Nels Highberg is the Director of First-Year Reading and Writing at the University of Hartford in West Hartford, CT. The University of Hartford has an enrollment of 4500 undergraduates. In September 2003, Highberg joined the Department of Rhetoric and Professional Writing as an assistant professor. Nels took over as WPA in January 2007. The First-Year Reading and Writing program runs 50-60 courses each semester and hires 20-30 adjunct faculty members. As WPA, Nels makes these critical personnel hiring decisions. While many discussions about adjuncts center on R1 institutions and community colleges, it is important to remember that many of us work at institutions which are centered on undergraduate education. Nels offers a glimpse into how he makes decisions for this kind of institution.

Prior to working at the University of Hartford, Highberg worked as an adjunct for both the Writing Workshop and the Center for the Study and Teaching of Writing at Ohio State. Additionally, he did adjunct work for Ohio State’s Department of Women’s Studies.

What elements on a vita make you want to interview or hire an adjunct?

It all comes down to teaching experience. For this fall, I had a pile of CVs submitted by potential faculty members. After the university had finished the majority of its orientations, and we had staffed sections with current adjunct faculty, I figured out how many sections remained open. Then, I took the pile of CVs and put them into three categories. First were the people with experience and training teaching writing. Second were people with teaching experience but not necessarily in writing. The third group was for people with no teaching experience but an interest in teaching writing. Obviously, I want to have faculty on board who have as much experience teaching writing as possible. This year, I was lucky that I filled almost all sections with people from the first group.

What aspects of a shoddy vita or application urge you to round-file it?

Generally, I don’t remove any CV from consideration. I rank them all, as I describe above. We’re a small school that does not have a graduate program, so we do not hire faculty from within. Also, central Connecticut is a relatively competitive market for adjunct faculty. There are a number of community colleges, state universities, and private schools in the area. We have been very fortunate in attracting dedicated, experienced faculty, but I know we could get in a bind someday, so no one gets trashed, but lack of teaching experience does put someone’s CV at the bottom of the pile.

In your experience, what is the greatest oversight adjuncts have in writing their vitas and filling out their applications?

If you’re asking to be considered for an adjunct faculty position, I want to see your teaching experience first. Letters that describe research may be interesting, but they do not provide information that tells me what I need to know. CVs that detail experience as a technical writer, attorney, or activist may again be interesting, but they are not really relevant. I have had to dig through some CVs to find the information on teaching. It should be upfront. That other information, which may be useful if I have to choose one person over another when all have similar teaching backgrounds, should come later.

Also, being a good writer does not mean you have a natural ability to teach writing. Those of us in composition studies know this. But I occasionally receive an application from someone with little teaching experience that contains several writing samples. I find those distracting, occasionally to the point of being annoying when I have to sift through papers in a file.

Is there a specific area of professional development you expect adjuncts to have/ demonstrate?

Other than general experience teaching writing, there’s nothing that I really expect adjunct faculty to demonstrate, but I do like to see people who have experience with technology. We have a dedicated computer lab for our classes, and it’s great to have faculty able to take advantage of it. We use Blackboard on our campus, so it’s good to find faculty with experience using that or another course management system. From this round of applicants, I found a few people with interest in incorporating visual rhetoric into first-year writing, and that was appealing as the field of composition continues to discuss the relevance and importance of such work in the first-year writing classroom.

What should adjuncts keep in mind when applying for a position at a school like yours which does not issue doctoral degrees as compared to applying to an R1 school or a community college?

We need faculty who can hit the ground running. I’ve been told by our faculty members that we do a good job of staying in contact, providing assistance, and being available. We also try to have several different types of professional development workshops on Wikipedia, Blackboard, assessment, and other topics. But we are not able to train people to teach. I, of course, try to answer questions, and I’ll review syllabi and observe classes when needed or asked. Still, I hire professionals, treat our faculty as professionals, and expect professionalism in return; professionals do not need or want someone standing over their shoulders. To be a part of our faculty, be open to joining a team, be able to ask questions and seek guidance when needed, and be able to stand in the front (or at the side) of a classroom and lead students in work that will improve their writing.

