by Holly Clarke, Adjunct Lecturer, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York; member, Professional Staff Congress (PSC-CUNY) and Executive Committee John Jay College; member, HELU’s Contingency Task Force and NCOC.
I’ve been an adjunct lecturer for more than thirty years at the City University of New York (CUNY). I’m a member of the Professional Staff Congress (PSC), the faculty and staff union for CUNY. PSC represents more than 30,000 workers (about 11,000 of whom are teaching adjuncts) across 25 institutions – senior colleges, community colleges, and professional and graduate schools.
More than half of faculty across the country are contingent workers who teach without job protections, with low pay, and with few benefits.
This adjunctification of the university has been decried for years. Often it is framed as too few tenure-track or full-time faculty and too many part-time faculty. This has various consequences, such as a growing burden on a shrinking body of full-time faculty in terms of administrative tasks, service duties, advising, etc. At the same time, contingent faculty are often seen as less than or less deserving than their full-time colleagues.
However this framing disguises the main problem, which is not whether workers are full-time or part-time, but the difference in their working conditions. Tenure-track faculty have significant job protections (though less so in this era) while contingent faculty face greater job uncertainty, are underpaid, and often lack benefits.
Why is the lack of job security for half the faculty a major concern for the entire higher ed workforce? Because it is unfair, unethical, and undermines union solidarity – at a time when that solidarity is desperately needed for fights against management and the federal assault on higher ed. Also, critically, it undermines academic freedom. With half the faculty lacking just-cause protection and continuing appointments, academic freedom is on a shaky foundation.
Let me share a poignant recent example. At the end of the spring 2025 semester, four adjunct faculty members teaching at Brooklyn College, who had already been appointed and assigned classes for the fall, were fired by the administration without explanation or due process – and barred from teaching anywhere in the CUNY system. Why? For engaging in free speech and peaceful protest in support of their students and Palestine. Six full-time faculty and staff were subjected to questioning as well. Our union mounted a significant campaign that got national attention and support. After eight months of struggle, three of the four adjunct faculty were rehired in January—a great success to celebrate. But, the fourth has yet to be rehired. The struggle continues.
So, a workforce that has strong job security must be prioritized. But how best to get there – call for more tenure-track lines? Get legislation passed to limit the percentage of part-time faculty? No, these approaches do not address the core issue and may, in fact, worsen it.
I’m going to propose something radical. We must take an approach that I’ve labeled “Embrace Not Replace.” Simply put, we need to embrace our existing contingent faculty. We must strengthen the job protections for these colleagues – not simply replace them with other workers, such as new tenure-track faculty from around the country. We need to move existing contingent faculty to stable appointments, regardless of workload, whether they work part-time or full-time, teach one course or three, with a presumption of reappointment, just cause protection, seniority rights, a path to full-time work, if desired, and a path to continuing appointments.
Hence Embrace Not Replace.
Other public sector institutions don’t allow half their workforce to be on insecure appointments or remain probationary for years on end. Yet, we in academia have become so accustomed to this arrangement that it has become normalized. But it need not be normal.
Two strategies that many unions have used are problematic at best.
For years, one strategy has been to call for more tenure-track lines without any plan for addressing the needs of existing faculty or minimizing any collateral damage to contingent faculty. Of course, even this call has often been hard to obtain. But when more tenure-track lines are made available, who is hired into those roles? Unless they are specifically designated for existing workers, the new line is typically filled by someone outside the department or the college who will teach courses formerly taught by a current adjunct. And that current contingent faculty worker (or one with less seniority) often loses courses, income, or their job altogether as they are replaced by new hires.
This then is a “Replace Not Embrace” strategy, intentionally or unintentionally.
Another approach is to seek state legislation that limits the percentage of adjunct faculty at any institution. This is again problematic because it can lead to unintended consequences, including layoffs of contingent faculty. Again, not an Embrace Not Replace approach. If it were accompanied by provisions that existing faculty should be moved into secure full or part time positions that would be better and limit the collateral damage.
So, what do our unions need to fight for contractually, legislatively and culturally?
First and foremost, prioritize the fight for job protection for existing contingent faculty. One of the most important tasks of any union is to fight for its members’ jobs.
Second, get the rest of the faculty and staff on board in this fight.
Third, ensure that job security provisions contain these features as outlined above: eligibility of all contingent faculty for job protection (regardless of workload) after a short probationary period; allowance for discontinuities in employment; just cause protection; seniority rights; a path to full-time work if desired, and a path to continuing appointments with presumption of renewal.
Fourth, develop guidelines for a new approach to hiring tenure-track or non-tenure-track full-time faculty by considering minimizing the impact on existing contingent faculty. This can include provisions to hire from within or pacing such new hires in accordance with attrition.
Fifth, pursue just-cause legislation for all faculty and staff.
And lastly, in the interim, let’s declare that we are one faculty and one staff – and act accordingly. Let’s undo the normalization. And let’s not use the term faculty unless we truly mean all faculty.