The Symbolism of one Adjunct Professor's Death

[xchrom]

https://www.commondreams.org/view/2014/03/26-0


Margaret Mary Vojtko, fall 2008. (Photo courtesy Joseph Ball/Off the Bluff)


f one obscure college professor dies, does it make any difference? If you're Margaret Mary Vojtko, yes.

Margaret Mary died last summer at age 83 — and her death has turned her name into an emotional rallying cry for adjunct college teachers who're seeking justice from their schools.

Vojtko had taught French classes for 25 years at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, earning high marks from her students. Their praise helped make up for Duquesne's poor pay and lack of respect. Like most teachers there, Margaret Mary was part of the adjunct faculty — a group that now teaches more than half of all U.S. college courses, yet has no tenure or bargaining power, thus allowing schools like Duquesne to take advantage of them. And, boy, do they ever!

As with other adjuncts, Professor Vojtko was unsalaried, instead paid a low rate for each course she taught. This provided no reliable income, for she was never told until just before a semester began whether she'd be teaching three classes, one ... or none. Even in good years with full teaching loads, her pay was below $25,000 — with zero benefits.

[BainsBane]

1. some universities have a separate class of instructors

that aren't classified as faculty at all. They teach all of the language instruction, freshman composition, and a huge variety of other courses. And yes, of course the pay is much lower than that of faculty.

[hfojvt]

8. well in many universities

those are called "graduate students". All of us with assistantships were teaching two intro classes per semester, although I, for some reason, spent my first semester just assisting a prof who had a much larger class. I was glad for that, it gave me time to catch up since I had graduated in 1985 with a minor, and went to grad school in 1988.

And good grief, just typing those numbers makes me feel really old.

The impending birthday does not help either.

[BainsBane]

21. I'm not talking about grad students

I'm talking about people with PhDs who are in effect adjuncts but are a non-faculty class of employee.

[malaise]

2. Yes the really intelligent professionals are now slaves for the

managerial class - they have this ever-growing bureaucracy (just like the high schools).
Sadly too many academics never saw this neo-liberal approach to education destroying our universities.

[xchrom]

4. +1

[zazen]

3. a few places are trying f/t teaching lines, but it's a patch

I think if those lines had tenure and comparable salaries too, then that's a different story. I know research faculty and teaching line faculty who are quite pleased with that trial system, but I don't think it will get legs.

The expectations for TT faculty (even with benefits) are insane. The claim that universities or NSF or whatever give a shit about really making it hospitable for women is BS, because very few individuals can raise a family with any engagement and work 100 hours a week under constant expectation of generation publications, grants, teaching, advising doctoral students, service work, etc. The only women I see make it to full have no children (or are gay and have a woman at home looking after the kids).

The insane competition WITHIN the ranks of the remaining tenured is bifurcating them as much as the bifurcation between TT and adjuncts. Keep them exhausted and fighting with each other for the golden ring. I've been disgusted at the way TT faculty--the ones who stay--implicitly endorse this neoliberalism and go after each other rather than try to end the proliferation of unnecessary middle management positions and high salaries for unnecessary vice chancellors of blah blah blah, but it tends to self-select for the most aggressive.

[enlightenment]

5. The smaller the pond,

the more vicious the fish.

[kairos12]

10. It's an academic gladiator school.

[anneboleyn]

6. It is an epidemic! The Chronicle stated recently that only about 24% of young faculty are

on the tenure track. All the rest are adjuncts, often graduate students fresh out of school, desperate for jobs, who will take pretty much anything to stay "relevant" in their academic field. the Chronicle profiled adjuncts who have been stuck in adjunct positions for years, while their colleges let tenure track lines die out but continue to hire more and more administrators. Some of the adjuncts profiled for the Chronicle story were using public assistance (food stamps, Medicaid) as their salaries did not even provide the basics.

The pressure to get an academic job, of any kind, is enormous for junior academics (the traditional logic has always been that if you are "out" of the field for more than one year then you don't have a chance) and the current job market is brutal. In the "old days" a junior academic could reasonably hope to get an entry level tenure-track position, as long as his/her credentials were solid and his/her research project seamed viable. Now the young academics are taking low-paying "post doc" positions (an adjunct position in disguise) or "three year visiting term" positions. These positions lure these young academics, who don't realize that they can quickly get stuck in a position and that their chances of landing a tenure track job decrease dramatically the longer they stay in an adjunct position.

There has been a sinister, long-term revolution happening at these universities -- the corporate-minded administrations have doubled and/or tripled their levels in the last decade or so, funding themselves, their pet projects (building new gyms and so on while the faculty, and, in turn, the students, get screwed out of research money and financial aid), and constantly justifying the need for yet more administrative positions, all the while eliminating old tenure-track academic positions, reducing faculty salaries, research funding, etc. (and they have been hiring adjuncts in large numbers). It is a disaster, and it is very hard to say when or where or how it will end. This is why workers need unions.

[hfojvt]

7. "she died jobless"

The woman was 83 when she died. Why the hell should she still be working at age 83???

Did she want, or expect to be able to, keep teaching until she was 90?

She was 57 when she STARTED teaching there. I hope to retire by the time I am 57. Actually I hope to partially retire this year and start working part time again at age 52.

"Also, her cancer returned, piling huge medical bills on her back."

How did she NOT qualify for medicare/medicaid?