Many adjuncts teach multiple classes at multiple locations. For a first-timer, this can be very intimidating or overwhelming. Fortunately, Kevin Eric De Pew asked a great question of the WPA list five years ago:

I am working with a lecturer who for the first time will be teaching a total of 6 courses (2 campuses) this semester. She is a little worried about the time management issues. If you know of lecturers who are carrying (or have carried) similar teaching loads, can you please give me their email addresses and I will forward them to her. Or if there is a listserv for lecturers, please let me know. Thank you.

For adjuncts headed down this path, Jerry Nelms offers advice and a few things to consider. Rather than getting lost in the specific details of time management and juggling responsibilities, Jerry offers potentials that can help adjuncts keep balanced lives and remain sane.

What does the lecturer want to do with her or his life? There are ways of moving up in the profession, but continuing to teach part-time at different campuses may not be it. Instead, why not teach just a few classes just to keep in the field (no more than 3 total)–and all for the school that appears to value the lecturer the most. Then, just take a job–part-time or full-time–any job that will pay the bills but makes no demands on the person outside of the time she or he is there. Or the person could start his or her own small business (e.g., technical writer for hire, babysitting, whatever), something that a person can do at home that might actually even allow time to do other things while conducting that business. And then, save some time (evenings? weekends?) to do research and write. Keep an eye out for conference proposals and present at conferences as much as possible.

Try to get something published. If interested in teaching at a teaching institution (i.e., a teaching university, a small college, a community college), then focus the research on teaching writing or literature. If interested in teaching at a research institution, then look to get a PhD, if you haven’t already, and publish in the best journal(s) possible. I doubt that anyone spending all of their time teaching and rushing from campus to campus will lead to a full-time job anywhere but will most certainly lead to burnout eventually–and then, where will the lecturer be?

Dr. Gerald Nelms teaches at Southern Illinois University Carbondale.
Dr. Kevin Eric De Pew teaches at Old Dominion University.

Where I work, several members of the library staff are invaluable allies. They, as staff, and I, as an adjunct, have similar places in our professional food chains. Not only are we in similar positions, we have similar interests. Few of them spend days and weeks a year in meetings; it is not a part of their job description. I spend a handful of hours each month in meetings, and those meetings directly relate to the status of adjuncts on campus. Instead of being responsible for, or distracted by, the institutional and political needs of our college, instead of being lost in the maze of politics and structure, instead of grappling with institution-wide issues, we focus on serving the students and developing ourselves professionally.

One of the best ways I have found to improve my teaching is to understand the facilities at my institution. Having allies in the library has familiarized me with technology, rooms, resources, and schedules which I knew little to nothing about. Additionally, I can share the knowledge with my peers just as my library colleagues shared their resources with me. Alone, none of these resources will make for a better class, teaching handout, or learning environment. Together with my other efforts and work, I know I am a better and more prepared instructor. Additionally, I know I can refer my students to reliable and professional colleagues.

One of the best results of having allies outside of my department is that they have a different perspective on our school, my program, and my students. Their insights, anecdotes, and experiences bring me up to speed on campus-related issues, help me better understand the student population, and give me a sense of the school’s work culture. On top of all this, it is simply nice to know other people around campus who are not a part of my department. I am able to live and work in a world that includes, but is not limited to, composition. During busy points of the term, this helps me stay sane.

While reading through archives and following hyperlinks to find great advice and useful tools for adjuncts, I came across the Peer Editing Exchange. A new online resource, it holds potential and promise for writers of all skill levels. The site has several potential uses for adjuncts. First, students can post their work and give feedback to one another in a semi-anonymous fashion. Second, students could solicit feedback and reviews from strangers. Third, adjuncts can seek out and receive feedback on conference proposals and professional papers from their peers and colleagues.

As the site is new, it is difficult to predict where it will go. However, as a cost-free service, it offers great potential. If adjuncts started using it, surely they could further the site’s intention of peers helping peers.

