Following a union symposium last month that included over 100 contingent faculty from 20 Boston-area colleges and universities, today 150 Bentley University adjunct faculty were the first to file for their union election to join Adjunct Action, a project of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).
“It is very exciting to be a pioneer in the effort to organize adjuncts in the Boston area,” said Doug Kierdorf, an adjunct professor in the History Department at Bentley University. “The problem for me and a lot of adjuncts is you never know if you’re going to have work. I think if most students knew the terms of our employment they would be appalled.”
Being a professor was once the quintessential middle class job but today it’s a profession that has seen dramatically declining standards — a trend that reflects what’s happened to so many jobs that no longer pay a living wage in today’s economy.
Adjunct faculty, now the majority of teaching faculty across the country, typically have no job security, no benefits and low pay that forces adjuncts to string together jobs at multiple colleges and universities to make ends meet.
At the same time, revenues and tuition have increased steadily over the last two decades while spending on instruction has declined – and it’s adjuncts and their deeply-in-debt students who are suffering as a result.
Bentley University adjuncts’ efforts to form a union with SEIU come on the heels of a significant win last week when 600 Georgetown University adjunct faculty won their union with SEIU. This victory means a majority of Washington, D.C. adjuncts are now part of SEIU, a major step forward in SEIU adjunct members’ vision to raise standards for the profession and improve the quality of education market-wide. It’s this vision that inspired the Boston-area adjunct symposium in early April.
Adjuncts interested in being contacted by an organizer can sign up here.
