What would the pros and cons be on forming a DL Instructors Union?

Besides the books and articles, you have people like Dr Babbs that actually tours around the US giving conferences on how to make the 100K as a stay home mom.

She is not the only one, there are quite a few people writing books and giving courses on how to make this kind of income teaching online.

This kind of publicity only damages more the industry, employers might get the wrong idea that online adjuncts are making too much money and just pushes wages down and requirements up.

 

Bad information, my friend.

From www.irs.gov:

To determine if you need to file a Federal Income Tax return for 2008 answer the following questions:

Occasionally, individuals have one-time or infrequent financial transactions that may require them to file a Federal Income Tax return. Do any of the following examples apply to you?

Did you have Federal taxes withheld from your pension and wages for this tax year and wish to get a refund back?
Are you entitled to the Earned Income Tax Credit or did you receive Advance Earned Income Credit for this tax year?
Were you self-employed with earnings of more than $400.00?
Did you sell your home?
Will you owe any special tax on a qualified retirement plan (including an individual retirement account (IRA) or medical savings account (MSA)? You may owe tax if you:

Received an early distribution from a qualified plan
Made excess contributions to your IRA or MSA
Were born before July 1, 1937, and you did not take the minimum required distribution from your qualified retirement plan.
Received a distribution in the excess of $160,000 from a qualified retirement plan.
Will you owe social security and Medicare tax on tips you did not report to your employer?
Will you owe uncollected social security and Medicare or Railroad retirement (RRTA) tax on tips you reported to your employer?
Will you be subject to Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT)? (The tax law gives special treatment to some kinds of income and allows special deductions and credit for some kinds of expenses.)
Will you owe recapture tax?
Are you a church employee with income in wages of $108.28 or more from a church or qualified church-controlled organization that is exempt from employer social security or Medicare taxes?

Self-employed means independent contractor. If you made $5K, you'd have a very hard time explaining to the IRS why you thought it was ok to omit that income.

Even if you have expenses that reduce the income to (0), you should itemize and include a worksheet of those expenses. Otherwise...

 

$300,000 Income Tax Reward

Here is a challenge for you $300,000 Income Tax Reward if:


1. Show what statute written by the Congress of the United States that requiring Americans to file an income tax “CONFESSION” (return) and pay an income tax.

2. Show how Americans can file an income tax “CONFESSION” (return) without giving up their 5th amendment right to not give any information to the government that may be used to prosecute them.

3. Prove that the 16th amendment to the United States Constitution, which, according to the IRS and modern American courts permitted the income tax to exist was lawfully added to the United States Constitution.

http://www.livefreenow.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=6&Itemid=76

 

David,

to address the topic directly I think that an adjunct union would be beneficial in many regards but that coming up with bylaws etc... would be difficult due to the geographic, including other countries, factors (labor laws, etc..). But it would be interesting if it could be tackled at the accreditor level. Say for instance compel SACS or other regionals to have to deal with adjuncts as part of the accreditation process (ok so I'm dreaming) and develop and agree to a labor policy and its implementation. I think that the regionals have actually set themselves up for a challenge as they already stipulate faculty composition and qualifications.

 

Maybe union is the wrong approach but an association of DL instructors is a better answer. this way we could approach sccreditors and schools as a partner.. I have done a ton of work in this space. The question is, would anyone join such an association, say at $25 a year for membership (or something).. you have to sharge membership fees as that build some equity, which you can then use as a carrot to get things you want...

 

DAvid,

This association might not be enough to act as bargaining unit but it could publish salaries, jobs, trends, etc so online instructors can have enough information about the job market. Having more information can put some pressure to schools like UoP as their online adjuncts might realize that are grossly underpaid and leave to greener pastures.

As more schools go online, they will be more demand of online instructors but you also have a huge over supply of online PhDs from online schools. Online schools should follow the example of Nova and reduce the number of graduates to less than a hundred a year if you want to keep the profession profitable. If online schools keep supplying the hundreds of graduates, they will lose credibility. I have seen already many advertisements for professor jobs mainly in the middle east that explicitly say that graduate degrees from online schools are not accepted.

 

Screw it, I just registered the "National Association of Distance Learning Instructors"

It take a while for a non-profit to get set up and get a tax ID and stuff. I think if our numbers get large enough, wecan influence issues and also start to get NADLI's voice heard on Capital Hill...

 

Excellent move, I think is an excellent an idea. Please keep up posted about the details.

 

Same here - I'm not doing any online adjuncting right now, but plan to after I finish my doctoral studies (expected December 2009). I plan to keep my current full time teaching job for financial reasons. (I'll be able to walk away from most of my student loan debt since I am full-time faculty at a tribal college).

Shawn

 

Rather than form a union, why don't you guys just start your own DL university. Call it DLU! Start small, get DETC accredited first, and who knows where it could lead!

For my finders fee, I would just like free tuition in your first PhD program.