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As an adjunct professor, Kristin Quadracci teaches about six classes a semester and works well over 40 hours per week.
It’s enough for Quadracci to scrape together a salary of about $40,000 a year. But she works about 50 percent more as a contract worker than full-time college instructors, she said.
Plus there’s “no vacation and no job security,” Quadracci said.
Adjunct professors are those contracted part time to educate students. Many like Quadracci say they’ve dedicated their careers to teaching in college and endure tough conditions that they say carry over to students.
Senate Bill 84 would allow Colorado adjuncts to qualify for forgiveness of federally backed college loans. The bill makes a minor change to state law to better calculate how much work adjunct faculty perform in a semester.
Adjunct faculty and the unions supporting them also want the state to someday address the low pay, limited benefits, and little say part-time faculty have in the classroom. Until that happens, access to loan forgiveness is one way to ease the burden on adjunct faculty, who often need advanced degrees to do their jobs.
Jason Gonzales is a reporter covering higher education and the Colorado legislature. Chalkbeat Colorado partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage. Contact Jason at jgonzales@chalkbeat.org.