Earlier this week U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis appeared on NPR's Talk of the Nation.  During that interview a question was raised about the working conditions of part-time faculty, specifically at community colleges.  The Secretary's response (excerpted below) worried some activists concerned about contingent faculty working conditions.  They took the Secretary's answer to imply that part-time faculty were not committed to their students.

"If that were the case, we would be very concerned about that as well" stated AFT President, Randi Weingarten.  "However, having worked with the Secretary and knowing her concern for workers in all professions, we were sure that was not her intent and so we approached the Department of Labor seeking clarification."

In response, Secretary Solis made the following statement:

Adjunct faculty are being particularly hard-hit by the financial crisis at the state level. They deserve to be represented in collective bargaining, and their collective bargaining agreements should be respected. I certainly was not implying that adjuncts are not committed to their students, or that they are anything other than excellent educators.  In fact, my involvement with California community colleges has shown me that they are committed professionals who are dedicated to helping students succeed. What I wanted to get across is that, too often, adjunct faculty do not get the level of compensation or professional supports that full-time faculty receive to advise students academically, follow students through their academic careers, develop the college's curriculum, etc. Too many adjuncts, I noted, wind up needing to move from college to college each week just to put together a small living. 

                                                          --Secretary Hilda Solis

We appreciate the Secretary's concern and commitment to improving the working conditions of our members and her desire to make sure that she was clear about her support of part-time faculty.  We will continue to work with her and the Administration in general on finding ways to address the staffing crisis that our colleges and universities face, now even more acutely than before.

Excerpt from Talk of the Nation after the jump.

CONAN: We're speaking with the secretary of labor, Hilda Solis. You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. And this email from Betsy in Cape Cod: "I'm a part-time community college faculty member. We earn a small fraction of the salary our full-time colleagues earn for doing the same job, and many of us get no benefits. The stimulus money that was supposed to be going to keep jobs is frequently going instead to one-time capital projects. Even those of us who Re unionized - and we are the minority - are unable in the main to strike so there is very little we can do during contract negotiations. If educating people is as important as the president said, is strengthening faculty salaries, benefits and job security part of your agenda? If so, how do you propose to do it?"

Sec. SOLIS: Wow. That's a big challenge. But it's one that I understand well as a former trustee of a community college and understand well the challenges, because many states by the way, who provide most of the bulk of support for funding for community colleges, their revenue has gone down. So, I know even in my own state of California many people have been pink-slipped, laid off. They've had to reduce class size and actually turn away a number of students that want to enroll in the fall, or postpone their education. So, I understand there has to be a need to help provide assistance and leadership for community colleges. And just to give you an idea, most of the training money that DOL is putting out - a lot of it will be going in partnership with community colleges. So, there will be an opportunity to hire up, to bring in more faculty and to also expand the services that community colleges offer because they are by and large the people that entertain the most number of people who go into a higher education.

CONAN: I didn't hear a lot in there that would her happier about in conditions in which she works.

Sec. SOLIS: A lot of - I think a lot of that - certainly we want to make sure that contracts are respected, collective bargaining agreements. There's always been an issue with respect to different bargaining groups, or groups that are represented in bargaining groups, that want to be a part of that. So, I think the continuance of involvement on the part of part-time faculty members I think is a legitimate issue and should be looked at. Because as it stands, you also find that that faculty member is not as inclined to stay committed to those groups of students that they do teach because they're off to different - other -what they call, freeway traveling or teaching...

CONAN: Mm-hmm.

Sec. SOLIS: ...because they're going to find wherever they can get their salary paid. And it's unfortunate that that's what it's kind of turned to. I hope that we could end that in some way. But right now with the recession being what it is, I think it's going to be difficult.