Exploring the Hidden Realities of Latinx/é Contingent Faculty in STEM

ABSTRACT

This paper provides an overview of the literature exploring the realities of contingent faculty at U.S. universities and colleges with a focus on STEM. We focus our review of the literature by exploring the experiences of Latinx/é contingent faculty in STEM and propose a series of conceptual frameworks that can be used to explore the hidden professional realities of this population. A focus on the field of STEM, via a deeper exploration of the literature, points to the evolution of contingent faculty in the disciplines and the diversity of the roles they currently fill at our universities and colleges. This paper draws on various frameworks for exploring the experiences of contingent faculty.

KEYWORDS:

• Contingent
• Faculty
• Latinx
• Lat crit
• Post-secondary education
• Race/Racialization

Introduction

I (Idalis) worked as a contingent, full-time faculty in an engineering department between 2011 and 2013. I taught four different courses a semester, each requiring a new course prep and some of these courses were a blend of undergraduate (lecture and labs) and graduate courses. I signed a new contract each term and teaching evaluations were solely dependent on student evaluations with no clear policies or bylaws for promotion based on teaching. This Boricua was severely underrepresented and overworked.

I (José) worked as contingent faculty in the Sociology Department and one Chicano/Latino Department in California between 2007 and 2011. My work entailed teaching as many as four courses a semester and often being assigned new course preparations. I signed a new contract with the start of each term, which is the experience of most contingent faculty across the country. I had little choice in my schedule as I was assigned to teach during the times that the full-time faculty did not want. This schedule was given even though in one case, I taught both core undergraduate classes and graduate courses. In most cases, I worked for minimal pay. Experiences like the ones we shared have informed the focus of this manuscript to explore the experiences of contingent labor on Latinx/é faculty, particularly in STEM.

While recent reports have suggested an increase in academic faculty positions, “the lack of permanent faculty positions” introduces a “state of affairs that forces young Ph.D.’s to take low-paying temporary positions as […] adjunct faculty” (Xue & Larson, 2015, p. 4) and non-tenure track positions (e.g., postdocs, lecturers, etc.), researchers, postdoctoral faculty, graduate students, and adjuncts with administrative (Fetcher et al., 2019; Fitzmorris et al., 2018). Contingent faculty are defined as faculty “in non-tenure-track positions that are contract-term bound or temporary [...] are part-time or full-time […]” and exists when “the hiring institution makes no commitment of long-term employment to these faculty” (Atkins et al., 2018, p. 76). Contingent faculty positions are sub-categorized, according to the American Sociological Association, as either full-time or part-time. Full-time contingent faculty typically have multi-year contracts at institutions that do not offer tenure and tend to be in “potentially pseudo-tenure” positions (ASA Task Force on Contingent Faculty Employment January, 2019, p. 5). Part-time contingent faculty, on the other hand, may have similar working conditions as full-time contingent faculty with the exception that benefits (e.g., health) may be variable and inconsistent compared to full-time contingent faculty (ASA Task Force on Contingent Faculty Employment January, 2019).

Due to scant attention paid to the lives and careers of contingent faculty in STEM (Fetcher et al., 2019), this topic is severely under-studied and under-supported (e.g., Strong et al., 2022). According to a 2018 National Center of Educational Statistics (NCES) report, more than 1.5 million faculty are employed in U.S. systems of higher education, among whom 46% are considered part-time or full-time contingent (De Bray et al., 2019). The majority of part-time positions are disproportionately held by historically marginalized populations (e.g., Latinx/é and African American) (American Association of University Professors [AAUP], 2020). Also, within STEM fields, Fetcher et al. (2019) found that part-time contingent faculty make up the largest faculty composition in STEM and for some disciplines such as the natural sciences, part-time faculty are required to conduct research in addition to their teaching duties with little to no administrative support. In STEM disciplines (i.e., engineering), contingent faculty report feelings of exclusion from departmental discussions that directly impact their work schedules, work not being recognized, feeling professionally threatened and disrespected, and a lack of resources (Fitzmorris et al., 2020; Roy, 2019).

