5 Reasons Why You Should Go for the Adjunct Professor in Grad School

I went to all my graduate programs (MBA, PharmD, and JD) at night, part-time, while working full-time during the day. (No one gave me a lot of free $ to go back to graduate school, and my parents cut me off at undergrad — I had to pay the bills if I wanted to continue to learn!)

One thing I learned quickly in grad school was that some of the BEST teachers/professors, bar none, were those who had professional lives and jobs outside of the university or graduate school environment. When I had options — I nearly always went with the adjunct professor on a course.

I mean no disregard or disrespect to professors who are full-time; however, there is value in being able to apply real-world scenarios to textbooks. Law adjunct professors, for example, could put reality on top of cases by discussing past (and now public) issues and how they really played out in a courtroom. Pharmacists could tell me tricks that aren’t really in any book on how to help patients improve their pharmacology and health.

As I’ve said all along — there is value in going to graduate school AFTER having worked in the real world for some time and returning to campus, rather than going straight through. I firmly believe in the flip argument here as well for students on the professor side: always go for the professor who is working in the real world if and when you can.

Why? Read on for 5 Reasons!

Reasons to Go for the Adjunct Professor

1. They are likely experts in their professional field — if they are teaching only one class, chances are that they are experts in that particular field. Let me give you an example — in my previous day job, hiring PBMs for self-funded employers — I could easily teach a class on how PBMs work for pharmacy schools. In fact, I did lectures on data analytics and PBMs for several schools of pharmacy while working full-time in a broker/advisor shop. Get your $’s worth and go for the expert pragmatist.
2. They are gig economy gurus — Most or many adjunct professors I know are gig economy gurus. They have had multiple gigs, and may currently have a portfolio career, instead of just one thing on their resume at a time. There is something to be learned from being around that mindset, which I argue is the future of work in this world anyway. You as a college student will not have your mom or dad’s career. The odds are not in your favor that you’ll work for one company for the rest of your life. Odds are high that you might even start your own part-time side hustle to supplement your hobbies or your income or both. So why not go for the added bonus of getting a prof who knows how to hustle? I would bet good money that your adjunct professor(s) are part or full-time entrepreneurs at one point in their careers too. Embrace that bonus!
3. They can show you real-world career paths — No offense to my previous full-time tenure track colleagues, but many of them don’t really understand how crazy the economy really is right now. The average work tenure within a position (time in the job) is getting lower. Companies are hiring and “letting go” employees in less than 1 year. Even “stable” companies in my first chosen field (of pharmacy) are turning over people in droves, even though millions of American workers are still missing from the workplace post-pandemic. You need to connect with those in the real world if you’re preparing for a career switch or change by going to graduate school, and we all do what we know. The tenure track full-time professors know: full-time tenure track academic positions. Unless that’s for sure what you want to do after graduate school, you need to get a variety of real-world perspectives on career development during your classroom education as well.
4. They can become some of your best mentors — I have a variety of mentors in my career — I’ve been lucky to engage them and do call upon them when I’m in a pickle. There is value in hearing opinions from many different professionals and their points of view. However, the most valuable, if I had to narrow it down in my mentor board are those who I met when they were teaching as adjuncts, and are still in the real world. Mentoring can and should be a 2-way street too, and they appreciate it when you bring them something of value to them too. Full-time faculty has hundreds if not thousands of students who ask to be mentored during school. But adjuncts? They seem to have less requests because they’re not teaching as much, and thus may place and value more social capital into your mentor-mentee relationship. This has been my personal experience.
5. They have empathy — Let’s face it — a lot of tenure track faculty are focused on one thing: getting tenure. Once they have tenure, they may not be as motivated to see what’s going on in the real world and practice of whatever it is that they are teaching. However, your adjunct professor is still out there cranking it out and doesn’t really need the teaching gig— and if they are still teaching, definitely have empathy for your plight when you get stuck in a professional jam than that prof with tenure. (And who hasn’t in the past 10 years with this rocky economy and all the machinations of the work world changing?) The adjunct prof is going to understand and I argue have more empathy for those of us working and trying to create great careers for ourselves, because there is not one way in career development — but many ways. They also likely have many others in their network off campus who can help you too.

I get it — there in law school especially were tried and true full-time profs who were well known for being an “Easy A” in the course. But that’s not why I went to law school — or ANY graduate school for that matter. I went to learn, ideally from the best — professionals who were or are at the top of their professional game.

If you want the Easy A by the class favorite full-time prof that seems to be cool and your buddy — go for it. That wasn’t for me, and if you’re being honest with yourself, that shouldn’t be for you, either. Grab a hold of that adjunct prof — you may just be pleasantly surprised, learning a real-world thing or two, and find a mentor when you do!

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Erin L. Albert is a recovering full-time nontenure track professor, author, podcaster, and serving as VP of Pharmacy Relations at Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company, PBC. She taught both full-time and part-time, as well as served as a guest lecturer for several schools of pharmacy, business, and law. The opinions above are hers alone.