On adjunct professors, see (1) (2).
[Imaginary dialogue based on Catholic confessions I willingly endured during my Catholic adolescence in the 1960s; doubtless the format/questions/vocabulary have much changed since that epoch.]Georgetown adjunct professor [GAP, yours truly]:
Bless me Father, for I have sinned.
I bless you, my son. What sins do you confess?
I have been teaching courses, with much gratitude to Georgetown University, on American foreign policy, off and on for over a decade.
So what is your sin? After all, teaching is not a sin, if practiced in the right way.
Father, excuse my materialist concerns, I just don't think my students are getting their money's worth.
My son: Money is only part of the moral universe.
Thank you for your kindness, Father. But Father, although I was honored to receive a Ph.D from Princeton University, and then went on to be a Senior Foreign Service officer in the United States Foreign Service with many awards, and have many publications (some actually quite "scholarly") I am not a tenured professor. I recently was asked to be on a Georgetown University dissertation committee, dear Father, which allowed me to judge on the scholarly value of academe's "true," professional entrance into serious scholarship.
So why should all these qualifications of yours bother you, my son?
GAP: Because my students are enduring extravagant costs for a college "higher" education, expecting, I assume, the best and the brightest academic pedagogues, who -- as they fully deserve -- get a full salary.
And by the "best professors," I mean those who have tenure and are respected by their professional academic colleagues.
I am not in their league/"lane," Father, as has been made somewhat clear (by whom I don't really know) for over a decade at a Jesuit institution of higher earning (please forgive my spelling sin, Father, I meant "learning)."
And yet students are paying high prices, to be taught by non-tenured academic hired-hands (hacks?), such as I, "instructing" them.
Should not the "real" professors teach students more than the academic hired-hands do, instead of high-priced universities relying on "second-rate" instructors/adjuncts supposedly enlightening the young (and not so young)?
I feel guilty, Father, and seek your absolution.
My son -- How much are you getting remunerated for teaching your course (s), now over a decade?
GAP: A couple of thousand dollars per course, Father, without insurance or any assurance of permanent employment.
GAP: Father, with all due respect: My consolation is Christ on the crucifix.
Priest: Say three Hail Marys and go back to the books before you pretend to be a "professor" you, so-called "Dr." Brown. Roma locuta est; causa finita est.
Full disclosure: I was reprimanded (excommunicated?) by a Georgetown dean for distributing photocopied materials in one of my classes, which included non-copyrighted speeches by American presidents (Wilson, Roosevelt, Truman). ... Yep, somehow it has something to do with copyright laws.
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