tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-88351878957165746262012-02-01T15:33:16.047-05:00Brown is the new black, 40 is the new 30, and adjuncts are the new slave labor, upon whose backs the Pharaohs of Academia are building their ivory pyramids. So that's an overstatement, but it IS well known that universities are increasingly relying on underpaid, overworked, undertrained, etc., part-time instructors to teach lower level general education courses. This blog is for adjuncts -- an answer to both your teaching needs and your labor concerns.Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.comBlogger101100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8835187895716574626.post-15471003506116438802009-09-15T11:59:00.000-04:002009-09-15T12:01:43.054-04:00

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Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8835187895716574626.post-30884993272587092542009-08-21T09:29:00.004-04:002009-08-21T10:06:17.828-04:00

So here's an idea (and most of a document) I got from Ira Shor, who is pretty much the foremost theorist on critical pedagogy (check out Empowering Education, the "bible" of critical pedagogy). Instead of just handing out a syllabus with your set-in-stone policies, negotiate a grading contract together with your class. I observed and have copied Shor's method, and I've found that the semesters

Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8835187895716574626.post-2363042255958485122007-11-18T22:07:00.000-05:002008-01-09T19:13:21.572-05:00

Student Resistance to Authoritarianism I could also call this “How to Share the Power with Students,” but both titles are pretty cheesy. However, these ideas have proved very helpful for several colleagues and me. Drop a line if you have any more suggestions! During their entire education experience prior to college, your students were probably forced to attend classes they neither chose nor

Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8835187895716574626.post-42809069862521379512007-11-05T13:50:00.000-05:002007-11-05T13:51:15.000-05:00

As an adjunct English teacher with many other responsibilities, I’ve tried to memorize and apply every technique for becoming a quicker paper grader I’ve heard throughout the years. The main thing seems to be keeping the attitude of letting your students learn from their mistakes instead of micro-managing their every rhetorical move. Here are a few strategies I’ve collected: <!--[if !

Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.com75tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8835187895716574626.post-71858702724591089822007-10-23T12:55:00.000-04:002007-10-23T13:35:32.095-04:00

With Campus Equity Week beginning next Monday, the Adjunct Project is launching our Equity Curricula in several ways, including email forwards. This is the email we're sending out -- of course, you'll have to email me for the attachments, but please feel free to copy, paste and send to an inbox near you!Every other year, Campus Equity Week (CEW) is observed to raise awareness of adjunct working

Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8835187895716574626.post-23441852642643978412007-10-14T17:33:00.000-04:002007-10-14T18:08:43.637-04:00

Peer review, though few people think of it in these terms much anymore, is your opportunity to induct your students into your discipline community’s main practice: proposing ideas, then having them read and critiqued by equals. I mostly hear peer review discussed as a nice way to break up the monotony of classroom instruction or simply as an exercise you’re supposed to do for whatever reason,

Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8835187895716574626.post-56803535657439216492007-09-26T13:55:00.000-04:002007-10-13T16:46:21.633-04:00

I wrote a teaching narrative for a column in this issue of The Advocate, in which I described a twist on the traditional research paper for English 101, so I thought I’d include it here in case anyone's interested. This assignment is good for community colleges, where students are often more career-minded and a little less patient with deconstructing metaphors in French theory (though French

Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8835187895716574626.post-59486388838718400122007-09-25T14:33:00.000-04:002007-10-23T21:58:50.998-04:00

Every other year, Campus Equity Week is observed to raise awareness of adjunct working conditions and other issues. This year at CUNY, we don’t just want to celebrate being adjuncts or settle for feeling honored. Let’s do something! The Adjunct Project at CUNY is creating what we call "Equity Curricula": lessons designed to be incorporated in classrooms in order to raise awareness among

Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8835187895716574626.post-77074833783030603582007-09-22T12:34:00.000-04:002007-09-22T14:09:39.077-04:00

The art of nabbing and disciplining those dirty, lying thought thieves. Plagiarism is one of the oddest concepts, considering that Western societies are the only ones that even think it’s possible to steal “intellectual property” (a very capitalist notion, yes?), while there is simply a collective of knowledge in places like China that everyone owns and anyone is free to use without citing

Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8835187895716574626.post-29667379643882479272007-09-21T16:02:00.000-04:002007-09-22T14:14:42.838-04:00

Let's get down to business. What do you do when you walk in the first day? In short, be strict. Sounds authoritarian and awful, I know, but my disclaimer is that, while it's easy to loosen up on standards later, it’s nearly impossible to tighten up on them mid-semester. After you've taught for a while, you'll know what works best for you, but this is a good strategy for a first-time teacher.1

Nichole Stanfordnoreply@blogger.com1