AACC leaves its adjuncts behind
My name is Courtney Buiniskis, and I’m an adjunct professor at Anne Arundel Community College. I’m also a proud alumna. I take great pride in the college, so much so that after graduating and pursuing my master’s degree in higher education, I decided to come back to the community that gave so much to me.
When I was hired in the fall of 2017, I took off running into the adjunct world. I was excited to have found my purpose as a teacher. I thought I had found my career and my calling. I was proud to become an adjunct professor. However, I would quickly learn the realities of being an adjunct: a lack of diversity, underpaid hours, no recognition in the workplace, large workloads, and no guarantee of employment even after years of service. To work so hard in my studies and my career only to find frustration was enough for anyone to become fed up.
Then COVID hit. The pandemic was hard on everyone, but for my family, watching me suffer a serious life-threatening health condition at the age of 42 in the middle of a global pandemic was terrifying.
Unfortunately, the college’s response was anything but supportive. Just two weeks after being on the brink, I was asked if I would be able to get back to teaching. There was no follow up or concern for my health. After I had to take a break from teaching, my pay was taken away too. Then came the red tape as I fought to receive the minimal, legally required sick leave benefits we have.
Next semester, after much rest and healing, I was not given any classes and was forced to file for unemployment. Shamelessly, AACC would go on to tell the unemployment division to deny my claim because I had reasonable assurance of reemployment. As an adjunct, however, I am let go at the end of each semester with nothing more than the hope that I will be granted enough classes next semester to make a living.
Although my story seems filled with tragedy and struggle, there are hundreds of other professors who have reached out to me to share trials that would make a grown man cry. Some have had to apply for food stamps to feed their children. Others find it hard to pay the rent or mortgage.
These are hard-working and highly credentialed individuals who are struggling to pay bills and feed their families. Yet when AACC distributed stipends to professors who kept students educated and classes running during the pandemic, adjuncts were excluded. For all our work and sacrifice, we were paid nothing.
Teaching is a career not a job and adjuncts deserve better. Equality and equity are not just words to be printed in an HR pamphlet. They are ideals to live by and to aspire to for any institution.
When a community college falls short of its ideals, it harms countless people. While my story is deeply personal, the treatment of adjunct faculty is public. Community colleges depend on tuition as well as public tax dollars from various levels of government. When not enough of those funds go toward paying employees, those employees rely on public assistance.
Adjuncts have lived with this institutional problem for years. It’s time for the public to take notice and demand accountability. As Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman noted in his Feb. 17 letter to the General Assembly in support of adjuncts’ right to collective bargaining, “[community colleges] already provide an affordable education to many Marylanders, and they will no doubt be the source of professional retraining for workers who need a fresh start in the new economy.” He’s right. We are training Maryland’s future workforce. It’s time we were treated like it.
If you would like more information pertaining to the cause of helping adjuncts gain more equitable rights please contact MDCCUnited@gmail.com.