Temporary lecturer Jeff Jones has worked at the University of Idaho for the past 11 years, but has been hired and fired 17 times during this period.
“At what point do you become permanent?” Jones said. Jones is a part of the Long-Term Contingent Faculty (LTCF) Task Force that was formed after contingent faculty protested last academic year. He said he participated in the protests and was asked by Faculty Senate to serve on the task force and speak to them about contingent faculty.
Members of LTCF, including Jones, attended the last Faculty Senate meeting March 8 to make recommendations to improve the lives of contingent employees at UI.
Jones joined UI”s English department as a temporary lecturer in 2005, and he said for the first five years he was employed he enjoyed the benefits other faculty still receive.
“In 2009, I think it was, 2010, they took our benefits away, basically to save money,” Jones said.
Jones said many contingent faculty are paid so little they are in “survivor mode” and are in worse situations than some Wal-Mart employees. He said he encountered trouble when he tried to get a house because of his terms of employment.
“The word “temporary” is not something that banks like,” Jones said. “We were looking to buy a house and went in to get a bank loan and they couldn”t count my income because it has the word “temporary” in my title.”
The “specter of non-renewal,” as Jones put it, prevents temporary employees from speaking out about grievances with the system. He said multiple people who protested lost their positions. Jones” position is about to be eliminated if nothing changes.
At the Faculty Senate meeting, UI Provost and Executive Vice President John Wiencek said these decisions about contingent faculty and other policies are not made with ill intent. He said people should not vilify the current practices, but also said that UI needs to embrace its values and treat people in a fair way.
He said changes in regard to contingent faculty must be made slowly, and that it would not be beneficial to rush forward with a plan of improvement that is one-size fits all, or try to hammer it into the university process.
Despite this, Wiencek acknowledged this was an area that needs improvement at UI and shouldn”t be ignored.
“We need to do the right thing,” Wiencek said.
One recommendation was that a contingent employee be put on a one-year contract system, upon a vote from their respective department, if they have taught for three or more consecutive years. This would require the university to provide benefits to the employee.
Another recommendation was that long-term employees cover the base level of instructional demand at UI instead of temporary lecturers. Jones said the logic of this is because temporary laborers are usually only supposed to be employed when there are spikes in demand that can”t be addressed by other long-term faculty.
Larry Stauffer, another member of the task force, said these suggestions are purely recommendations for Faculty Senate to examine to help figure out how UI can move forward.
“These are just recommendations from the task force,” Stauffer said. “I think it will be up to the Faculty Senate to take this and decide what we are going to do.”
As of last fall, Stauffer said there are about 100 contingent faculty at UI. According to a report from Human Resources, more than 30 percent of university faculty are contingent.
Because UI doesn”t have a universal system, each department deals with contingent faculty differently. Jones said after the protests last year, the English department decided that temporary lecturers would be allowed to work for a maximum of two years – a deal that Jones was given.
“To their credit they have offered to give me a position for two more years,” Jones said. “But when I”ve already been here 11 years – I have a young son, I”m planning to be here for a long time – two years doesn”t seem like very much.”
Erin Bamer can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @ErinBamer