Given the great potential for Peer Editing Exchange, I wanted to interview the creator of Peer Editing Exchange. I thought it would be interesting to see what kind of person creates a cost-free site for peer review. Fortunately, Joshua Pritikin agreed.

What is your professional background?

I have about 20 years experience with software development culminating with eight years in New York City working professionally on financial applications. I
guess I got burnt out in those last 8 years though. I wanted to change my career but to what I didn’t know. I moved to India and spent a lot of
time reading and writing about psychology.

What is your relationship with composition?

I had previously viewed composition as a necessary evil. In India, however, I decided that I must perfect my composition skills. I wanted to open a discussion on the intersection of social cognition and emotion, and I knew that my composition ability must not hinder me with a topic which was already so challenging.

How did that lead to creating the Peer Editing Exchange?

In recognizing my ambition to write well, I anticipated that this goal would be shared by many others who would participate in the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) program. Many of these children would look to the Internet for expertise. One of the acknowledged challenges of OLPC is that there is a shortage of teachers. It may be hard to imagine from a plush armchair, but in many parts of the developing world teachers are not particularly well educated. So I anticipated a great need for help with composition.

Then I read Tomasello (2003)*. He argued convincingly that composition is firstly about communication and not about spelling, grammar, sentence structure, or any other technical contrivance I had learned in school. Perhaps this is already well known among composition scholars, but this realization dawned on me gradually. I felt less guilty about my ignorance of lexical categories.

Eventually, I completed an empirical study and began submitting my write-ups to psychology conferences. Of course I had heard of peer review, but
actually doing it, getting involved, made the process much more visceral. It became even more clear how much I had been helped over the years by getting other people to read early drafts of my writing. I asked myself, “Why can’t beginning writers benefit from the same kind of peer review system employed at the pinnacle of the academy?”

So is the Peer Editing Exchange designed for a specific writing level?

Not in the sense that any level of writing is excluded; however, it is necessary to approximate a writing level when you register a manuscript so that the manuscript can be matched with an appropriate peer. After all, it would probably be counterproductive for somebody with only sixth-grade skill in writing to be assigned to edit a college-level manuscript.

So manuscripts of all writing levels are welcome on the exchange. It remains to be seen how beginning writers will benefit from reviews of their own writing and by reviewing others’ writing. I am fairly sure that peer review has already been tried with beginning writers with some success, but on the exchange it could happen on a scale never before seen.

Do you see the Peer Editing Exchange working for students in classes as well as the teachers of those classes? How so?

Students can employ the exchange outside of class to improve their writing even if a teacher is unaware of it. In that case, the exchange would be involved to a minimal degree. A more integrated approach, however, would be an interesting experiment. A teacher could require use
of the exchange and, in addition to asking students to write and revise their own writing, students could oversee or assist in reviewing other manuscripts. My area of study is not composition, so I’m not sure what has been tried in the past, but this seems like a promising pedagogical innovation.

Personally, having the opportunity to edit other writers’ manuscripts would have fascinated me as a beginning writer. I am sure I would have enjoyed my English classes in high school much more than I did.

Where do you hope to see the Peer Editing Exchange five years from now?

Ultimately I believe the exchange will provide access to a depth of talent and unsurpassable turnaround time on editing assignments. By
“unsurpassable turnaround time” I mean feedback from 2-3 experienced reviewers within 2 hours with service available 24 hours a day, 365 days
a year (and 366 days on leap years). By “depth of talent,” I mean many excellent reviewers at all writing levels. That kind of service may be
achievable with a million members. Of course nobody can predict whether the exchange will have a million members within five years.

My own selfish hope is that the exchange will gain enough membership to offer me quick turnaround on my own writing. I believe that would require
about 1000 active members with 5-10 manuscripts registered per day. To put those numbers in perspective, I expect that one or two small
colleges could generate that much volume. Moreover, once there are 1000 active members then that would settle most doubt about whether the
exchange is providing a useful service. I would feel more confident about making predictions about membership and manuscript turnover
numbers.

