Adjunct Teaching: Career Trap or Entry Point?

How do you become an adjunct professor? It's not about sending out hundreds and hundreds of CVs, resumes to jobs all over the place. If that has been your strategy, you're probably still sending out hundreds of applications and stuck trying to move forward. I'm Dr. Steve Tippins, Ph.D., and I've been in academia for 35 years. I've been tenured twice. I've been in the hiring process both on being hired and hiring new faculty, as well as adjuncts, and I've done this at multiple universities. In this video, I'm gonna walk through how adjunct hiring actually works. We're gonna talk about what departments and schools are really looking for and how to put yourself in the best position to be hired for jobs that exist and even jobs that aren't advertised. Adjunct jobs are growing. Every year there are more and more of them. There are structural changes happening in higher education. There are budget issues happening in higher education, and adjuncts cost a lot less than full-time people. So the number of adjunct positions are gonna go up. One of the reasons for this is enrollment. There are many disciplines where enrollment has reduced dramatically, which means full-time hires aren't happening, but they still have the courses, they still need to offer them. So if I can put an adjunct in there who can do a good job, I've covered this and I've saved budget dollars. This allows institutions to plan their schedules with their budget much more easily. And for some, adjuncting has become a full-time career, not just a stopgap. This is a key point. If you want to teach, adjuncting might be your entry point. Especially for those of you who've completed degrees or, or are completing degrees at institutions where teaching is not an option. If you don't get to teach, how do you get to answer when you're applying for jobs? Well, what's your teaching experience? Then you have to be incredibly creative and talk about training you've done. But if you have adjunct and taught intro to sociology or business or whatever your discipline is, and you've taught it several times and you've taught it maybe at multiple institutions, you have a much stronger teaching portfolio to talk about when they ask you what you've taught, but also when they ask you to complete your philosophy of teaching statement that many schools now ask for. In the past, much of adjunct hiring was crisis hiring. Oh my God, George is sick and can't teach, or Betty is taking a sabbatical. What do we do? Well, we gotta hire somebody short-term. Now it's become a permanent part of the staffing portfolio for many institutions. Adjuncting is a really strong fit for you if you want teaching experience. A number of people adjunct because they want supplemental income. I work a full-time job and I want to adjunct for some supplemental income, but also in addition to that, there's this— I want to give back to those. Maybe I want to adjunct at my alma mater and give back to the people that helped me get to where I am. Adjuncting can be a good role to think about transitioning careers. I had a client, oh, a few years ago who had done a full career and got into his late 50s and was able to retire. But before he retired, he wanted to think about academia. So we put together a program for him where he reached out strategically to a number of universities and found who was responsible for hiring. Got contact with them, wrote to them directly, and I think it was 8 institutions he wrote to. 5 responded because of his unique skill set and his degree. He then, in effect, interviewed each of the institutions and took a job where he got to adjunct initially, and then within a year, they offered him a full-time job, and he's now finishing out his career teaching. And in addition, the bonus he found was the academic schedule was a lot more liberal than his full-time job schedule was in the past. So he now takes summers to travel and research and enjoy life and his grandkids. Now, it's a mistake to think adjuncting is the perfect route for you if, one, you're looking for stability, because if institutions change, adjuncts are going to be the first to go. If you're looking for benefits, which in this world, getting health insurance, things like that, very difficult and can be expensive if you don't have a job. Well, adjuncting is not going to come with benefits, and it's not a guaranteed path to full-time work. If you're navigating an academic career, thinking about doing adjuncting work and trying to figure out what's the most realistic path for me right now, we talk through those decisions with people every day in our free Scholar Career network. It's where you get clear, experience-based guidance so that you can make smarter career moves and avoid costly detours. So what do schools look for in adjuncts? Typically, you're going to see ads that say minimum requirement master's degree, Ph.D. or terminal degree preferred. Why is it preferred? Because when they go for reaccreditation, they count the number of terminally qualified faculty members within their field that the institution is employing, and it looks better for accreditation. And notice I said within their field. You don't want to see people who have education degrees teaching in physics or management degrees teaching in history because their degree is out of field and they don't get to count them as terminally qualified courses. That said, you know, they're looking for, does your degree line up with the courses you're asking to teach. Hey, I think I can teach this course based on my experience in life. That's not usually gonna fly. They want someone whose education lines up with the course. Just because you, you're an amateur archaeologist and you like to dig and brush off bones and things like that, your degree in mental health therapy isn't gonna help you teach an archaeology course. Universities, schools are risk-averse, so when the degree fits, it's a lot easier for you to get hired. Publications matter at research institutions, so if you're an adjunct and coming in with publications, they're going to like that, and they're going to like it even more if you publish while you're working for them and list your affiliation with their university. At places like community colleges or teaching-based 4-year schools, research is not going to matter much. It's: are you in the classroom and are you meeting the students' needs? Adjunct positions draw a large number of applications now. Many people who apply already have teaching