Crowdsource: Adjunct Hiring – Best Practices?

Dear Adjunct, Part-Time, and/or Contingent Faculty,

I’d like to know how you were hired. Was there a public call for positions or were you just contacted by someone in your network – a friend, a patron, a colleague, a mentor? You can let me know through comments here, on social media, or via email.

I’m writing a piece on this issue for the Chronicle and so please email me and offer me a pseudonym or ask for anonymity if you don’t want to disclose your identity.

I’m writing in the context of a new book that links the mistreatment of adjuncts to informal hiring practices, and argues that we need to re-professionalize systems of hiring. It’s a good book and more on that later, but for now I’d like to hear from adjuncts about their thoughts.

My questions are:

1. How were you hired for your last adjunct job? Was there any formal process? Was the job announced and open?
2. How would you like adjunct hiring to work?
3. Do you think there is a relationship between the informal hiring of adjuncts and their mistreatment?