PHANTOM PROF

I found this new blog - Phantom Prof. Apparently an adjunct prof. at SMU ( a female) started her own blog and ended up not having her adjunct contract renewed because of it. She writes commentary on various items of interest from her perspective as a phantom professor (because she's an adjunct) on a pretty "hoity toity" campus - SMU.

I was an adjunct for a couple of years at the local state university. On the one hand, I enjoyed it immensely. On the other hand it paid so poorly that I gave up the position after 6 semesters.
I was never sure that the department heads particularly liked me ( though I think my students did). And the classes didn't work well with my regular working schedule. But being with the students and hearing their stories was always fun.

One of my secrets as an adjunct. MAKE THEM DO THE WORK. I made them write the course syllabi, assigned them to create the test questions and insisted they provide the lecture material though "group presentations." I would even chose someone to be my assistant and have them grade the multiple choice tests. I never assigned essays for a test; way too much work for me. I did have them write a paper on occasion but never more than 1 per semester. "Ya gotta work the system." The students worked it, I worked it in return. They received 3 hours of credit, I received $2,000 worth of pay. Not much pay for graduate degrees. unless you looked at the responsibility as something to enjoy and learn from.