Given that a majority of Latinx/é faculty in STEM are contingent faculty, we consider the contexts described for contingent faculty more generally. Contingent faculty face challenges, including but not limited to work and life stressors, a sense of not fitting in, not being advocated for, inconsistent health care and sick leave, job insecurity, low course pay, few benefits, and under-resourced working conditions (Government Accountability Office [GAO], 2017; Atkins et al., 2018; Coalition for the Academic Workforce [CAW], 2012; Curtis & Jacobe, 2006; Douglas-Gabriel, 2019; Fetcher et al., 2019). Furthermore, contingent faculty are burdened by excessive service duties since many minority students, faculty, and administrators seek or appoint them as informal mentors (Moule, 2005; Stanley, 2006). The emotional toll for faculty under these working conditions that can lead to feelings of burnout and frustration should give university presidents and administrators pause (Muñoz & Villanueva, 2019). It is also important to note that many institutions of higher education hire contingent faculty to teach the first-generation, working class, and students of color (Hoff, 2014), in positions with extraordinary influence on undergraduate learning and motivation (Kezar & Maxey, 2012). Also, these same faculty are constantly sought out to recruit and teach historically marginalized students (e.g., first generation, Black, Latinx/é) (Hoff, 2014), positioning them as top influencers to student learning and motivation (Kezar & Maxey, 2012). Yet, without adequate support, these professionals quickly and often fall through the cracks (AAUP, 2020).

This paper provides an overview of the literature exploring the realities of contingent faculty at U.S. universities and colleges with a focus on STEM. We focus our review of the literature on exploring the experiences of Latinx/é contingent faculty in STEM and propose a series of conceptual frameworks that can be used to explore the hidden realities of this population of academic workers. Finally, we position these frameworks as ways to explain the hierarchies of employment positions for these contingent faculty and further situate the need for institutions of higher education to systemically support these academic workers.

Contingent faculty in the United States

Significant tracking of the contingent faculty pool in the U.S. includes a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report suggesting that contingent faculty fill 69.5% of full-time teaching instructional positions in higher education (GAO, 2017). A 2020 report from the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) suggested that only a third of faculty positions are tenure-track (GAO, 2017; AAUP, 2020). In addition, the Coalition for the Academic Workforce reported that when graduate student teaching assistants are added to the contingent faculty pool, more than three-quarters of the instructional workforce in academia is contingent (CAW, 2012). Out of the total contingent faculty pool, Barnshaw (2016) showed that part-time faculty made up 40.9% of all faculty appointments, while full-time contingent faculty comprised 16.7% of faculty appointments. This upward growth trend in contingent faculty has exponentially accelerated since the 1990s (Swarns, 2014) and includes worse statistics compared to the state of academic positions during the Great Depression (AAUP, 2020).

Furthermore, the American Federation of Teachers (2010, p. 11), reported that “underrepresented racial and ethnic groups are even more likely to be relegated to contingent positions; only 10.4% of all faculty positions are held by underrepresented racial and ethnic groups, and of these, 7.6%— or 73% of the total minority faculty population – are contingent positions.” Also, faculty who come from working class or poor backgrounds are mainly represented in this pool of contingent workers (Ortega, 2020).

The personal and professional issues stated earlier for contingent faculty are not without consequence. For example, although the data is mixed about their successes, there is ample evidence that contingent faculty, connected to a lack of belonging to their campuses, are less likely to engage students with innovative teaching methods and practices (Baldwin & Wawrzynski, 2011; Fitzmorris et al., 2020; Umbach, 2007). A study examining six university campuses found that “high levels of exposure to part-time faculty in the first year of college are consistently found to negatively affect student retention to the second year” (Jaeger & Eagan, 2011, p. 507).

It is also understood that contingent faculty lack resources for their research and teaching goals. Scholarship has explored the lack of institutional and departmental support to improve their practice and overall professionalization into the professoriate (Kezar & Sam, 2010). This lack of support can be seen by limited or no office space, clerical support, resources, or equipment required to effectively engage in teaching, service, and research demands (Kezar & Sam, 2010). Danaei (2019) and Kezar & Sam (2010) have pointed to the lack of professional development in that scholarship of teaching and learning that is needed to support career growth, both in teaching and research.

