I am sorry to see that this poor undergraduate has been either duped by one of her bitter adjunct professors and failed to do any research of her own on the subject, or that she simply misunderstood the tenure track system and felt a need to expose her ignorance to the world.

The tenure track system, in the United States at least, follows the same basic path at all universities. A professor is hired in at the level of Assistant Professor, at which s/he is expected to remain for 5-7 years. Following sumbittal of a portfolio and a rigorous review process some, but not all, will achieve the rank of Associate Professor. Later on in the faculty member's career s/he may either be invited to apply, or may proactively pursue promotion to full Professor, which is likewise judged by a rigorous review process of teaching, professional involvement, research and publication.

First, and most important to understand, is that tenure is not guaranteed. Its not even comfortably assured. Tenure is a much desired and heavily protected system for good reason. Once a professor has achieved tenure a school has almost no recourse to get rid of them. Some Ivy League institutions who shall remain nameless, almost never grant tenure to their young assistant professors but instead have a constant rotating crop of fresh blood, and they hire in established tenured professors from other institutions. Sadly many other institutions will deny tenure for financial reasons or reasons of internal departmental politics. The ethical issues here are many and are deserving of debate.

However, I am taking this is not why I am taking Ms. Rabinowitz to task. The reason I am taking her and the Cornell Daily Sun to task is because the entire premise of her article is fallacious. Adjunct Professors are NOT tenure track, nor have they ever been. By definition, an Adjunct Professor (or Instructor or Lecturer), is a faculty member hired not as a permanent full-time employee of the university, but on a contract basis. Some contracts are for one year, some for two or three, some teach full course loads, some teach only one or two classes a semester, but none of them come with the promise, or even the offer of a tenure review. When their contract is up, the most they can hope for is the renewal of their contract.

Now, another question that is well worth asking and perhaps should be opened up for wider debate, is whether the policy of hiring Adjunct faculty members is ethical in and of itself? Some Adjunct Professors simply go from contract to contract, never even being accepted into a tenure track position, and never granted the kind of job security that one could argue they deserve, or that they might expect if they worked in the private sector. Universities are increasingly turning to adjunct faculty members the same way that corporations are turning to contracted employees, because the overall expenditure on salaries and benefits with contract employees is lower. This practice has come under fire in several U.S states, where an employee is now only allowed to remain under contract for a certain period of time, after which the company must offer them a permanent position, let them go, or face legal action. Perhaps this problem will soon face universities.

However, from the other direction, one might ask whether the entire system of tenure has become antiquated and unnecessary? As economic times have grown more difficult, and as American institutions of higher learning have become increasingly focused on efficiency and performance, the entire tenure system has come under attack from all directions. Gone are the days when a young man would graduate from college, work for the same company for 40 years, and retire with a comfortable pension, and today it is expected that a man or woman will change employers, and even possibly careers, several times within their lifetime. Undoubtedly, many tenured professors work very hard and deserve their job security, but it has been oft argued that some faculty members, once the hard-fought tenure has been achieved, might take advantage of their immunity to allow themselves to underperform. In the private sector such protection is never granted, and an employee is required to continuously produce results or be in danger of losing his job to one who is making a greater effort, and steps in this direction have recently been taken in the higher education system in the UK.

The issue is no doubt a complicated one, which again let me state is most deserving of discussion and reappraisal, and most certainly will be reconsidered many times as the landscape of higher education adapts to the changing modern world. However, I would advise that when taking one's own school to task, the author and editors of the newspaper would do well to check their facts before publishing.

Wow, what a terribly thought out and poorly written article. First off, adjuncts are not tenure-track, a fact made clear to them when they take the job. The idea that adjuncts "wait anxiously to see if you are finally to be chosen for tenure... and get passed right on by" is specious. It's like me waiting for my appointment as a hospital head of surgery even though I'm not a doctor. Second, of course faculty groups want more tenure track positions. Who wouldn't want to be given a lifetime employment guarantee? The real questions here are 1. is tenure necessary and appropriate in the current academic environment, and 2. do tenure processes that are 99% geared towards research and publishing and almost not at all to teaching quality serve the student population appropriately?

I'd recommend that Ms. Rabinowitz take a do-over on this column and look more closely at this very important issue facing Cornell and other universities.