Catherwood LibraryILR School

Tired of low pay, and a lack of benefits, job security or opportunities for advancement, the adjunct faculty who now make up almost two-thirds of lecturers, and whose numbers have grown by just under eighty percent in the past twenty years, are increasingly deciding that enough is enough (see WIT?s for Oct. 15, and July 10, 2002, and Dec. 7, and Oct. 30, 2001). Also known as ?road scholars? or ?freeway flyers? for the fact that many have to teach at multiple colleges to make ends meet, seventy-five percent of adjuncts are forced into part-time jobs and often make little more than janitors despite holding master?s degrees and PhD?s and having to deal with student loan payments. Since 1998 these conditions have resulted in a growing number of unionization drives among adjuncts supported by the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the Coalition of Contingent Academic Labor (CCAL) and the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), and historic strikes such as those on the campuses of the University of California (UC) system.