"A place where Miners live, who labour in the bowels of the earth," returned the Spirit. "But they know me. See!"
I have used this passage from A Christmas Carol before. The Ghost of Christmas Present has brought Scrooge to a mining village. The Spirit's goal is to show Scrooge that even people who live in the most desperate of circumstances celebrate Christmas. Yes, the Ghost is saying to Scrooge, even these poor schlubs enjoy this holy time.
For my Good Read today I have chosen a book near and dear to my own circumstances. The book is titled In the Basement of the Ivory Tower, and it is written by a person who simply identifies himself as Professor X. Professor X is an adjunct English instructor, and he performs the same job I perform at my university. In his Introduction, he describes his duties:
We may look mild-mannered, we adjunct instructors, in our eyeglasses and our corduroy jackets, our bald heads and trimmed beards, our peasant skirts and Birkenstocks, but we are nothing less than academic hit men. We are paid by the college to perform the dirty work that no one else wants to do, the wrenching, draining, sorrowful business of teaching and failing the unprepared. We are not characters out of great academic novels such as Pain or Lord Jim. We have more in common with Anton Chigurh from No Country for Old Men.
Adjuncts are the miners of higher education, working in the bowels of universities and colleges. Professor X doesn't use his real name, doesn't name the academic institutions at which he teaches. He says he maintains his anonymity to protect his school. That may be true. However, being a 17-year veteran of the adjunct wars, I also know that Professor X is protecting himself. As "contract" teachers, adjuncts are hired semester-by-semester, depending upon enrollment. We are hit men. The analogy in the passage above is fairly accurate. We teach classes that the full-time professors cannot or do not want to teach. We adjuncts are always one disagreement with a department head away from unemployment.
Professor X captures the plight of this underclass of higher education fairly well. Most adjuncts begin teaching as a way to supplement their incomes. A bad mortgage or high credit card debt or sudden job loss forces a person with an advanced degree to join the ranks of these teachers at the bottom of the educational mineshaft. If I remember correctly, Professor X's situation involves the purchase of an expensive new home.
Don't get me wrong. Professor X also writes about the rewards of the adjunct business, which are abundant. There's always the hope of improving students' lives. That's one of the reason why I have been an adjunct for close to 20 years. I believe I can make a difference in the world, every year, every semester, every class, every student. That is the ultimate goal of my teaching career. Professor X captures this hope pretty well in his final paragraph, where he describes meeting with his students in the basement of the ivory tower:
We are, all of us there gathered, trembling with fright, short of breath, sick at heart, but perhaps hopeful. That our senses are so alive is thrilling. The whiteboard markers give off a vaguely medicinal smell. The edges of posters from semesters past curl away from the wall. Motes of dust bob in the light from the overhead projector. The old heating unit comes on with a shudder. There seems a meaning in all this mundanity that lies just beyond our grasp. Every new assignment, at least, starts us all thinking.
Saint Marty is ever hopeful, ever thinking.
Confessions of Saint Marty
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