Resources: the Coalition for Contingent Academic Labor

The venerable Coalition for Contingent Academic Labor, which has convened in eight international bi-annual conferences, sponsored Campus Equity Week, and founded a listserve (for information on how to subscribe, go to http://adj-l.org/mailman/listinfo/adj-l_adj-l.org), is planning a “to move our work further within a new political context [by] founding … a regular electronic … newsletter … along with developing COCAL’s website” (meanwhile a Google search will turn up regional COCAL sites, including one to the international conference held in San Diego last August, with links to yet more sources of information on contingency: http://www.cocal-ca.org/confhome.htm).

The aim will be “to create a vibrant center to which contingent faculty [can] turn for help and useful advice.”

Resources: adjunct/quality-of-education issue

Here's some context for those who argue that part-time instruction hurts educational quality:

http://chronicle.com/jobs/news/2008/12/2008121101c.htm

Resources: Adjunct Nation (Adjunct Advocate)

"AdjunctNation.com is the on-line component of the Adjunct Advocate magazine. AdjunctNation.com is updated several times each week. Jobs are added daily to the JOB-LIST."

http://www.adjunctnation.com

Resources: AFT/FACE

The American Federation of Teachers' Faculty and College Excellence campaign's blog (link below), provides an ongoing discussion of issues relating to contingents and, in its new "Reversing the Course" document, recent (Fall 2008) information drawn from U.S. Department of Education compilations of data nationwide. As with A.A.U.P. documents, you might draw from these to underscore the situation of adjuncts locally.

http://www.aftface.org/

Resources: AAUP info on adjuncts

The American of Association of University Professors has been studying the use of contingent (i.e. non-tenurable, both full- and part-time) faculty since 1980, when it traced to financial crises of the early 1970's what's now the established practice of hiring such faculty to cover courses without commitment to them. The link below leads to many more recent documents -- compilations of nationwide information and policy statements -- from which you might draw to support your local case:

http://www.aaup.org/AAUP/issues/contingent/resources.htm