[SheilaT]

9. Thanks.

This story has been posted before and all those who screamed outrage at what happened to this woman missed the important points you've raised: How old she was when she started at the university, her cancer, her mysterious lack of qualifying for Medicare or Medicaid.

I suppose it's possible she made it to age 57 without ever having worked anywhere, and without ever having been married, or married long enough before a divorce, to qualify for Social Security through a spouse. And if she was adjunct faculty and there was no retirement or pension plan for such as she. It can happen.

An acquaintance recently told me that his 35 year old son lives with the mom (they're long divorced), does not work, apparently has never worked although he has a law degree. The mom has social security and a pension. But when she's no longer around the son will have no income of his own. What must he -- or the mom -- be thinking?

[catrose]

11. would Medicare cover all her cancer bills?

People with insurance go bankrupt over cancer copays; I don't know how much Medicare or Medicaid pay, but I'm guessing not all.

And even if she did have SS, it might not be enough to lift her out of poverty.

Jim Hightower is not a weasel; he probably knows the answers to these questions and might even provide them.

It's scary to think how big the holes are in our safety nets.

[SheilaT]

14. I suppose not.

And in that case, how is she different from any other elderly person -- or person of any age -- who dies from cancer? Who has any catastrophic illness that bankrupts a person?

It is true that SS is often quite a low payout, depending of course on how much a person earned and for how long before collecting.

I'm sure the essential point is that we need to have the kind of coverage for all that other civilized countries have.

[catrose]

16. Yes, while the focus is on an adjunct professor

If an extremely educated, capable person can end up like this, anyone and everyone can.

[Blue Diadem]

18. She did collect Social Security

I went looking for more info on her after remembering the story posted last year about her. This Slate article gives a pretty good look at her life.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/education/2013/11/death_of_duquesne_adjunct_margaret_mary_vojtko_what_really_happened_to_her.html

[Helen Borg]

12. "How did she NOT qualify for medicare/medicaid?"

Same question... If she worked for such a long time, didn't she pay FICA automatically?...

[happyslug]

19. Let me address Medicaid first

Pennsylvania restriction on Medicaid is based on income. Medicaid in Pennsylvania cuts out at 50% of the Federal Poverty level, 75% if someone is on Supplement Security Income (SSI. please note SSI Is NOT Social Security).

100% of the Federal Poverty level is $11,630 in 2014, so if she earns $25,000 she earned to much income for any Medicaid program. The state has "adult Basic" that caps out at 200% of the Federal poverty level of $23,340 in 2014. Thus her earning $25,000 makes her ineligible for the state programs (Which do not cover much to begin with).

2014 poverty guidelines:
http://familiesusa.org/product/federal-poverty-guidelines

Fact sheet on Medical benefits in Pennsylvania:

http://www.nashp.org/sites/default/files/Penn_FactSheet.pdf

Now, Pennsylvania has another medical program, the "Spend down program". which covers any medical bill that exceeds the difference between income AND what you would received in welfare. She lived in Allegheny County, so her spend down was set at $206 per month, i.e. if her medical bills were so high that they would leave her with only $206 a month, the State would pay anything that would require her to spend that $206. She would be left with $206 to pay all her other bills, food, clothing etc.

Obama care would have increased these limits, but Pennsylvania never adopted ACA and thus those higher limits do not apply (and she died in 2013, before ACA kicked in).

Now to Medicare:

Medicare is another ball game, but has co-pays. She did not have any supplemental health insurance to pay those co-pays and thus can be excessive. A recent study indicated that do to the massive increase in medical costs, the co-pays of today almost equal what senior citizens were paying in 1964 for Medical Treatment. When Medicare was created the co-pay, the 20% copay was a huge reduction in the cost of medicare care, now it is excessive unless paid for by some other means (If she was eligible for Medicaid, then Medicaid would have paid the 20% co-pay).

http://www.medicare.gov/your-medicare-costs/costs-at-a-glance/costs-at-glance.html#collapse-4809

[happyslug]

13. This was reported MONTHS ago, both in DU and Pittsburgh Post Gazette

First reported on DU in September 2013 (At least three different threads):

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1016&pid=73926

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023690475

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1018&pid=482944

Reported on DU in November 2013:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/101678788

And the Post Gazette Article that started the whole movement:

http://www.post-gazette.com/Op-Ed/2013/09/18/Death-of-an-adjunct/stories/201309180224#ixzz2fFjyUCaT

[ProfessorGAC]

15. That's Really Low Pay

When i was adjuncted to three different schools from the late 70's to just after 2000, i made way more than that. Not enough to get rich or anything, but on an inflation adjusted basis, i was averaging something like 18 or 19 thousand and i never taught more than one class and didn't always do both semesters. (Depended on other job travel schedule. Although i probably did 2 terms more ofter than not.)

I never felt disrespected or exploited either.

Something has truly changed dramatically.

[blackspade]

17. What a disgrace.

[SheilaT]

20. Everyone needs to read the article linked to

in post 13.

This woman's history is very sad. She was an adjunct all those years because she never completed her PhD. She was a hoarder who refused many, many offers of help. To me, this sums it all up:

To be fair to the university, though, better benefits and job security would not have altered many of the personal factors that precipitated Vojtko’s crisis. Her hoarding and her deep-seated stubbornness—not her finances—were behind her refusal to get her furnace fixed, or to move to a facility better suited to her medical condition.