*Tomasello, M. (2003). Constructing a Language: A Usage-Based Theory of Language Acquisition. Harvard University Press.

Teaching Basic Writing (BW) is challenging and rewarding. Taking on a BW class with little to no background can be overwhelming. Since many adjuncts are hired at the last minute, and many BW classes are staffed by adjuncts, it follows that a number of BW classes are staffed by adjuncts new to teaching or to teaching Basic Writing.

To offer some insight and experienced advice, I turned to Marcia Ribble of the University of Cincinnati. Her experience as an adjunct and long-term BW instructor yielded some great advice.

What are the most common issues adjuncts new to Basic Writing face when preparing for their classes?

The most important issue new BW adjuncts face is often derived from a lack of knowledge about basic writing and basic writing students. Because of this lack of knowledge they often grasp onto basic writing textbooks that are focused on sentence, grammar, paragraph levels like Grassroots, or those that simplify writing to the Five Paragraph Essay level, or those that focus on literature essays for students who desperately need to learn business writing for their jobs.

Some schools do a good job of introducing new adjuncts to the field, while others just hand them a textbook, a couple of sample syllabi, and a list of the semester’s dates. The students I worked with had taken a course in teaching basic writing, and shadowed me for several semesters before they were placed in a classroom on their own. They had a strong support system and tended to do very well as teachers. I’ve been in other situations where the support was less useful or even absent entirely, with teachers left to figure it out themselves.

The uncertainty about what to do and how to do it is the biggest problem most new adjuncts face. As the National Writing Project discovered about high school teaching of writing, faculty can usually teach better if they are active writers themselves and have a better notion of problems writers face on a day-to-day basis.

I’d suggest that folks read Derek Bok’s new book Our Underachieving Colleges for a solid understanding of why teaching writing is challenging. They might also read Victor Villanueva’s book Cross-Talk in Comp Theory, Mina Shaughnessy’s Errors and Expectations, and David Bartholomae’s The Tidy House. Villanueva’s book will help them understand that there is no single “right” way to teach basic writing with plenty of disagreements. Shaughnessy’s will help them to understand that not being a great writer as a basic writer doesn’t necessarily mean they aren’t going to become strong, capable writers. Bartholomae’s personal story about his introduction and struggles with basic writing and basic writers will increase their patience with themselves as teachers.

Basic Writing classes often generate a lot of paperwork that requires time, attention, and feedback. How would you advise staying on top of the work without foregoing sleep for weeks?

When I was in graduate school at the University of Utah, Dean Rehberger advised me to focus on helping the writer to resolve only one problem at a time, cutting down a lot on the tendency to mark every error. If folks are going to take this advice they need to explain this approach to students, so they won’t be as shocked when they correct problem A, only to have their teacher bring up problem B. I try to focus on that one problem which, if it were resolved would cut the error rate for that student down to the point where their paper will receive a better reception, or which they will need to go to the Writing Center for help with (a good decision when the problem is one that’s likely to be relatively permanent such as missing articles in the writing of some students who are English as a Second Language learners), or when the problem is one that learning just one strategy is likely to cure. Note that I don’t always follow that advice myself, but it’s good advice.

The second part of my response here is to understand that new BW faculty need to take care of themselves in order to respond well to student writing. When I was a part-time freeway flyer, I learned that I had to go out on Saturday evening to listen for three hours to live jazz played in a funky bar with an upside down Christmas tree hanging from the ceiling. Listening to jazz gave me enough energy to grade papers from the 6 or 7 classes I was teaching each term (18-20 a year).

In your experience, what kind of assignments do you think generate the greatest student interest?

Over the years I’ve been teaching writing, students have liked best those assignments that allowed them to focus in on something they cared about. Under those conditions, many of them devoted hours to conducting solid research, wrote significantly longer papers, and maintained better attendance. So my answer is inquiry with lots of input from the teacher to help students avoid the generic paper on any frequently addressed topic. For example, one of my students started out thinking that he wanted to write about the use of steroids in sports (he played football). I asked him about the battle of Marathon in Greece. His final draft was an incredibly interesting paper on the origination of the Olympics following that battle, and the runner who brought the results by running 26 miles and then died of exhaustion. This can be fun for both teacher and student.

