Online Course Instructor Salary

[ProfessionalStudent5]

Hello,

For anyone that's teacher an undergrad psych course, like intro to psychology, solely online. What is your salary? Is there a pay bump based on the number of students in the class? Have there been any bonuses given to you regarding how long you have taught the class?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[DynamicDidactic]

This is adjunct teaching. I haven’t seen those positions be salaried any differently than f2f adjunct positions. The salaries are tyicially not great, especially when teaching only a single class. However, there is a great deal of variability in those positions depending on the type of school. Meaning, more prosperous schools pay more and some schools are dismal. As far as size, typically salaries aren’t different based on class size. However, there are exceptions to all this.

 

[foreverbull]

Hello,

For anyone that's teacher an undergrad psych course, like intro to psychology, solely online. What is your salary? Is there a pay bump based on the number of students in the class? Have there been any bonuses given to you regarding how long you have taught the class?

I’ve seen a wide range in course salaries, anywhere from $2-$3k at the super low end at poorer institutions to maxing out around $9k per course for someone with the highest level of experience at some institutions. The average is around $4k-$5k per course, but some schools advertise it as per hour pay, like $75/hr, which only includes weekly teaching time (3 hours/week), not prep hours, so you can quickly do the math to see overall salary.

Pay varies by experience, degree, region, and institution.

 

[Mama Bear]

Some institutions pay by the head for adjunct.

 

[AbnormalPsych]

Salary is the same as traditional courses. Yes, includes a pay bump for additional students. No bump for teaching it for awhile, just the standard salary raises per College adjunct salary schedule.

Personally, I love teaching online. It is easy money once you have the course developed, because the lectures can all be recorded video and there is no travel to/from campus, no physical office hours, etc... So in theory, per hour worked, online is a higher salary.

 

[chemphysicsinstructor]

For some public institutions, the salary information is considered "public knowledge" and you can email an administrator and ask for it. Sometimes it is posted on websites.

I will say that salaries vary a LOT with region. A comparable position on the west/east coasts pays about 2.5 times greater than what I make in the rural midwest....but one should also consider the cost of living.

 

[R. Matey]

Hello,

For anyone that's teacher an undergrad psych course, like intro to psychology, solely online. What is your salary? Is there a pay bump based on the number of students in the class? Have there been any bonuses given to you regarding how long you have taught the class?

My experience has been that it is institution specific. My salary as an ad hoc was usually higher at R1s than at other places I’ve taught.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[WisNeuro]

At least for everything I have seen around here, the estimated hourly breakdown for teaching online classes is 50% or less than what I make clinically, and like 10% of forensic rates.

 

[Justanothergrad]

I believe I have a google doc link saved of adjunct salaries. It lists school and varies by discipline. Let me see if I can find it.



There it is - and evidently I can't just make it a link.. annoying. It's not just psych, but will give some insight that may be useful. Its generally a good salary resource (TT, adjunct, and grad student) for a variety of fields although far from exhaustive. Typically its a set rate per course and doesn't vary by enrollment - the more students is where the institution makes their money (that and non benefit based employees - thus some motivation for the move to increased adjuncts over TT roles). I've seen similar rates vary for TT positions as well for summer class funding with a few people I know making 2-3k and others making 7-9k, so a lot of this is univ dependent (also varying by research intensity, at least for TT, that I've seen).

 

[PsyDr]

I don’t really know how this world works. Ive given guest lectures, but always turned down more teaching full courses due to the low income. The following might not be possible.

if you take an online instructor gig, you may benefit from asserting copyright of your lectures/slides and/or demanding you are paid each time your lectures are used.

This could be a key time where less reputable schools ( at first) pay a professor for a course, record it, and then resell it as nauseum without paying the professor again. Or reduce pay to office hours only.

In the words of BA Baracus “Protect yo income, fool.”.

 

[R. Matey]

I believe I have a google doc link saved of adjunct salaries. It lists school and varies by discipline. Let me see if I can find it.



There it is - and evidently I can't just make it a link.. annoying. It's not just psych, but will give some insight that may be useful. Its generally a good salary resource (TT, adjunct, and grad student) for a variety of fields although far from exhaustive. Typically its a set rate per course and doesn't vary by enrollment - the more students is where the institution makes their money (that and non benefit based employees - thus some motivation for the move to increased adjuncts over TT roles). I've seen similar rates vary for TT positions as well for summer class funding with a few people I know making 2-3k and others making 7-9k, so a lot of this is univ dependent (also varying by research intensity, at least for TT, that I've seen).

