ABSTRACT
Of course the cooling-out function happens at four-year institutions as well, but according to Clark, community colleges especially serve to manage ambition. Sunke costs from holding out for a better position make leaving even more painful to face; plus, many long-term contingent faculty members may not have continued developing other marketable skills. Ultimately, contingent faculty face situations eerily parallel to the mechanisms Clark identified in his article about cooling out students. This leaves contingent faculty in a state of limbo, with no clear pathway up or out. Instead, the aspiring contingent faculty member, like Clark's students, finds his or her 'occupational and academic future being redefined' and this frustrated contingent faculty member must then either accept long-term precarious employment or realize that it is best to ease out of the competition. They can continue upholding a system that treats contingent labor as grist for the mill, grinding out cohort after cohort of contingent faculty.
