Death of An Adjunct: A Sobering, True Story

The Pitts­burgh Post-Gazette ran a sad and galling sto­ry yes­ter­day about Mary Mar­garet Vojtko who died of a heart attack at the age of 83. At the time of her death, Daniel Kova­lik writes:

She was receiv­ing radi­a­tion ther­a­py for the can­cer that had just returned to her, she was liv­ing near­ly home­less because she could not afford the upkeep on her home, which was lit­er­al­ly falling in on itself, and now, she explained, she had received anoth­er indig­ni­ty — a let­ter from Adult Pro­tec­tive Ser­vices telling her that some­one had referred her case to them say­ing that she need­ed assis­tance in tak­ing care of her­self.

Vojtko had end­ed up in pover­ty after spend­ing 25 years work­ing as an adjunct pro­fes­sor of French at Duquesne Uni­ver­si­ty, a Catholic school locat­ed in Pitts­burgh, Pa. Until she was ter­mi­nat­ed last spring, she worked “on a con­tract basis from semes­ter to semes­ter, with no job secu­ri­ty, no ben­e­fits and with a salary of between $3,000 and just over $3,500 per three-cred­it course.” When teach­ing three class­es a semes­ter and two dur­ing the sum­mer, Vojtko nev­er earned more than $25,000 a year. (A pit­tance com­pared to the pay pack­age of Duques­ne’s pres­i­dent — report­ed­ly about $700,000 per year in salary and ben­e­fits.) Mean­while, Duquesne thwart­ed attempts by adjuncts to union­ize, claim­ing that the school should have a reli­gious exemp­tion.

As Kova­lik goes on to note: “Adjuncts now make up well over 50 per­cent of the fac­ul­ty at col­leges and uni­ver­si­ties.” And that sta­tis­tic is bound to increase. You can — and should — read the full sto­ry at the Post-Gazette. Read Death of an Adjunct here.

via @stevesilberman