The realities of contingent Latinx/é faculty versus other ranks

When considering race and ethnicity of contingent faculty, the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) conducted a nationwide survey of 1.5 million faculty in degree-granting postsecondary institutions (De Brey et al., 2019). NCES identified that among all tenure-track ranks (full-time Professors, full-time Assistant Professors, etc.), Latinx/é faculty accounted for approximately 4% percent of the total faculty (tenure-track and non-tenure-track) surveyed. Among these, approximately 43% percent of hired Latinx/é faculty are in a contingent faculty role. Arellano et al. (2018) conducted a follow-up study exploring all reported Latinx/é faculty in STEM colleges across the United States. The authors found that a large percentage of Latinx/é tenure-track faculty hired in STEM colleges were Mexican-born. No reports on Latinx/é contingent faculty were provided in the study. The lack of information on racial or ethnic contingent faculty is troubling as it appears that there is a severe scarcity in our understanding of the professional realities of contingent faculty in universities across the United States. As suggested by these studies, little to no information is available about that state of the contingent faculty (Kezar, 2020).

The only known exploration for Latinx/é contingent faculty in the U.S. studies the realm of teacher perceptions for Institutions (Salgado et al., 2021). Premising from Salgado et al. (2021) study, we chose to expand upon Hispanic-Serving Institutions for contingent faculty in STEM since little information is known about this population (Strong et al., 2022) and it represents the experiences, either ethnic or institutional, for the authors of this work. We wanted to first center our positionalities in this study before expanding to other institution types, which future work will do.

Frameworks from recent studies

A diverse set of frameworks can be used to approach the study of contingent faculty, both from a barrier and asset standpoint. We posit that both are needed to understand the problems experienced by contingent faculty, many of whom are ill-understood. We need to better understand how academic systems support or disrupt the hierarchies of employment for these faculty. At the same time, barriers must be juxtaposed with a counternarrative of the assets that faculty bring as knowledge sources fundamental to identifying solutions. We will first discuss the frameworks that may help identify barriers and then we will discuss the assets.

Frameworks to situate the barriers for contingent faculty

Job performance models like those of Blumberg and Pringle (1982) focuses on “1) the capacity of an individual to perform the work; 2) the willingness of the individual to perform the work; and 3) the opportunity to perform the work.” This model takes an individualist look at job performance and the capacities of a particular worker, their motivation, and whether they possess the “appropriate tools” (Fitzmorris et al., 2020, p. 2). This approach to contingent faculty has been labeled elsewhere as a deficit model, in which “many researchers frame studies of non – tenure track faculty in a deficit perspective – non-tenure track faculty as a negative to the higher education enterprise.” (Kezar & Sam, 2011, p. 1420). Kezar and Sam (2011) state that this deficit model of contingent faculty consists of several assumptions. One assumption is that “non – tenure track faculty lack qualities that are important to a functional workplace such as commitment, satisfaction, social capital, agency, the ability to learn and form collegial relationships, and the ability to integrate students on campus.” (p. 1421). The major assumptions challenged by Kezar and Sam (2010) are that contingent faculty are “often framed as laborers and not as professionals” (p. 1421). This deficit classification emerges from economic and business approaches of academic environments that, when applied to contingent faculty, hinges on the notion that their job satisfaction is tied to feelings of economic security (Kezar & Sam, 2011). Similarly, within STEM working environments, Villanueva and colleagues have identified gender, racial, and ethnic differences in hidden curriculum (unacknowledged and often, unintentional messages of exclusion or belonging) around the professionalization of faculty in STEM (Villanueva, Carothers, et al., 2018; Villanueva, DiStefano, et al., 2018) where women are oftentimes the most victimized in systems of higher education. Other models (Gappa et al., 2007; Kezar, 2013) include employee job satisfaction such as academic freedom and respect, as well as the exploration of the impact of department culture on contingent faculty. Additionally, there is the perspective that academia promotes tenure-track faculty in fields like STEM, whereas contingent faculty are effectively seen as second-class citizens and are not promoted (Fitzmorris et al., 2020; Kezar & Sam, 2011).

Work from the ASA Task Force on Contingent Faculty Employment (January, 2019) as well as other scholars (Kezar & Sam, 2011) has advocated for contingent faculty to be seen as professionals. Kezar and Sam (2011) argue that “faculty are professionals who operate under a different set of principles and standards from other employees or laborers” (p. 1424). As such, contingent faculty experience the same professional socialization and identities as other faculty roles in academia (Kezar & Sam, 2011) although they teeter between professionals and “managed professionals” (Kezar & Sam, 2011; Rhoades, 1998). At the same time, these contingent faculty are faced with balancing their role as “laborers” with poor job security, working conditions, and sense of belonging (Kerzar & Sam, 2011; Shaker, 2008), creating exceeding stress and poor self-concept (Muñoz & Villanueva, 2019; Thoits, 2013).

