Contingent faculty seek equity

We knew it wasn't going to be a typical conference when five of us stepped off the plane in January in San Jose, California. We were greeted by the living symbol of part-time faculty-the Freeway Flyer in full regalia, including black academic robes, black wings, and an oversized chicken's head. She leapt into the air and squawked, flapped her wings, and generally terrorized the clueless passengers crowding the airport lounge. Not that they knew who she was or why she was there. As we later learned, many parents confuse part-time faculty in higher education with substitute teachers in high school. So there is much work to be done in educating the public and achieving fair employment practices in higher education.

But the fourth annual COCAL conference went a long way toward showing how that work can be done. When the fledgling union for contingent faculty at Citrus College in California learned that the college president had stomped past faculty mail boxes and removed organizing fliers from each and every one of them, they filed suit and won an unfair-laborpractices case against him.

Eminently practical advice was interspersed with stirring statements of principle. AAUP president Jane Buck gave an eloquent testimonial to the ideals of shared governance, while Linda Collins, president of the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges, delivered a riveting indictment of present hiring practices in higher education. Meanwhile, as another speaker pointed out, increasing numbers of part-time students are drifting from school to school taking courses taught more and more by contingent, itinerant, part-time teachers who believe their institutions are hostile to them. Yet some administrators have urged a reduction in the current outlay for salary and benefits.

The answer, as COCAL made clear, is to organize. It is the only answer to powerlessness and alienation, the only recipe for change. Indeed, the parttime faculty members who came to San Jose from a distance came mostly because their unions paid their air fare. How else are faculty members frequently paid less than $2,000 a course going to fund their travel?

Nearly two hundred people gathered in California to continue shaping a national movement. Among the recommendations heard was a call for a national two-day work stoppage

accompanied by teach-ins about the state of academic labor. How many more part-time teachers might join the movement if they could afford air fare?

Meanwhile, those who participated were treated to a conference perfectly balancing theory and practice. Even the entertainment came with an edge. At one point, fifteen contingent faculty members were on stage to perform the academic version of "The Twelve Days of Christmas." They called it "The Twelve Days of Bargaining," and it constituted a list of the alternatives to fair wages and benefits that administrators might like to offer their part-time faculty. "On the first day of bargaining," they began, "the college offered me: one lottery ticket, instead of salary." And so it went, on through two freeway maps, three self-help workshops, four feet of floss, five sweatshop pencils, six pats on the back, seven yawning trustees, eight spoons of Maalox, nine minutes of prep time, ten cups of coffee, eleven extra students, and twelve penny raises. Perform it in your own department or at the next disciplinary conference. It is time for street theater in higher education.

(The lyrics to "The Twelve Days of Bargaining" were written by Linda Janakos and the Rabble-A Players Comedy Troupe.)

-CARY NELSON

Copyright American Association of University Professors Mar/Apr 2001
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