The Bulletin

On the Job with Adjunct Professors

Brian T. Magee, Ed.D.
Associate Director, Wilson Commons Student Activities 

University of Rochester 

Syllabus preparation, in-class time, assisting students, grading, meeting institutional requirements. Can you offer any tricks of the trade for balancing professional expectations and teaching requirements?

Magee
Time management is key!  I tend to keep a very full and detailed calendar to help with class prep, office hours, additional readings, and not to mention my day-to-day student activities position!  Be honest with yourself about what you can commit to.  One thing I will say is DO NOT commit to adjunct a course if you cannot put in the proper time to prep and teach.  This only hurts the students that you instruct as you are not giving them the full learning experience of the course and profession. 

Do you believe teaching and working  in your profession can each facilitate  success in the other, and if so, why?

Magee
I think that they most certainly complement each other. Having student affairs practitioners that can bridge the research or teaching gap is most certainly needed. I like to refer to individuals who do all of this as a “pracademic.” Practitioner and academic! The more we can share the practitioner story through research, the more validation and credibility the field can achieve. 

Being an adjunct does provide additional income, but what really inspires you to take on this additional work role outside your professional job?

Magee
While the additional income is great, it is for sure not my inspiration for taking on the additional workload.  For me, it is giving back to the profession and helping new masters and doctoral students to learn and think critically.  The more prepared and knowledgeable that we can make them, the better they can be to help students daily.  The learning process is critical! If I can at least make my students question things that have always been, I know I have been successful. 

If you could choose and develop your own class, what would it be and why would you create it?

Magee
For me, I think it would be a course on student leadership development or how to build a successful leadership program on your campus! This area is one of my passions and areas of research.