Adjuncts Unite! The Struggle to Unionize, Administrative Response, and Building a Bigger Movement

Abstract

In the last decade, adjuncts have become the dominant faculty type at most colleges and universities, making up to 80 percent of those teaching college courses. Their conditions and struggles have been well documented in terms of their compensation and working conditions. Adjuncts have begun to organize across the nation, while also fighting for a broader movement, most notably through Service Employees International Union’s (SEIU) Faculty Forward Campaign, along with others. However, institutions of higher learning have been fighting back against these efforts in the same manners that for-profit companies have done in the past. This paper demonstrates the conflict as well as providing a framework for something bigger.