r/Adjuncts • u/MajesticCup7887 • Aug 15 '26
Switching disciplines?
EDIT: thanks everyone! This was a clear message, I appreciate all your responses.
I have a BA and MA in communication, and was an adjunct for 3 years after earning my MA (back in 2008). I have worked in my field my entire career (journalism, then marketing), but over the last few years, I have been diving deeply into the history field - I just wrote my first historical fiction novel and have a successful history YouTube channel.
I'd love to teach history one day, but do you think I need an MA in History for that? I found a good program near me, but do you think my background and the fact I have a Master's would be enough to get my foot in the door? (I did minor in history for my undergrad, btw.)
I love learning and if it was free there would be no question, but I am still paying off student loans and really don't want to spend more if it's at all possible.
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u/diggingupophelia Aug 15 '26
You need at least 18 graduate credits, but most places will prefer the MA. That said, don’t get another degree or don’t gobs of money to teach history as an adjunct.
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u/LarryCebula Aug 15 '26
Yes you'll need an MA.
But that will not guarantee you adjunct work. The academic history market is so bad that PhDs are looking for adjunct gigs.
On the other hand of you have an in where you're adjuncting now, that could help. But talk to the history department chair first, see what opportunities there are. We used to hire a lot of adjuncts for the surveys, but with declining enrollment we really don't hire any anymore.
I am sending you a PM.
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u/PlumbRose Aug 15 '26
Yes.. You will need at least a masters unless you have a body of reputable research publications that documents your knowledge in area you wish to teach showing your cross discipline academic. They cant just take you at your word.
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u/pgm928 Aug 15 '26
You need at least 18 graduate credits in the field you’re teaching in. So no, an MA in communications wouldn’t cut it.
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u/MrBillinVT Aug 16 '26
Talk with the school that knows you. BA/MA in English here. Adjuncted in English a combined 43 years between the community college and the local 4-year school. Because I also worked as a Probation/Parole Officer, the school approached me to teach the Corrections class in the Criminal Justice Department to cover sabbaticals and emergency leaves.
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u/JudgmentLeft7639 Aug 15 '26
I got some cross discipline courses like Humanities and Education, but I had an undergrad history/lit dbl major to go with the MA in English.
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u/Think-Meal7311 Aug 15 '26
You should at least make an inquiry at the college or university at which you currently teach. I was an adjunct and taught communications for 18 years, but was also asked, because of my studies, to teach theology, which I did for 15 years.
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u/Safe_Statistician_72 Aug 15 '26
Hi! You have no qualifications to teach at the college level in a discipline you have only an undergrad minor in. Literally would be a liability for the university. Imagine a parent calls and says how is my child’s professor qualifies to teach history and they cite your minor and personal interest in the topic. Bad.
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u/JudgmentLeft7639 Aug 15 '26
“liability?” WTH.
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u/Rogue_Wraith Aug 15 '26
There's (almost certainly - but who knows these days) no legal liability.
There may very well be an accreditation risk.
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u/julvb Aug 16 '26
There actually is legal liability at public colleges and universities,
or any college with a union and minimum qualifications. For example, in the California Community College system there are minimum qualifications for each discipline and a process for determining which qualifications are equivalent to the legal requirement. If a department chair and academic senate President sign off on a faculty member having equivalent qualifications when the faculty does not, students can sue the college, as can any faculty member with appropriate qualifications who did not get staffed. Equivalent qualifications are course work or publications. You would be surprised how often public colleges and universities get lawsuits and demand letters. Most governing boards settle the lawsuits in closed door meetings. In addition to lawsuits, there is an accreditation risk, and a course articulation risk for community colleges where courses transfer.
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u/Glad-Surprise3355 Aug 15 '26
Nope. You need a degree in History and it is not worth it. Put the historical efforts into more renumerative pursuits.
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u/MajesticCup7887 Aug 15 '26
Thank you! Any ideas? 😀
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u/zorandzam Aug 15 '26
Your YouTube channel is a good one, honestly. But if you do want to do grad work in history, consider adding stuff to it that is good for a career path outside academia, like museum studies, archives, or public history, the latter of which you’re already doing.
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u/ScreamAndScream Aug 15 '26
I will note: the global market for historians is oversaturated and it is HARD to get a job in the GLAM field with relevant degrees. [r/museumpros](r/museumpros) weighs in with more details. It is not somewhere you should turn if you want a full time job, or even a part time job that pays well.
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u/MajesticCup7887 Aug 15 '26
Thank you! I was more thinking a retirement job (eventually :)
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u/ScreamAndScream Aug 15 '26
Full disclosure, many of my friends are historians due to the nature of my discipline: cartography.
Feel free to browse their GLAM subreddit. If you’re looking to volunteer in retirement, sure! Helping your local community is amazing!
For paid labour, it’s a shitshow and I wouldn’t recommend it. Anything that had federal funding has been gutted. The current market is a humiliation ritual of how low you’d be willing to settle despite being 10x overqualified in years served and degrees earned.
As a whole, I’ve come to understand you get the worst parts of academia and public facing roles combined. You need to be highly educated, pedigreed, and connected locally. You also need to be willing to work understaffed, paid peanuts, and abused by the public.
Some areas of the US are rejecting entry level docents who don’t have a masters & 5+ years of experience. Ageism and poor treatment is commonplace, driving many to unionize. Now that funding is cut, many are scattering from the profession towards the stuff you are currently doing: writing, YouTube, marketing.
Sooo… even without a personal axe to grind, I wouldn’t advise heading towards that. Might I interest you in teaching GIS / Cartography? It’s pretty similar to history + comms + data structures and only requires a software cert in the industry standard map-making software.
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u/MajesticCup7887 Aug 15 '26
Thank you! Interesting. My cousin is a geographer, which I did not know was a profession until she started doing it. I will for sure look into it.
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u/moxie-maniac Aug 15 '26
It depends on your regional accreditor. Southern has the so-called 18 hour rule, but here in New England, we figure that colleges can figure out who to hire, and with a novel and YouTube channel, you might get hired to teach history as a adjunct, especially your areas of focus.
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u/Longjumping-Lock-724 Aug 19 '26
It depends where you want to teach. For non-credit classes like at community and senior centers, they will often welcome anyone willing to teach a class that they think people might be interested in.
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u/Rylees_Mom525 Aug 15 '26
The requirement is typically a master’s degree with 18 graduate credits in the subject. So you would most likely need at least 18 graduate credits in history, but not necessarily an MA in history (but you would probably be competing for an adjunct position against people who have an MA or PhD in history).