Adjunct Best Practices

April 2025

These aspirational practices developed by the AAUP-SC Committee Z on Equity in the Workplace are informed by reports by the USCA Faculty Welfare Committee in 2017, by Julia Eichelberger at the College of Charleston in 2019, and Committee Z’s survey of adjunct faculty in 2023 and subsequent conversations with some respondents, AFT and AAUP resources, other print sources, and consultations with AAUP-SC membership during and following the Fall 2024 AAUP-SC meeting. They were adopted at the Spring 2025 AAUP-SC meeting. We are using the term adjunct to denote faculty “compensated on a per-course-section or hourly basis” (AAUP, Contingent Appointments and the Academic Profession.) We recommend that chapters consider their unique institutional contexts and consult the guidance provided by the AAUP report on contingent appointments when deliberating the implementation of these best practices at their respective institutions.

Equitable Compensation. Adjunct faculty receive pay, benefits, and respect comparable to that earned by professional and tenure track faculty with similar qualifications for doing similar work.
Equitable hiring and evaluation practices. Hiring and evaluation practices for adjunct faculty are comparable to those used to hire and evaluate tenure-track faculty;
Career Ladders. Adjunct faculty have access to a clearly articulated career ladder and seniority system, including specified criteria, making them eligible for greater job security and conversion to full-time positions.
Equitable support. Support for adjunct faculty teaching parallels support for TTF: appropriate supplies, equipment, office space, parking, and access to campus resources, professional development, and mentoring. Adjuncts receive training in Learning Management Systems and institutional IT platforms, FERPA, TITLE IX, campus safety, and institutional student support resources.
Equitable participation. Adjunct faculty are invited but not required without compensation to participate in department meetings and may contribute to curriculum design.
Equitable representation. Adjunct faculty have the right to vote and serve on committees for which they have the relevant expertise, especially those committees whose decisions affect their work and working conditions.
Equitable professional development. Adjunct faculty have access to professional development opportunities and the opportunity to apply for support for professional development and scholarly research.
Transparency. The institution collects and publishes data that tracks institutional and departmental reliance on adjunct appointments as a proportion of all appointments and of all credit hours taught, as well as the median adjunct salary at the institutional and departmental levels.
Equitable inclusion in policy. Adjunct faculty are formally included in any definition of the institution’s faculty and receive explicit protection in the institution’s faculty manual or equivalent, as well as in university and academic affairs policies.
Academic Freedom Protections. Adjunct faculty enjoy explicit protection of their academic freedom in the classroom, in scholarship and research, in shared governance, and when speaking or writing as a citizen.

Adopted by the South Carolina Conference of the AAUP at the Spring Meeting, April 12, 2025.