To the adjunct who has never taught Basic Writing before, what are the three things that you think they need to know about their students?

That always depends on who the students are and where they’re located. But a commonality, across all the many different demographics and locations I’ve taught, is that many students are giving their hearts and souls to succeed. I’ve had students come to class after miscarrying, after signing divorce papers that morning, after losing a 15-year-old friend who was shot the night before, after throwing up blood in the bathroom from a bleeding ulcer. I’ve had students in ankle tethers who come to class from jail, and some who can’t read, but think we can perform miracles. Some are terrified that you will confirm their feeling that if they weren’t stupid they should have been able to write as easily as others seem, to them, to write. Here I’d suggest the wonderful Richard Haswell and Min-Zahn Lu book COMPTales for the stories of other writing teachers. If you believe in your students, and they believe that you are on their side, they’ll do more and better than you could believe might be possible given their histories in school.

What do you say to the adjunct who has the impression that teaching Basic Writing is less scholarly/ prestigious than teaching college-level composition or English Literature?

Teaching Basic Writing requires greater professional knowledge and depth of commitment and compassion and understanding of how writing works for many different kinds of brains. We need to know that if the pedagogies used in the entire K-12 years of grade, middle, and high school haven’t worked for our students, they may need a pedagogy that hasn’t been tried yet, and it’s up to us to figure out what that pedagogy might be. One size doesn’t fit all in teaching writing. Most of the faculty I am working with today to teach Basic Writing have twenty or more years of experience and choose Basic Writing as their primary preference in teaching. We aren’t frustrated English Lit folks, but men and women who’ve made working with basic writers our main passion in life. And many of us are poets, fiction or nonfiction writers ourselves. For me, my first exposures to basic writers forced me back to grad school to learn more about the students, the pedagogies, and the theories.

I had encountered a student and was told that BW students seldom write more than a couple of paragraphs. I gave my students a story frame to write about. This student first turned in 7 typed, single-spaced pages of a story that was totally unique and incredibly complex, but asked if he could finish it. The finished story was 15 typed, single-spaced pages of a story that controlled plot, voice, language, psychological depth, character development, etc. at a professional writer’s level, but was loaded cheek by jowl with spelling and grammar errors. I had to find a way to explain extraordinary writer/ basic writer in one person. He wasn’t an anomoly, just a young man with learning disabilities. Awesome experience!

It is the middle of the term. The Basic Writing course seems to be going fine. What do you think the new Basic Writing teacher needs to remember while the seas are calm?

Spend the extra time reading about Basic Writing, and use some of it for tasks that they won’t have time for later to ease their lives. Precooked and frozen reheatable real meals can be a godsend when even stopping at the grocery store on the way home is too much to handle. I cook big batches of chili, spaghetti, etc. that tend to taste just as good thawed and heated.

We also use that time at UC to schedule whole days for one-on-one student conferences that our research shows our students love. Each of my students gets a 1/2 hour conference, although some faculty have four students in at a time which would work better when there are larger class sizes, or more
classes.

Web Worker Daily, while centered around web workers, offers a cornucopia of suggestions for people, like adjuncts, who piece multiple income streams into an economic existence. While their tips center around online work, they offer many resources, reviews, and links that can benefit adjuncts–especially if they spend any amount of time online.

Once again, Dean Dad answers a great and relevant question that all newbie adjuncts should read. Graduate students and new adjuncts would do well to read Dean Dad and his readers’ advice. This post addresses key issues, such as the difference between teaching upper and lower division classes and grading, for those feeling a bit nervous and new to teaching.

This question was so useful and inspiring that it prodded Doctor Pion to address his own blog post to the question. While a bit lengthy, it is an informative read.

Lifehacker offered this link–videos included!–of some workplace exercises to keep from getting too tense, out of shape, or knotted. Whether driving your freeway-flyer or using a laptop, everyone needs some stretching.