experience. People who have that teaching experience, people already in the system, seem to be preferred over cold applications, or referrals are more important than cold applications as well. So how does hiring happen? Typically, universities will post a position. Many times, if it's— especially if it's a state-run institution, there are state laws and they have to post in certain areas. So you'll find posted on the website. You may also find them posted in places like highered.com, maybe Indeed. Sometimes you'll see adjunct positions posted in the Chronicle of Higher Education. Typically, that's more for full-time jobs. But, you know, looking at places like those is where you're going to see adjunct positions posted, but definitely on their websites. If you are applying for their job, use their language. Fulfill their need. We want someone who can teach undergraduate biology teaching. Well, you want to then say, I can teach undergraduate biology teaching. Fulfill their need. If you don't, it's a lot harder to be moved to the next level, especially at places that hire a lot of adjuncts, that your application letter is probably going through some sort of AI or bot where they're looking for key terms, and they put their key terms many times in their posting. You want to make sure you use their key terms. Quite simply, answer exactly what's asked. So how do I become proactive? Well, first, reach out before there are positions. Find the department chair. Talk to the department chair in the field that you're interested in. Find out first, are they involved in the hiring at all? At some schools they are. At some schools it's all done through HR or some other independent area. Find out where that is. Have discussions with them. What type of needs might they have? Let them get to know you because when it does become a crisis, and I've been in this position as a department chair, wow, Somebody can't teach the course and we start in 2 weeks. That's not enough time to put on a job posting and all kinds of other things. Many schools will have a file where they keep people's names. And I know it seems like it's a dead file, but no, people go in there when there is a crisis or an emergency and said, okay, who have we talked to in the past? Or who do we know who has a job capabilities to teach this class? And they'll call people. And I've done it twice. I've had to do it. And find somebody at the last minute to teach a class. When you do reach out to people, you want to let them know who you are. What's your background? What's your degree in? What can you teach? Why are you talking to them? You want to let them know you know who they are. This is a part of networking. They'll keep you in mind, but also stay in touch with them every 6 months, 9 months, something like that. Be in touch. Also be aware of the scheduling cycle. If I'm a department chair and it's August, it's too late. I've already filled my positions for the fall. In fact, in October, probably, I'm filling my positions for the spring, and in March, I'm filling positions for summer teaching as well as I'm thinking about the fall. So understand their timing and be back in touch with them coinciding with that type of schedule. When you do make a contact, you can offer value to them before even thinking about jobs. Hey, you need a guest lecturer on X, Y, or Z topics. I'd love to come in and talk. That gets you more known. It makes them like you more. Covering courses on short notice is always great and being available when others aren't, meaning, hey, you got it, I'll do it, and figuring it out. Because this could be your path into long-term employment. When you meet people or when you're even having phone conversations with people, you're talking about your readiness to teach. You're showing them that you're professional. You understand the job that they have and understand what the requirements are to do that job. And you also want to let them know that you're reliable. Now, one of the things that comes up is, what's your familiarity with LMS? Learning management systems. There are a number of them, and if you're familiar with their system— I'm not going to mention because there's too many of them— that's great. But knowing a system is great because it's not that difficult to switch to another system. So you can let them know, I'm familiar with and worked with System A, which you probably did in your graduate program. You had to use that system, so you can understand it. And I'm confident in my ability to use System be, but just being aware that LMS is very important to them. Having a technical competence is wonderful because COVID changed the world for academics. COVID means everybody's got to be online and using an LMS, even if it's just for grades, but you have to be doing it. And to go back, adjunct jobs are— can be fun. They can be rewarding. Psychically. They're not going to be incredibly rewarding financially. $1,200 to $3,000 for an online school, or even some community colleges up to $10,000, maybe traditional established high reputation schools. But it's not a job where the pay is going to allow you to retire very early. And again, you aren't going to get benefits. And you probably don't get a lot of course selection where full-time faculty get to choose first. You get the courses that are left over. Becoming an adjunct can get you teaching experience. It can be an entry point into academia. It can provide some supplemental income. It can be a relatively flexible schedule in that when students get time off, you get time off. However, the pay is relatively low, but if you think of it as an investment in the future and future opportunities, it can be worth it. There aren't going to be benefits. You are typically the last person who gets to make course decisions, meaning you get what others don't want, and you don't get a large voice at the institution. Adjuncting can be a great choice though when it's done intentionally and when you think about it as your portfolio of positions moving forward to the job and fulfillment you're looking for in your life. It's really not a fallback plan, but it is a trade-off. Think about, "Why am I doing this, and what comes next from it?" If this helped clarify your thinking and you want help thinking further about this, join our Scholar Career Network. It's where we help scholars think clearly about their options, avoid common missteps, and move forward with intention. Just click the link in the description to join the Scholar Career Network for free.