Still so much to learn...

Guilty party

I am now on my TDY (temporary duty) tour here at one of the nicest places on earth, beautiful Palo Alto, California, serving as a chaplain and learning at the Veteran's Hospital here.  We are right down the street from Stanford University and very near the famous "Silicon Valley".  And just about 40 minutes or so south of San Francisco.

This is quite a place.  Very different than my last two harsh deployment tours (Antarctica and Arabia)!   My mobilty bag (see photo) survived two global deployments....but did not survive two weeks in Palo Alto, CA.  (Rather,  two bored little doggies in my hotel room who chewed through it trying to get to their treats inside...)

The VA Hospital I am happy to report, is one of the most beautiful and modern VA's I have ever seen.  And I am quite lucky to be here, serving here and learning. 

This is a side of the military I have not yet seen much of...all the years I have been in...what happens after the vets get discharged?  What happens to the vets who are injured...and do not fly home with their units, but rather, in planes that take them from SW Asia to the USA...to a hospital or care facility?

They are young and they are old.  Some are in between.  Vietnam vets, Afghanistan vets, Iraq vets, people still on active duty, people who got out long ago.   Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force.  National Guard.  Reserves, and so on.   The veteran's do receive top notch treatment here. 

One vet I was visiting the other day said he had been in 30 years.  I asked him to share some wisdom from all his years in the service.  He said "Don't let the B.S. get to you!"   We both laughed.

Still so much to learn....

Sigh.

The Normal People

I started this blog last summer when I found out I was being deployed to Antarctica.  After I returned home, I decided to continue telling my stories...of my travels, my deployments, the amazing people I have met, continue to meet, life in the military, music, teaching, and more...

As I write this post, I am once again...on the road, to my next military assignment....to the next "edge of the earth" so to speak, to a VA hospital where I will serve as a chaplain for the summer.  It may not be as glamorous as when I deployed to SW Asia, or to Antarctica, or to Panama, or some other far away, exotic place, but...I go where they send me...and to have this tour of duty is a blessing.

Someone recently asked me, "Do you LIKE being on the road this much?"   Well...yes I am tired of living out of a suitcase.   Like so many people, I wish I had a regular, normal job, or a normal, comfortable life.  Sigh.  But, I don't.  Actually, I never have!

Many years ago, in my music playing days, one late night we (the band members) were tearing down our equipment after a gig, and the drummer and I began talking as we were prone to do.  I was wrapping up my cords and she was dismantling her drum kit.  It was late, and this evening was not a weekend, so the crowd was thin.  Weekend nights were packed with people, but not so much during the work week.  I commented, 'Why do they (the club owners) have us play so darn late if hardly anyone stays up this late during the week, much less go out to hear a band?'     The drummer chimed in, 'Yeah, the normal people usually don't stay up this late during the week...'

The normal people.   It made me chuckle.  But I knew what she meant. 

Some people have the blessing of living a "normal" life, whatever that means.  In this instance, it meant people who were blessed with full time jobs, people who worked during the week, usually day schedules, 40 hours a week and had weekends off.  Normal people are typically married, have families, a house, and all comforts of life that normal people have.

Normal people don't have to take jobs that whisk them away far from home or to the other side of the planet, because they have normal jobs, in the very city they live in!  They don't work have to work into the wee hours of the night, they work normal day hours, 8 am to 5 pm or so.  They don't have to work three part time jobs just to survive and pay the bills.  Oh, I should also mention, normal people HAVE JOBS.  Good, full time jobs with good, decent pay.

When I was in Antarctica, I met some very interesting people.  Some took the jobs down there because they had no job and no job prospects at home.  Some of them had lost their homes, had to give up their pets, had put all their things in storage while they worked in Antarctica for the 5 month summer season there. It was not "normal".

When I returned home, I was telling a certain person about what it was like down there.  The cold, the wind, the harshness, the austerity.   This person responded to me, with irritation,  "You could not pay me enough to go down there!"

Well.  I guess he had the blessing of having that choice.  He had a normal, comfortable life.

But so many don't.

And for so many, we were just not created that way.

Invisible Adjunct

I came across an old blog that is now no more called "Invisible Adjunct".  What a great name!  But alas, it is actually sad, but true...and a sign of the times.

For those not in the higher education world,  colleges and universities hire many part time professors, (called "adjuncts" or "lecturers").  For the college, this is much cheaper than hiring full time professors with decent salaries and benefits.  The trend the past twenty or so years is hiring more and more adjuncts and less and less full time professors.  About 75% of the faculty at community colleges are now adjunct faculty! 

An adjunct faculty has to have the same qualifications as any full time college teacher, at least at the community colleges.  This usually means a Master's degree at minimum.  In universities, they do hire people with Master's, PhD's of course, are preferred.

Many people work as adjuncts while they are working on their PhD or another degree.  Some are adjuncts because they have another full time job that is their main bread and butter, or a spouse that supports them.  Many, hang in there year after year with the hope of getting on full time some day, and or are searching for a full time professorship.

Some do it for the joy of teaching and love for the students... because it is certainly not for the money! 

The adjunct faculty is a second class citizen in the academic world.  No tenure, no benefits, no  office (usually), and no say in what goes.  The pay is about 1/5th of a full time college teacher, and only by each class (hours) one teaches per semester.   

Yes, the invisible adjunct teacher.  As an adjunct faculty, the pay is minimal and there are virtually no benefits.  No offices, no health insurance, no supplies, etc.  The college can let the adjunct go at will, and basically rehires by contract every semester.  A full time teacher can take an adjuncts classes last minute before the semester begins if they want to, even if they filled because of the popularity of the adjunct teacher's reputation as a good teacher. 

The adjunct basically comes to the college, teaches their classes, and leaves.  Oh, maybe some time at the school for class prep, like photocopying, or meeting with students.

The adjunct is usually not invited to the weekly or monthly faculty meetings, or the department meetings.

Yes, working as an adjunct can be a lonely life. Many give up after a few years, disillusioned.  Hurt.  Angry.

Some of the full timers have never been an adjunct, and have no idea what an adjunct goes through. There is an unspoken hierarchy in academia, an adjunct is "low on the totem pole".   Some pity the adjunct, "those poor adjuncts".  It is a part time teaching job not for those that need lots of ego massaging.  As one article put it, adjuncts are the "slaves of academia".

So I can see why "Invisible Adjunct" gave up on teaching and closed up her blog.  Those graduate degrees do cost lots of money...and then, the only job to be found is work as an adjunct faculty...part time work, for what pretty much equates to gas money.

When I was a college student some 25 or so years ago, 95% (if not more) of all my professors were full time teachers.  They had offices, benefits, decent pay.  I remember ten years after I finished my degree going back to visit my community college, (where I went my first year before transferring to the university), and finding my former philosophy and music teachers...still there!   It was so great to see them again!  And, they remembered me.  One writing me a letter of recommendation so I could attend graduate school. 

But nowadays, students wanting letters of recommendation for graduate school may come back of few years later, and their former professor, who was an adjunct is now gone.  And that is that.

More for less.  Less pay.  No benefits.   Tuition keeps going up, and the vast majority (75%) of teachers are part time with minimal pay and no benefits.     Who is making the money here?  Where are the ethics?

What is going to happen to higher education?   What is going to happen to us?