Adjunct vs. tenured teaching quality

Thanks to a student who alerted me to the Times Sunday dialogue this week, which includes a bunch of opinions about interpreting a recent NBER working paper showing small gains in subsequent grades and increased probability of further study in the topic associated with adjunct teachers at Northwestern University. There is a lot one could say about this and broader issues about the move toward employing more part-time faculty especially at the lower end of the spectrum of schools. The specific question in the NBER paper stirred fond memories of Dr. Elizabeth Bogan at Princeton, now a senior lecturer there and probably still inspiring young students the same way she did back in the early 1990s. Adjunct faculty at outstanding institutions are outstanding; not a surprising result!