Other barriers contingent faculty face is at the intersection of their race and/or ethnicity, where historically marginalized contingent faculty often carry a heavy service burden compared to White faculty (Flores, 2011; Ponjuan, 2011). For example, for Latinx/é faculty, faculty service commitments, such as additional administrative duties, are evaluated as having less value during the promotion process (Ponjuan, 2011; Urrieta & Chavez, 2010). Ponjuan (2011) explains the heavy toll that this extra workload can have on Latinx/é faculty. Urrieta and Chavez (2010) elaborate on what constitutes “service” for Latinx/é faculty and how it is disproportionately distributed. They state that “Latin@ faculty’s sense of obligation to their respective communities has often come in conflict with what institutions define as service” (p. 225). Urrieta and Chavez (2010) state that due to Latinx/é faculty member’s “sense of obligation,” they add to their “responsibilities and sacrifice their own personal time to write and conduct research, creating hectic schedules and stressful lives” (p. 225). This research is again consistent with what is understood about Latinx/é professionals in other settings where there is a sense of “giving back,” or contribution in time and energy that Latinx/é dedicate to their work environments, professions, and communities (Agius Vallejo & Lee, 2009; Agius Vallejo, 2012; Flores, 2011).

The tension between service work and promotion for racial or ethnic contingent faculty (Zambrana et al.,) can “result in physical and mental exhaustion, emotional drainage for many Latino faculty members” (Ponjuan, 2011, p. 101). While workload can be burdensome for all faculty, this is a critical experience for Latinx/é contingent faculty, given the unique role that they play on university campuses (Ponjuan, 2011). Feelings of stress, frustration, and overloaded work schedules are significant for faculty in STEM (Villanueva, DiStefano, et al., 2018). However, a more complete understanding of the barriers experienced by contingent faculty is lacking, in part, because systems of hierarchies in academic systems, the onboarding procedures, the existence or lack of promotion bylaws and procedures, the recruitment and retention procedures, the financial decisions associated with hiring more contingent faculty, among others, are not studied or understood. What is known is that contingent faculty have assets that are of value to academic institutions (Kezar & Sam, 2011). By better situating these strengths, more impetus to explore, sustain, and support contingent faculty can be attained.

Frameworks that situate the assets of contingent faculty

While Latinx/é contingent faculty’s sense of obligation has been studied, how they use their assets and more specifically, their “cultural wealth,” as outlined by Yosso (2005), is less understood although suggested to be vital to their professional experiences (Ortega, 2020). The community cultural wealth model (Yosso, 2005) includes six forms of capital and amongst one of them is an aspirational capital, which is the “ability to maintain hopes and dreams for the future, even in the face of real and perceived barriers” (p. 77). With further research, we could explore the goals of Latinx/é contingent STEM faculty in terms of their six capitals, community service, teaching, and scholarship needs. More research would allow for a richer understanding on the role that these faculty see for themselves and the qualities in possession to reach said goals. Yosso (2005) explores linguistic capital where “intellectual and social skills attained through communication experiences in more than one language and/or style.” Latinx/é contingent STEM faculty that are bilingual, bicultural, or sensitive to the linguistic and cultural needs of their students allows for the possibility of improving learning outcomes in their students. The concept of familial capital refers to the “cultural knowledges nurtured among familia (kin) that carry a sense of community history, memory, and cultural intuition” (Yosso, 2005, p. 79). This sense of ethnic belonging and identity builds confidence, pride, and motivation necessary to connect to others and bring values to their cultures as well as that of their students. Navigational capital, according to Yosso, “refers to skills of maneuvering through social institutions” (Yosso, 2005, p. 80). This can vary based on the educational histories of the Latinx/é s contingent STEM faculty, which are valuable to understand as they navigate academic life. Finally, Yosso writes about resistant capital, which includes the “knowledges and skills fostered through oppositional behavior that challenges inequality” (Yosso, 2005, p. 80). Understanding how Latinx/é contingent STEM faculty navigate authentically in university systems is of importance to learn. The model presented by Yosso (2005) provides a fruitful model for exploring the work lives of Latinx/é contingent faculty in STEM and the assets they bring into academia.

