a straight path into academia

…more Omnivore, a selection of briefly annotated links about academia…highly readable equivalent of "Calgon take me away" for higher ed bloggers. Yes, wedo have our own news and plenty of it: from a new adjunct pages; an important new education column that we hope to feature regularly; chapter news; the impending arrival/revival of the NFM Newsletter; a new installment in the saga of Green River intra-union conflicts ~ to the saga's chronicler working on a new article about the New Faculty Majority (presumably our Foundation  as well). All sufficient unto the morrow, a new day...

From the Los Angeles Review of Books, the academy in peril: A symposium on Blow Up the Humanities by Toby Miller (and more).

Atlanta Area Meet & Greet, Jan 25

…for contingent faculty, NFM friends, members & anyone interested in meeting us to learn more). In the neighborhood? Please drop by for a visit this coming Friday, January 25 1:30 - 5:30 pm at the Hyatt Regency Hotel, 265 Peachtree Street NE, Atlanta, Georgia 30303, in the Spring Room (lower level)

New Faculty Majority and the NFM Foundation invite friends and member to attend all or part of a meeting designed to update participants on our activities, introduce NFM to those who are not familiar with its work, and engage in conversation about issues related to the relationship of "adjunct" or "contingent" faculty working conditions and student learning conditions.

Discussion topics will include

Livetweeting 4th #CFHE Gathering, Sacto CA

…more to come, plus a Storify, more images (which I had to delete as they did not display well with quick copy/paste ~ taking tweet links with them). Check agenda for afternoon speakers. With any luck, we may get a peek at the new website

Maria Maisto ‏@MariaMaistoNFM

#cfhe Cmnt by @garyrhoades: do not 4get that tuition is not only obstacle. Must remember STRUCTURAL obstacle of disinvestmt. Tuition /= cost

Maria Maisto ‏@MariaMaistoNFM

#cfhe @NewFacMajority 's Judy Olson: we need 2 take long view - free hi ed. Joe Berry: our job is 2 inspire stus, others to ID w/ wkng class

3mMaria Maisto ‏@MariaMaistoNFM

#cfhe Comments: PIF lots unintended consequences: pits diff income levels against each other, will lead 2 more casualization of labor force

Steve Hicks ‏@APSCUFSteve

#cfhe PIF generates much discussion, much on unintended consequences. The room desperately wants a way to provide affordable HEd @ltaiz

8mMaria Maisto ‏@MariaMaistoNFM

#cfhe - Comment: PIF cannot be evaluated without input from Latino, AfAm communities, low income communities.@NewFacMajority

8mGary Rhoades ‏@garyrhoades

#CFHE John Halcon on pay it forward. We shld poll our communities about these issues. @CFA_News

Maria Maisto ‏@MariaMaistoNFM

#cfhe JBurbank response: PIF reduces barriers 2 access. Challenges exist, can be addressed. More disc. Impt, lively discussion taking place

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Demand justice for Aaron Swartz

…via @DemandProgress, a new addition for #PetitionJunction. Say thank you for Creative Commons, blocking SOPA/PIPA, developing RSS, advocating for a free and open internet, and more. Besides, most of us have more than just a passing acquaintance with abuses of power. Here's Larry Lessig's message:

Click here to join Demand Progress and me in demanding justice for our friend Aaron Swartz. 

We spent Tuesday burying and mourning our friend Aaron. We're sad, we're tired, we're frustrated -- and we're angry at a system that let this happen to Aaron.  Now we want to set upon honoring his life's work and helping to make sure that such a travesty is never repeated.

We and Aaron's friends and family have been in touch with lawmakers to ask for help, and several of them -- who've worked with Aaron and Demand Progress on SOPA and other issues -- are beginning to take action.  We're asking them to help rein in a criminal justice system run amok. Authorities are encouraged to bring frivolous charges and hold decades of jail time over the heads of people who are accused of committing victimless crimes.

Only Contingent Faculty to be Affected

…a new study from #newfac house anthro, specializing in the study of NOTTSPASMS investigates this group's troubled and all too often invisible relationship with main stream media. Excerpts below. Alan Valerick writes, 

Cool picture of Roy from here. What if we all wore 

shades like that, all the time  even at night teaching \

off-campus? Would they notice us?

I've done a study. It shows that most higher ed faculty jobs are stressful because 1) most of them are adjunct or contingent and therefore low-paid, low benefit, and insecure, and 2) because most of what is ever written about adcons (Ed note: alternate synonym for NOTTSPASMS. See above link) is stupid or, if not stupid, just sort of “too bad and tough luck.” 

And now, I've done the study for you and you may now put my study up against what Huffington Post calls "A controversial new survey from CareerCast" that "insists college professors have the least stressful job in America."

So, that's stressful.

You know, perhaps it's because of more pressing problems—that pesky time-in-seat aspect of the credit hour, for example—but, whatever the cause, it's clear that some of our pals in "journalism," or whatever it's called, are having problems with higher education reality....