Though increasing numbers of racially and ethnically minoritized (REM) individuals earn PhDs and national initiatives focus on faculty diversity, challenges persist in recruiting, hiring, and retaining REM faculty. While a pervasive issue nationally, the literature predominantly focuses on faculty diversity at research-intensive institutions. This…

Intercollegiate athletics occupies a unique place in higher education, but little is known about administrators working in this area. This chapter proposes a functional definition of "mid-level" in the context of college sports, describes the prevalence of these jobs nationally, and summarizes key factors associated with mid-level…

This chapter reviews discourses about "senior" and retired faculty. These discourses suggest a deficit or burden-based view that shapes the values and practices of faculty and department chairs. Yet retired faculty can be valuable resources and help with teaching, service, and research. A process for changing departmental views to create…

Mid-level managers have the difficult task of juggling needs and direction of entry-level staff with the demanding outcomes from their supervisors and senior leadership. To be successful, they must maneuver through demanding expectations from their supervisors while simultaneously garnering buy-in from those they directly supervise in order to…

This chapter continues the discussion of what leadership education is and highlights the importance of emotionally intelligent leadership. The authors assert the need for deliberate practice and better collaboration between student affairs, academic affairs, and academic departments to develop emotionally intelligent leaders.

This chapter explores the work-life experiences of administrators as well as whether and how the ideal worker model affects those experiences. Departmental and supervisory differences and technology complicate administrators' work-life experiences.

The Lipscomb University Adult Degree Program exemplifies how a centralized governance system can benefit nontraditional college students and promote cross-departmental interactions. The two-person staff of the adult program at Lipscomb University envisions a number of potential benefits of having a much larger staff. However, such a programmatic…

North Park University's adult program has moved steadily from a centralized governance structure toward a more distributed structure in many ways. The School of Adult Learning hires its own faculty, some of whom are full time in the adult program. The school also has autonomy over academic policy. Ultimately, this academic autonomy has fostered…

Case studies show the capacity of chairpersons to make distinct improvement in their departmental management. This would occur more often if there were systematic attention to the evaluation of institutions, departments, and chairpersons so that the objectives for decision making in departments are clarified. A chairperson evaluation form is…

This chapter, which focuses on the socialization process for new chairs, offers suggestions and recommendations for practice. (Contains 1 figure.)

The reputation of UC Merced as a student centered research university rested on administration's success in attracting top-flight faculty. This chapter describes how this process started, through choosing the deans, then recruiting the faculty. As faculty arrived, the academic picture came into focus. Not surprisingly, the initial ideas about …

This chapter describes characteristics of department chairs and identifies various tasks and challenges that they face during their time in office.

The Associated Colleges of the St. Lawrence Valley is an educational consortium with four members: Clarkson University, State University of New York at Potsdam, State University of New York at Canton, and St. Lawrence University. Access to higher education at the Associated Colleges has been a special ongoing interest and mirrors a national…

Describes the development of a mission statement for the biology department at Morehouse College, and discusses how mission statements at the departmental level can frame strategic planning and assessment efforts, build community, and focus teaching and research activities. (EV)

What is perceived as poor fit between liberal arts and the individual disciplines results not from narrow subject matter or analytical focus but from the disciplines keeping too many of the interesting questions to themselves. College students are not exposed enough to the reasons their teachers find their fields compelling. (MSE)