Letters to the Editor:

More part-time issues raised

To the Editor:

I read with interest the latest issue of The Voice (October 2001) and the various articles dedicated to the plight of adjunct (part-time) faculty in the SUNY and community college systems of New York state. I completely agree that these staff members are exploited in more ways than pay inequity.

I was an adjunct faculty member at Mohawk Valley Community College (MVCC) in Utica from January 1986 to May 1999. Although I had expressed my interest in full-time teaching, I was continuously discouraged by my department head, due to college downsizing. This I understood and went along with until December 1998, when the department head told me there were going to be three retirements from my department and that I should submit an updated resume stating my interest in full-time teaching. I did so, but was never even granted an interview for a position.

Instead, I got a brief letter from the human resources department informing me that my qualifications fell short for consideration for full-time work. Shortly afterward, in October 1999, the department head who didn’t think I was qualified to be interviewed called me to say that one of the full-time staff members was unable to fulfill the semester’s teaching load; she asked if I could step in to teach two classes — both from 8 to 10:45 a.m., Tuesdays and Thursdays — and provide office hour time.

Talk about exploitation! Or, at the very least, being professionally insulted! I can’t even tell you how grateful I am that I have a job with SUNY at the Small Business Development Center. It is so much better than working for MVCC in any capacity.

The point of all this: In addition to the inequity in pay, let’s see if we can provide some mandated mechanism for part-time instructors to move into full-time faculty positions. This fine group of people has paid its dues in more than one way. What happened to me should not happen to any adjunct with a spotless record and the same degrees as full-time faculty.

— Sharon St. John, SUNY Utica/Rome

Labor beholden to Isaac Stern

To the Editor:

We have lost a supreme musician and social activist. Isaac Stern, like so many great Americans, came to his adopted country young and left it, 81 years later, greatly in his debt. Carnegie Hall would be only a memory without his effective activism.

We at SUNY Fredonia, we of UUP, also owe him. When Gov. Pataki gave him a state award for his lifetime of service, he attended a wonderful concert in a packed King Concert Hall to receive his medal. Many of the faculty were demonstrating outside for educational funding and for a new contract, two years overdue. Bless him, he asked what it was about. When he had finished his playing with our students (the first movement of the Bach D minor double concerto, as I recall), he praised our student musical organizations for their excellence. He warmly thanked the governor for his award.

And then he said that he would be even more grateful if the governor would approve full funding for the arts and education. The hall erupted into a standing roar, and the chair of the SUNY Board of Trustees sat frozen-faced until the roar subsided.

Fifty years from now, some of our alums will still be bragging that they played Bach with Isaac Stern. Many of us will cherish another memory — when his great heart spoke out for social justice.

Thank you, Isaac Stern.

— Malcolm Nelson, SUNY Fredonia