Meet #SteveEarly & ❝Save Our Unions❞…video, book review +

…not that I intended to make this a movie marathon weekend but with this Saturday post and a Barbara Wolf selection scheduled for tomorrow's Sunday Matinee / COCAL XI lead in post, that's what the weekend is starting to look like. Some post decisions are considered, even planned and researched; others appear on the spur of the moment, unannounced or prompted by a chance exchange. This is one of the latter.

I've been reading and saving Steve Early articles on unions and organizing. Just recently Keith Hoeller brought up the most recent book. He met and spoke with Early at the book tour's Seattle. That gave me the idea of asking Keith to write a review of Save Our Unions from the perspective of organizing adjunct and academic labor. So I did. Then came the idea of this post while I''m waiting to hear from him (and  OK to nudge him on just a bit too). To accompany the video below, here are links to a review, an interview (podcast) and an author bio, short version:

David Blacker: The Falling Rate of Learning & the Neoliberal Endgame

…makes a powerful case that in the present phase of capitalism, our rulers are abandoning the previous era’s principle of universal education. No shit.

Blacker’s specific focus is on education in the Western states but his contextualisation also includes hard-hitting analyses of political economy, environmental degradation and socialist strategy. The book is written in an erudite but witty style that leaves the reader with the clear and distinct impression that the next few decades will decide the fate of the human race. Blacker ominously warns us that the current global hegemony of the capitalist order presents most of our species with a grim choice: ‘we are subject to the harsh survivalist disjunction - we will have to kill it before it kills us’ (p.19).

Read a review of the The Falling Rate of Learning and the Neoliberal Endgame in Counterfire and listen to an interview (one of many) with David J. Blacker,

On Being Interviewed as a Road Scholar

…reflections from +Joseph Fruscione (GWU Writing Program). More media ~ higher ed, mainstream, national, local, print, radio, television ~ are interviewing not just the usual "leadership" or spokespersons but Payless running shoes on the ground adjunct and contingent faculty. The genre ("Interview with an adjunct"), its terrain and conventions, are new. Some but not all experiences have been positive. Let's learn or write them ourselves: own the genre and speak with our own voices. Be ready: you could be next. Joe Fruscione writes about his experience, offers good suggestions:

Sometimes, ditching MLA sessions and walking the book exhibit can lead to good things. In 2009, talking with an editor led to a book contract. In 2013, a conversation with Maria Maisto—whom I’d never met landed me in the middle of a news story about contingent university faculty, “road scholars” as the producer called us before my on-camera interview for PBS NewsHour.

Checking email after teaching my second class on the first day of spring semester classes, I saw “Interview for PBS?” on a subject line and, intrigued, jumped at the chance. After a few threads between Maria, the producer, and me, a phone interview was scheduled for the next day. Although never hesitant to accept the invitation,

Chronicle Requests, NFM Forums Update

An e-mail alert from Esther Merves to NFM Members

Dear NFM Member:

The Chronicle of Higher Education is interested in interviewing NFM members who have experienced either or both of the following situations:

1. Eligibility for (or application for and receipt of) public assistance including Medicaid and food stamps. Reporter Stacey Patton is working on a story on this topic and will be glad to keep identifying information confidential.  Please contact her directly at Stacey.Patton@chronicle.com as soon as possible.
2. Chronicle editor Jeff Selingo is working on a book on the future of higher education and is interested in further exploring the idea of student as consumer in higher ed and the impact that has had in the classroom. He wants to talk to faculty members who deal with this on a regular basis, in terms of grades, assignments, and in other ways, and talk about the outcome on the classroom dynamics. You may contact him at jeff.selingo@chronicle.com

If you respond to either request, we hope you will mention the fact that you are an NFM member and also talk about the potential for NFM as a national organization to address both problems in constructive and meaningful ways.

FYI we are almost ready to launch a members-only bulletin board/discussion board feature at which we will post similar inquiries and topics for discussion.  Thanks for your patience as the process has taken longer than expected.

Best wishes,

Maria, Esther and the NFM Board