An Unsuccessful
Faculty Protest for Better Pay
by Jeffrey Ross
In the burning
Cleveland sun today, 273 adjunct (part-time)
faculty marched back and forth between the
parking lot and administration building at
Eastern Cleveland Community College. They were on
the third day of an organized strike. Each wore a
black t-shirt with a skull and crossbones image
emblazoned on the front and back. Professor
Richard Hose, the organizer of the protest., wore
a stylish three-cornered black and silver pirate
hat and carried a toy parrot on his shoulder.
Most of the dissidents carried signs— “Slavery
ended in 1863 "; “Give me Bennies or I’ll
be Dead”; “We’re doing this for
the students”; “#PiratesforPay”;
“Stop the cultural salary appropriation!”
Some motorists leaving the parking lot honked and
waved in support of the movement. Many gave the
marchers the middle finger and shouted angrily
about how the marchers were interfering with
traffic flow in and out of the college. Four big,
burly alleged Marxist students had marched with
the professors on the first day, but only tired
and sagging part timers remained on this this
third and pivotal day of the event.
According to Hose, in an interview granted
earlier in the week, the adjuncts had simply
endured enough. Decades of lousy salaries
and stringent administrative puffery had finally
called them to action. Adjunct faculty were paid
$650 a credit hour for teaching at ECCC--$1950
for a three-credit hour course that lasted from
mid-August to early December.
The protest ended when the Chief of Campus Police,
Lt. General First-Class Terry O’Neal,
arrived on his golf cart. He addressed the long
sweaty line using his bull horn.
“Protestors! You are hereby ordered to
disperse pursuant to ECCC Policy 1006A- Unlawful
Assembly! I will give you 30 minutes to get
out of here, or our officers will begin making
arrests.”
Groans of disbelief erupted from the passionate
but discouraged academics. They had come so far!
“Come on, Terry—the admin knows we are
doing this. They were supportive of the idea”,
said the disbelieving Chief of Pirates.
“Aww, Dick, I know, and I don’t want to
arrest you. But here’s the thing. Enough
students dropped your classes that every class
taught by adjuncts was cancelled because of low
enrollment. So, you have all been terminated—and
now you are trespassing.”
Beaten, and unable to afford much jail time, the
#PiratesforPay organization morosely found their
way out of the parking lot in their early 90’s
era automobiles and headed down to the Cleveland
unemployment office. A moral victory….
Justice was served!
|
