Requirements to be an adjunct IT professor?

[jam123]

I have been told that in order to become an adjunct teacher in the IT field for college level undergrad I must have a related masters degree that includes 18 masters level credits in the subject matter. I understand this is a minimum and some schools require a doctorate.

Here are my questions:

Is my understanding above correct about a masters degree with 18 subject matter credits in order to teach undergrad?

If I have a Masters in Computer Science with 36 master level credits spread out over multiple subjects (network, security, database, software eng., etc) can I then teach any of those subjects or must I have 18 credits directly in that subject area? For example, do I need 18 credits in networks to teach networks?

What if I have an Masters in Information Systems where most of the 30 credits are more management/business (ex: IS proj mgmt., IT integation, etc) then technical, but they are all IT related. Plus I have 20 years experience in networks, databases and development. Would this be enough for me to teach networks, databases, development, etc.?

Thanks for any enlightenment!

[clep3705]

Having a master's degree with 18 subject matter hours is fairly standard. How related the hours taken are to the subject taught is somewhat a matter of interpretation. A doctorate is preferred.

For accreditation purposes, your graduate hours matter far more than your experience. Really, only the hours matter.

Accreditation bodies make a distinction between graduate school and professional school. Having an M.D. is considered as a professional degree, something less than an academic graduate degree.

[marianne202]

It varies by schools and accrediting body. The community colleges in my area are under SACS accreditation (RA) and while SACS recommends (not requires) Master's degree with 18 credits in the subject area for all transfer courses, schools can make the decision to hire and use instructors with lesser or different credentials. If SACS questions that decision then the school would have to submit a written statement of their justifications such as experience, similar degree, certifications etc. We are currently going through re-accreditation right now, so I'm becoming very familiar with these rules. You shouldn't let this deter you from applying for a teaching job. Most schools also have other academic areas such as continuing education or AAS degrees which have different degree requirements, so I say explore your options. I love teaching and can't imagine doing anything else. Good luck!

[sanantone]

I've seen job ads say a master's degree in the subject or at least 18 credit hours in the subject. For example, if you have master's degree in political science, SACS is not going to nitpick over whether you have 18 credit hours with the political science prefix. The 18 credit hours comes into play when you don't have a degree in the subject. Some of the people here are working on a Master of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies at Western New Mexico University. In that case, the school will look at whether you have 18 credit hours with the political science prefix. People often get confused and think 18 credit hours is required no matter what. If you have a political science degree with less than 18 credit hours designated with the political science prefix e.g. you mostly took international relations or some other related courses for a concentration, it does not matter. You can still teach political science. Also, I had criminal justice professors who did not have degrees in CJ; they had law degrees.

Check out page 25 from an SACS document.

http://www.sacscoc.org/pdf/PrinciplesOfA...tation.PDF

Faculty teaching general education courses at the undergraduate level: doctor’s or master’s degree in the teaching discipline
or master’s degree with a concentration in the teaching discipline (a minimum of 18 graduate semester hours in the teaching discipline).

For people with terminal degrees, there is no 18-credit hour requirement at all as long as the degree is in a related field.

Faculty teaching graduate and post-baccalaureate course
work: earned doctorate/ terminal degree in the teaching discipline or a related discipline.

[ryoder]

A friend of mine has been doing adjunct teaching for years and reminded me that computer training companies pay about 5x the amount of a college. New Horizons, for example, will pay you $6,000 to give a 4 day training MCSE course or something similar. I once took a 4 day Oracle Forms programming course back in 2000 and the guy who gave the course told me he made $800 per day. He made 4k that week and all of his expenses were paid. He only worked 9-4 and had his nights off. He said he worked 6 months per year and took the rest of the year off.

[clep3705]

A friend of mine has been doing adjunct teaching for years and reminded me that computer training companies pay about 5x the amount of a college. New Horizons, for example, will pay you $6,000 to give a 4 day training MCSE course or something similar. I once took a 4 day Oracle Forms programming course back in 2000 and the guy who gave the course told me he made $800 per day. He made 4k that week and all of his expenses were paid. He only worked 9-4 and had his nights off. He said he worked 6 months per year and took the rest of the year off.

Those days are long gone. Yes, in 2000, $800/day was possible. I made $800-$1000/day. Rates starting dropping in 2002. There is an oversupply of technical trainers and has been for years. It's never going to be what it was. YouTube didn't exist in 2000. Although Google did, there wasn't nearly as much good technical content as there is now. People can access all kinds of great educational content for free. The expectation is that free material should be available. This affects what people are willing to pay.

[ryoder]

Our training was charged to the state of PA, which had massive job training subsidies for local tech companies. My employer paid my salary and the state paid for the training. Since the taxpayer is paying for it, companies can charge as much as they want and nobody cares. This helps keep wages high for trainers.

[marianne202]

As sanantone indicated those are the SACS guidelines, however, they are just guidelines. Schools can still allow instructors to teach even if they don't meet those guidelines. States and individual schools may also have their own restrictions or requirements. Keep in mind that colleges also teach many other courses and programs that are not considered "transferrable general education" classes so there are many options. Good luck!@

[dcan]

So this got me thinking... Looking at the SACS guidelines and their policy on "The Transfer or Transcripting of Academic Credit" I see no reason why one couldn't establish a school offering a bachelor's degree, consisting entirely of CLEP and similar, for $1,000. Teach no classes directly. Even the Big 3 mostly teach classes and do transfer as a "side effect" so to speak. I propose a transfer-only school.

Seriously. Found a school, get grants from major charities like Pew, MacArthur, Gates, etc to cover core costs and salaries, and then charge the students enough to cover basic processing and operating costs. Do it just like the Big 3 do, liberal transfer acceptance. But "legit" transfer. No PLA allowed, that would be too much effort and too much risk to accreditation for a small, light, fast operation like this. Pay for a student system that plugs into ACE and the CLEP/DSST/ECE systems to eliminate paper, and sign up for most/all of the electronic transcript services. Eliminate as much paper as possible.

Yes I know it's a longshot, and I know there also needs to be oversight and governance, institutional effectiveness, etc. But this should be doable. With regional accreditation no less.

Thoughts?

Edit: It's late and I'm tired. Didn't think about COSC. But it's still at least $2,500 and does test-outs 100% transfer students are still very rare there. There are enough education-focused charitable foundations that should be able to help cover the operating costs that COSC otherwise has to charge for. Besides, if COSC went to transfer only their costs would certainly go up, since the operating costs to cover transfer students are basically subsidized at least in part by the remaining student body paying for classes. The MacArthur Foundation is already deep into pursuing alternative forms of education credentials, so groups like that should be interested in something like this especially if it can carry national or even regional accreditation.

[jam123]

Let me ask another question. I'm trying to decide if the MSIS from Minot State for ~$8,000 is acceptable for teaching IT or if I should go with a MSCS/MSSE for ~$21,000 from Nova, Regis or National Univ. which is much more technical

Minot State Program
MSU - College of Business