Flexible tenure contracts are proposed as an alternative to the current college faculty tenure system. Such a contract would make more explicit, and potentially more varied, the contributions expected of the candidate, but avoid the tenure-track/non-tenure-track distinction. It could also help resolve conflicts over the relative weights to be…

This paper, one in a series about the priorities of the professoriate, seeks to clarify the relationship between academic freedom and tenure by examining the standards and procedures used by the university to protect academic freedom without a tenure system. The paper considers first the minimum elements necessary to protect academic freedom…

This essay, one in a series about the priorities of the professoriate, seeks to explore variations on standard tenure practices that might be advantageous to the interests of both faculty and the institutions by proposing three modifications to traditional policies. The first, tenure by objectives, involves reconfiguration of the probationary…

Colleges without tenure are rare; in the United States 97 percent of research universities and 99 percent of four-year public colleges offer tenure. This study, one in a series about the priorities of the professoriate, examines the 9 percent of private colleges that operate without tenure; some are highly specialized professional schools, others…

This paper, one in a series about the priorities of the professoriate, explores several alternatives to tenure for faculty and institutions. Data for the study was drawn from a series of site visits to seven institutions during winter/spring 1995-96. Seventy-one interviews were conducted with administrators, senior faculty, and full-time…