Find our headlines more quickly in Google search results.

Scores of adjunct professors at the City University of New York aren't getting paid on time, CUNY officials acknowledged, in an ongoing problem that has frustrated the university's part-time teaching workforce for several years.

Some CUNY adjuncts are owed sums north of $10,000.

“First paychecks don’t come through for a lot of people, and they’ve made that standard,” Rose Shelor Moulton, an adjunct at Hunter College, told The City Reporter. “But our first month of rent is still due.”

This semester, CUNY’s Professional Staff Congress said it has received 110 complaints of delayed pay. That’s actually an improvement: Using payroll data from the state teachers union, the PSC counted just over a thousand late paychecks in Spring 2025.

Sign up for free morning headlines in your inbox.

No paywall here. THE CITY is a free-to-read, independent newsroom covering the stories that help you understand NYC. Sign up to get our headlines in your inbox.

The delays are due to late additions to the payroll at individual colleges, CUNY said.

“CUNY values the dedication of its adjunct professors and has worked to improve the payroll process to reduce delays, including sending reminders to the campuses before payroll deadlines for the start of each semester, making it easier to provide advance pay to faculty who are hired at the last minute or paying them outside the normal payroll period,” spokesperson Noah Gardy said in a statement.

Adjuncts and union reps said the delays are baked into the university’s hiring practices.

Lynne Turner, a union vice president and an adjunct lecturer at LaGuardia Community College, said pay delays are one of the many consequences of what she called the university’s “employment model of extreme contingency.” Adjuncts are hired on a semester-to-semester basis, according to their union contract and CUNY standards.

“We are employed, re-employed, and then re-employed again,” Turner said. “Of course that comes with problems. Late paychecks are the tip of the iceberg.”

GET THE CUNY SCOOP: Subscribe to our new weekly newsletter covering the City University of New York

According to CUNY’s most recent human resources report, the university employs 11,000 part-time faculty, compared with just under 7,000 full-time faculty. CUNY reported that part-time labor makes up 52% of its instructional staff, higher than the national average of 40% , as reported in February by the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources.

Most CUNY part-time faculty must be rehired each semester. Adjunct pay can range from approximately $7,000 to $11,000 per course.