Editorial: Full load for just half pay

Monday, Nov. 7, 2005 | 8:37 a.m.

Our hallowed halls of higher education are increasingly populated with part-time professors and are being led by presidents whose strengths lie in showing us the money.

With regard to professors, more than 70 percent of the faculty at the Community College of Southern Nevada and Nevada State College in Henderson are part-time or adjunct instructors, the Las Vegas Sun reported Friday. And almost half of the instructors on UNLV's faculty are part-time workers.

And a quarter to a third of presidents at American colleges and universities described their previous work experience as a nonacademic post or said they had never held a faculty position, according to results of studies conducted independently of each other by the Chronicle of Higher Education and the American Council on Education.

Student enrollment is outpacing cash-strapped universities' abilities to hire enough professors, so the institutions are more often turning to lesser paid, part-time instructors for entry-level classes.

Part-time instructors are paid by the credit hour but earn only half as much as their full-time counterparts teaching the same number and types of courses. Still, without part-timers, many universities would have to cut classes and would be unable to serve a growing student population.

It's a problem only money can fix, and as a result college boards of directors charged with hiring presidents are keeping an eye out for candidates who have successful fund-rasing backgrounds.

The Associated Press reported last week that former CEOs or even state lottery heads have as good a chance of becoming university presidents as top-notch educators with doctorate degrees.

UNLV President Carol Harter, in a recent meeting with the Sun editorial board, said her duties at the university have shifted toward more fundraising than in the past.

Somewhere along the line, state lawmakers deciding how to fund our higher education system have lost sight of the real goal, which is to empower future generations by teaching them how to think and to question, so that they can become well-educated, productive citizens capable of improving their communities.