While these frameworks can serve as a starting point to understand the lived realities of Latinx/é contingent faculty, there are still limitations. For example, they do not provide nuances in our understanding of the contexts and diversities of the hiring institutions. The frameworks do not fully situate the hidden curriculum of the structures and systems within institutions (Villanueva et al., 2020) and how they are differentially interpreted by individuals. Finally, the frameworks do not fully capture the community and regional characteristics or generational elements behind the lives of these faculty.

At the same time, these frameworks can serve as a starting point by which to explore these considerations more fully and can serve as a counter-narrative to the deficit models stated earlier. Situating the strengths that contingent faculty bring will also help systems and structures in academia to view these individuals as professionals who deserve equitable working conditions and support.

Overview of case study: California State university system

During spring 2022, a group of 24 Latinx/é contingent faculty within the California State University System (CSU, 2021) were invited to a 1.5-day symposium where some of the findings from the ASA report along with other literature sources pointed out in this manuscript were presented to them. The contingent faculty were asked to comment on the strengths they bring as well as the challenges they experience in their existing roles in STEM departments across the CSU system. Their stories were provided in the form of oral stories, written accounts, and questionnaires. While data analysis is ongoing, preliminary findings pointed to very important recommendations to better support these faculty, some of which are summarized below.

Recommendations

Associational and organizational bodies have made efforts to advocate on behalf of contingent faculty (ASA Task Force on Contingent Faculty Employment January, 2019; COCAL [Coalition of higher education activists], 2022; Contingent Faculty Task Force, 2019) as well as our early findings from the case study have motivated this section with particular focus on the ASA Task Force on Contingent Faculty in the exploration of recommended practices for administrators, deans, and chairs.

• Consider clarifying role descriptions of contingent faculty during hiring to ensure that there are more considerations into equity considerations during onboarding

• Consider providing yearly surveys to all faculty asking about accommodations (e.g., office equipment and materials) to fulfill their roles

• Develop bylaws or procedures around promotion pathways for these faculty based on teaching performance and other job-related metrics of performance

• Sponsor professional development or invite campus resources (e.g., Centers for Teaching Excellence) to ensure all faculty have equal access to trainings

• Invite or consider virtual forms of participations for contingent faculty who are not continually available for faculty meetings.

• Create opportunities for contingent faculty to propose meeting topics or initiatives in departmental meetings

• Host check-in conferences or opportunities for contingent faculty to speak about the barriers and assets they bring to their position

• Validate Latinx/é identity through systems and structures of the university such as cultural relevance in courses and across the institution

• Payment mechanisms for uncompensated work and improved hiring policies to combat contingent faculty job insecurity

• Create more pathways for upward job mobility and promotion

• Provide formal mentorship programs for contingent faculty

• Provide institutional resources (e.g., office space, research support, and internal funding opportunities) to help contingent faculty meet the demands of teaching, research, and service

As can be seen from the recommendations, most if not all items can benefit not just Latinx/é faculty with minimal use or leveraging of existing university resources. To maintain a healthy and happy contingent faculty workforce, institutions can make small but meaningful steps to achieve this goal.

Update on Latinx/é faculty studied

At the time of the study, one of the participating faculty contacted us to let us know that she decided to transition to a tenure-track faculty position. As she indicated to us, she realized how exploited she had been in her contingent faculty position. Another faculty member is currently on the job market and looks to land an assistant professor position in California. We are still in communication with the faculty and will be sharing more nuanced information with their respective deans.

Conclusion

This paper explores the experiences of contingent faculty with an emphasis on Latinx/é contingent faculty in STEM. Exploring the hidden burdens and threats that Latinx/é STEM faculty face allows us to understand the marginality, alienation, and everyday inequalities that they face in universities. It is important to understand these hidden realities that faculty face as they are linked to their retention, commitment, well-being, and success. The frameworks in this review take a variety of approaches in exploring contingent faculty from a holistic standpoint and raise awareness to this under-explored, unattended, and often unsupported group in academia. Idalis and José have held a conference for contingent faculty in the CSU system where we were able to assess the needs of faculty. The data was presented to the Deans representing many of the schools that the faculty currently teach at. We will disseminate a recent policy piece across all our academic networks (Berdie, Downey, Muñoz, & Villanueva Alarcón, 2023) in the near future. Finally, the findings from the deans will be shared in a later publication.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The material is based upon work supported by the NSF [2137331 and 2137332]. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material do not necessarily reflect those of the NSF.