Non-tenure and adjunct faculty from Boston-area colleges are looking to form a union to attain better wages and benefits, and job security that is afforded to other professors based on status.

At a meeting hosted by The Service Employee International Union on Saturday at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Dorchester, faculty members gathered to discuss the formation of a union and what it would mean for professors in the area.

There were over 100 adjunct faculty at the meeting from over 20 Boston-area campuses, according to Adjunct Action, a campaign that unites adjunct professors from around Boston.

Avril Smith, assistant director of communications for SEIU, said a union would help give professors a platform.

“Nationally over 70 percent of classes are now taught off the tenure track and adjunct faculty often face low pay, no benefits or job security and many don’t have access to office space or basic facilities they need to do their jobs,” Smith said. “Adjunct faculty are forming unions to win a strong voice in their profession and in the future of higher education.”

Though the support exists across campuses, each school would have its separate union, Smith said.

“The National Labor Relations Act governs the process for how adjuncts form unions, so they would have to form their union at each university separately, but the vision is to work together across schools to raise standards throughout the Boston metro area,” she said.

SEIU represents 15,000 adjunct faculty nationally, according to the organization’s website.

Deborah Schwartz, an adjunct professor of English at Boston College, said she sees a disconnect with the amount that education costs and how much faculty are paid.

“When schools ask for upwards of $50,000 from their students, we have to ask why more of that money is not going to the majority of professors,” said Schwartz. “Both students and professors deserve more.”

Professors are not the only ones looking for change. Students from Tufts, Northeastern, and Emerson attended the event on Saturday to show support for their hardworking professors.

The idea of unionizing non-tenured and adjunct professors is not new in the Boston-area. Emerson College adjunct faculty unionized in 2001. University of Massachusetts Boston, and Suffolk University non-tenure-track faculty also unionized.

Boston University part-time faculty have not been unionized, and 33.9 percent of all faculty on both campuses are adjunct, said BU spokesman Colin Riley.

Joseph Massaro, a professor of statistics at BU, said that he knows professors from other schools in the area have unionized successfully.

“I can’t think of schools off the top of my head,” said Massaro. “But I know that non-tenure professors have formed unions successfully in the past working with their respective schools.”

Massaro also said that he understands the appeal of a union.

“I think that a lot of professors can get frustrated with salary and job security at institutions, but I’m very happy with my job here,” he said. “I didn’t go to the meeting on Saturday, so I don’t know the extent of their discussions, but I’m not opposed to the idea of a union.”