This week’s Campus Celebrity, Dr. Jack Dempsey, is personal favorite of mine. Dr. Dempsey has been an icon here at Bentley for over 12 years. His most recent project is heading the campaign for fair treatment of Bentley University Adjunct Faculty. If you have yet to take his class, be sure to register for COM 210!
HerCampus (HC): Where did you go to college?
Jack Dempsey (JD): My first college classes were in Bentley’s own 1970s Paralegal programs. Then, after two years of night classes at Middlesex Community College, I graduated from UMASS-Amherst in 1979. Following 13 years as a freelance writer in New York City and elsewhere, I earned my Ph.D. in Native and Early American Studies from Brown University in 1998. Then came three years of teaching at Wheaton College before Bentley.
HC: What courses do you teach at Bentley?
JD: I began in 2002 with Expository Writing and focus now on Effective Speaking.
HC: What is your favorite thing about teaching?
JD: That answer has to be plural. One favorite is learning from student feedback how to teach more effectively: there’s no limit to the synergy. The only thing better than helping someone past their obstacles is watching them realize and unleash their real abilities. And it’s great to hear from students four years gone who just keep on developing, because they took away a method for doing so.
HC: Tell us about your work outside of Bentley.
JD: I always had two historian’s passions, in the early Mediterranean and early American worlds. So, with six books and two films in those fields, and still involved with archaeology-based projects in both, I run a collaborative website called Ancientlights.org, which also brings work as a speaking coach and book editor. Peak moment: pulling poet Kay Ryan’s work from the great pile, and in three years she was National Poet Laureate! Meanwhile I love producing educational events from historical societies to public venues. I’m trying to make a film about early New England happen before the Pilgrims’ next big anniversary, and am into a second novel.
HC: Could you please share with us your feelings on the campaign for fair treatment of Bentley University Adjunct Faculty, and how you are involved?
JD: Some decades ago, schools created Adjuncts to meet a Ph.D. shortage. New teachers came in on the promise of proving themselves, only to become a permanent profitable underclass in higher education. Bentley agrees that Adjuncts deliver a crucial proportion of its educational value, but their pay, benefits and rights remain indefensibly inferior. This is a worsening national problem acknowledged by Congress. And yet, even as Bentley has just cut seven seasoned Adjuncts, consider what an opportunity this is for a university that champions business ethics and social responsibility—to take a national leadership role in realizing those values. Whatever Bentley decides, this is happening, with more Adjuncts ready for change after last year’s 2-vote margin, and with increasing support from tuition-paying families, alumni, students and our allies in Adjunct Action across the country. More than 500 people so far have signed our petition for fair treatment, realizing that higher education will not prosper by driving a generation of teachers into the ground. But the central fact is that Adjuncts want to build this school, and build it on ground in common with our administration.
HC: How much longer do you plan on teaching at Bentley?
JD: As things stand, Bentley decides that for me, one semester at a time.
HC: Are there any last words you would like to share with us on Bentley as a whole?
JD: I felt proud to win 2010’s Adamian Award for Best Part-Time Professor. But what made it happen was the students’ own efforts to develop. Bentley’s are the most dynamically entrepreneurial students I’ve encountered. They have the courage to trust each other and create an environment where everybody can grow. It was their showing up ready to take prepared chances that kept them teaching each other, helping each other realize their potential. To tell you the truth, in most of my best Speaking classes, I hardly spoke at all.
To find out more about the ongoing campaign and to sign the petition, please visit this site!
To participate in the Adjunct Fair Treatment movement students, faculty, alumni and parents are invited to attend the debate featuring Adjunct’s bargaining rights. This open forum will take place on Wednesday April 9th from 6:30 to 9 pm in Harry’s Pub located in the Student Center. The following Wednesday April 16th there will be an Adjunct Appreciation Night where all are welcome to speak and support in favor of the campaign. The final movement will be a Campus Walk to hand deliver petitions to President Gloria Larson. More information will be announced at a later date, but the event is scheduled to take place on Wednesday April 23rd. Please take a moment to come and support our beloved Adjunct Professors and their right to a fair wage.