Dear Chancellor Wrighton,

Washington University changed my life. The three years I spent at Washington University studying literature and finance prepared me for my doctorate work in philosophy of religion at the University of Chicago, as well as careers in academics and business. As an alumna of this fine university, I would like to give back, but I cannot in good conscience.

I have been following the adjunct faculty unionization campaign at Washington University and find it difficult to reconcile adjunct pay ($3,900 to $8,000 per class) with Washington University’s tuition ($47,300 sticker price/year, $33,484 average/year) and the fact that it ranks in the top-20 universities based on endowment size ($7.2 billion). Wash. U. is not a cash-strapped state university, which even with state funding cuts, I would argue, should not be abusing adjunct labor. So when I receive the glossy Washington Magazine, with photos of shiny new facilities and talk of community partnerships and how our graduates are changing the world, I find myself thinking of my freshman composition professor who must have been an underpaid graduate student or adjunct.

As an assistant professor, I saw many adjuncts who cared about their students and were excellent teachers; however, their working conditions prevented them from providing the kind of education they knew they could deliver and that the students deserved. These observations are supported by an increasing body of evidence, including the 2014 House Committee on Education and Workforce report, “The Just-In-Time Professor.”

Over 50 percent of U.S. faculty are now part-time and Wash. U. employs over 400 adjuncts. So what does it mean to be an adjunct? It means you are paid by the class, a class that can be cancelled days before the term starts. It means you have no benefits and to get by, you often need to work at another university or have another job and rely on food stamps. It means you don’t have an office and cannot participate in long-term planning or curriculum meetings. It means you cannot engage in scholarship because you have neither the time nor research budget to do so. What this means for students who pay $47,300 in tuition is that their class might be taught by a full professor making on average $186,900 per year, an assistant professor making $102,000 per year or an adjunct, making between $3,900 to $8,000 per class with no benefits.

In the Summer 2015 Washington Magazine, you wrote: “Changing the world is on the minds of many at the university, including our most recent graduates…I look forward to seeing how they use their time, talents and treasurers as they progress through their postgraduate lives and contribute to making the university, St. Louis and the world a better place.”

I have one suggestion for these recent graduates and for all Washington University alumnae: Demand that your alma mater, with its high tuition and generous endowment, hire only full-time faculty and pay living wages to all staff and faculty. The University would be stronger, St. Louis would have fewer citizens living on poverty wages and students would know that they go to a university that stands for economic and social justice, as well as academic rigor and integrity.

Jennifer Schuberth
Class of 1998