That is deeply impressive.

 

[Sanman]

I don’t really know how this world works. Ive given guest lectures, but always turned down more teaching full courses due to the low income. The following might not be possible.

if you take an online instructor gig, you may benefit from asserting copyright of your lectures/slides and/or demanding you are paid each time your lectures are used.

This could be a key time where less reputable schools ( at first) pay a professor for a course, record it, and then resell it as nauseum without paying the professor again. Or reduce pay to office hours only.

In the words of BA Baracus “Protect yo income, fool.”.

Not sure if that would work, but I am surprised that some enterprising adjunct would't copyright their recorded lectures and sell it to a bunch of schools as a course and only show up to office hours.

 

[Justanothergrad]

Not sure if that would work, but I am surprised that some enterprising adjunct would't copyright their recorded lectures and sell it to a bunch of schools as a course and only show up to office hours.

I've seen it done. We [as faculty] didn't bite on the offer despite the person being well established in the field at my Univ. I'm sure (and am certain) others have taken up the offer assuming it is equal to teaching.

 

[Ollie123]

My take from the spreadsheet:
Not necessarily a terrible gig for a post-doc or grad student looking to make a little extra cash. Depending on the course, not unreasonable to do if the main goal is just to maintain an academic affiliation and the perks that go along with it (library access, etc.) and any pay is just a bonus.

I have zero idea how or why anyone actually works in a "professional adjunct" capacity. Extreme dedication to the field beyond any semblance of sound judgment? Lack of skills for doing <literally anything> else?

I pay my techs significantly more than an adjunct teaching a 5/5 at many places would make...and they get benefits. I'm reasonably certain I could set up a private practice that only took medicaid patients and deliberately screened out anyone likely to show up more than half the time and still do significantly better.

I think its wrong we pay people so little to teach higher ed courses. I also don't understand how anyone ends up in a situation where doing that for a living is their best option.

 

[AbnormalPsych]

Depending on the course, not unreasonable to do if the main goal is just to maintain an academic affiliation and the perks that go along with it (library access, etc.) and any pay is just a bonus.

These are my primary reasons right now. And I teach online - everything is so streamlined the course basically runs itself. Aside from weekly online office hours (1 hour that no one comes to, so I basically catch up on emails and netflix) and grading 1-2 hrs a week, it feels like free money.

I don't know that I would ever accept any in person teaching contracts moving forward or new course assignments that needed to be developed from scratch.

 

[DynamicDidactic]

@Justanothergrad
Truly amazing collection. Where did you come across this? Who initiated this process.

I looked over the TT sheet and It seems very accurate for the schools I am familiar with but it is limited to mostly humanities and social sciences.

Some of those salaries are fairly sad. Under 50K for 4-4 loads, jez.

 

[Justanothergrad]

@Justanothergrad
Truly amazing collection. Where did you come across this? Who initiated this process.

I looked over the TT sheet and It seems very accurate for the schools I am familiar with but it is limited to mostly humanities and social sciences.

Some of those salaries are fairly sad. Under 50K for 4-4 loads, jez.

I dont rememeber where I found it. I came across it on some listserv I think. tucked it away to share. I wish psych was better represented

 

[ClinicalABA]

I teach in a hybrid model. Mostly asynchronous online stuff, plus a few live classes (including one full day) per semester. 5k per course, and not a lot of work, relatively speaking. 5-10 masters level students (and I get a TA if 10 or more). I work a full time (avg. 40 hours or so), and teaching two hybrid courses per semester (3 semesters per year) is very doable, and worth the money (imho). There a few other purely online courses I do (independent learning courses), and those are on a per student basis (~250 per student per semester, but not a tone of work for me). Basically, teaching college pays my kid’s college tuition, with some left over for good bourbon and beer.

I have adjuncted all-live courses at the local state college, and pay was less (3.7-4K) plus union dues and mandatory state retirement plan contributions.

 

[Temperance]

Some of those salaries are fairly sad. Under 50K for 4-4 loads, jez.

Yeah, it's galling how much is expected for what the pay is. I get that budgets are constrained, but expecting a 3/4 load for $25,500 is terrifying.

Not going to lie, I'm experiencing buyer's remorse looking at these salaries, even the ones under the tenure-track tab.

 

[Ollie123]

Yeah, it's galling how much is expected for what the pay is. I get that budgets are constrained, but expecting a 3/4 load for $25,500 is terrifying.

