Since the Affordable Care Act was enacted, adjunct professors across the nation have experienced deep cuts in their hours. Adjunct professors have historically been seen as temporary fill-in employees by many institutions of higher education. However, there are many adjuncts that have made teaching their career and do not intend to be seen as "temporary".
Due to the new regulations of the Affordable Care Act, full-time employees are entitled to receive health care benefits provided by their employers. Many adjuncts teach anywhere between 3 credits per semester to 14 credits per semester. In addition, adjunct professors put many hours of their free time aside to tutor students, grade papers, and provide feedback, which is not included in their salary for their semester. Adjuncts are often only paid for their contact hours (class time) and therefore anything they do beyond that is largely optional. This means that many adjuncts are being paid less than what they deserve, although in most cases they have agreed to it through a contract assignment.
As employers must comply with these new regulations by January 2014 or face penalties, many institutions of higher education have already began cutting hours of adjuncts so that they do not have to provide health care benefits to these employees. These cut backs in hours are severely hurting adjuncts who rely on their salaries to survive. Many adjuncts do not work additional jobs outside of teaching, and therefore will have to look for other work once their hours are reduced. Other adjuncts may decide to file for unemployment benefits and food stamps, as well as other forms of assistance if their hours are cut significantly.
At a time when we are striving to see the economy turn around for the better, it would really be a shame to see the unemployment rates climb even higher as adjunct professors are left with very few options. There is still time to act, though. Many adjuncts are writing in to their local and state officials to let them know where they stand. Some adjuncts have begun writing to President Obama to tell their story of how these new regulations will negatively impact them. Many other adjuncts are holding forums in which they are being heard by administrators of the institutions for which they are employed. Additionally, human resource representatives are working with the administration officials at various institutions of higher education to come up with an effective way of dealing with the new regulations that would allow adjuncts to keep most of their hours, if not all.
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