people including craft essays, discounted classes, live events, writing prompts, and virtual retreats
You can also become a monthly subscriber for just $5/month.
If you’d like a paid subscription but can’t afford one for any reason, email me by replying to the newsletter in your inbox. I will comp you one, no questions asked.
And if you’d like to donate a subscription to support someone who is unable to pay, you can do that too!
Thank you to Angela Veronica Wong for pointing me toward many of these resources.
all i can think when i read this is how INHUMANE this is. You aren't asking for much -- just some predictability and job security which is really the bare minimum that people need in life. This is life in America today for so many people.
Thank you for this transparent, necessary essay. The more I learn about the adjuncting the more I realize that it’s basically the same as freelancing. A friend of mine adjuncts here in NYC at three prominent colleges making around $3k per class. One time we calculated how much that means per hour and we realized I made more money folding yoga pants at lululemon (plus health care and job stability!). The system is fucking broken. Love you always.