Not going to lie, I'm experiencing buyer's remorse looking at these salaries, even the ones under the tenure-track tab.

If you are willing to play the soft-money/grants game and have research interests that lends itself to large-scale funding, it doesn't need to be that bad. I'm 3 years out of post-doc and doing better than all but a handful of the TT salaries on that list. I have peers at similar career stages who do substantially better than I do. The spreadsheet is tilted to university side, so remember these are 9-month appts and many people will have extra summer income (esp. at research-heavy places where grants are expected).

That said, this field is definitely anything but a get-rich-quick scheme.

 

[Sanman]

This is why I continue to shy away from teaching despite an interest. I have thought about adjunct teaching, but a cash private practice seems more worth the time to me.

 

[ClinicalABA]

This is why I continue to shy away from teaching despite an interest. I have thought about adjunct teaching, but a cash private practice seems more worth the time to me.

I don’t know- an extra ~30k per year for works out to be only a few weeks work total isn’t that bad. It’s a heck of a lot easier, imho, than taking on additional clients, and it’s some welcome variability.

 

[Sanman]

I don’t know- an extra ~30k per year for works out to be only a few weeks work total isn’t that bad. It’s a heck of a lot easier, imho, than taking on additional clients, and it’s some welcome variability.

30k is likely more than I would make. I am seeing offers around $3k per course. Teaching a course year round would still amount to $9-10k. I could make that with 1-2 cash only PP clients.

Realistically though, it is easier for me to spend the time maximizing my investment portfolio and maybe opt for a rental property. Stay away from psych all together to maximize cash for time.

 

[foreverbull]

I don’t know- an extra ~30k per year for works out to be only a few weeks work total isn’t that bad. It’s a heck of a lot easier, imho, than taking on additional clients, and it’s some welcome variability.

For all the folks saying it’s very little work to teach a course already taught, how quickly are you grading assignments? An average class I teach has ~70 papers to grade per semester (not including other possible assignments). Now multiply that by 3 for 3 classes. Teaching can be whittled down when the lectures are set, but grading ends up being a very time-consuming endeavor for me regardless of experience.

 

[futureapppsy2]

For all the folks saying it’s very little work to teach a course already taught, how quickly are you grading assignments? An average class I teach has ~70 papers to grade per semester (not including other possible assignments). Now multiply that by 3 for 3 classes. Teaching can be whittled down when the lectures are set, but grading ends up being a very time-consuming endeavor for me regardless of experience.

Also, responding to student email can eat up a surprising amount of time.

 

[Ollie123]

Also, responding to student email can eat up a surprising amount of time.

This was always the main time suck for me once I had lectures prepped. Of course, I never assigned papers in a class over 60 students.

Really a lot depends on circumstances. A 400 person Psych 101 course is not the same as an 8 person grad seminar. Not every course has papers, not every course has exams. Heck, I took one elective in grad school that didn't even have graded assignments (though that was obviously very unusual and due to the nature/goals of the course).

 

[ClinicalABA]

For all the folks saying it’s very little work to teach a course already taught, how quickly are you grading assignments? An average class I teach has ~70 papers to grade per semester (not including other possible assignments). Now multiply that by 3 for 3 classes. Teaching can be whittled down when the lectures are set, but grading ends up being a very time-consuming endeavor for me regardless of experience.

It's not NO work! I only have 5 students per class, with 8-10 assignments per course (i teach 2 courses), and each assignment averaging ~20-30 min to correct. I find it's pretty doable and I enjoy it, so good way to make some extra cash. YMMV, but it's a better option to me than working more at my day job (though I do that too and Max out my productivity bonuses). Some semesters are worse than others. I also only teach graduate courses.

 

[ProfessionalStudent5]

Thank you so much for all of the information that everyone has provided on this topic.

 

[Cantab109]

Is anyone aware of any programs hiring adjuncts for an online course over the summer? I'm looking for a side gig. Thanks!

 

[psych.meout]

Is anyone aware of any programs hiring adjuncts for an online course over the summer? I'm looking for a side gig. Thanks!

You're probably out of luck.

Enrollment is already down, in-person courses are cancelled, and many undergrads can't afford to take courses online, because they've been furloughed or unemployed. Also, some grad students who would have had paying gigs over the summer (e.g., I/O with internships) lost those opportunities and have requested to teach or TA to make up for the lost income, which further reduces the number of opportunities. Thus, psych departments have less money coming in and more demand from within their own institutions for teaching and TA spots, leaving relatively little, if anything, for new adjuncts.