While much of the quantitative research on Black women faculty has taken a comparative approach to understanding their experiences, this study provides a counternarrative, centering their experiences as faculty. This large-scale, multi-institution glance at Black women faculty helps to give us an overview of these women across the country, looking…

This article examines the costs faculty pay to gain status and security in the academy. Academics receive salaries for their work, but also "pay taxes" in order to maintain a positive trajectory toward the ultimate "prize"--promotion and tenure (PT). The psychology of narrative method is used to examine the articulation of the…

This paper investigates the amount of academic service performed by female versus male faculty. We use 2014 data from a large national survey of faculty at more than 140 institutions as well as 2012 data from an online annual performance reporting system for tenured and tenure-track faculty at two campuses of a large public, Midwestern University.…

The mission of higher education and the activities of faculty are often described in terms of teaching, research, and service. Additionally, tenure has been the standard model for employment in American college and universities since 1940. The traditional model of faculty earning tenure through high standards of teaching, research, and service is…

This study was conducted to develop a demographic profile of full-time educational leadership clinical faculty, to identify their professional responsibilities, and to compare their job satisfaction and perceptions of the educational leadership field with those of tenure-line faculty. Utilizing an online questionnaire, 140 clinical faculty and 755…

A combination of destructive trends in higher education--shrinking state budgets, stagnant student aid, the growth of corporate-style management, the overuse and exploitation of contingent faculty, increasing workloads and attacks on academic freedom--is weakening the educational integrity and professionalism of American colleges and universities.…

This article describes the experiences, perceptions, and available support systems of untenured faculty from a south eastern United States public university system in their progress toward tenure. Survey results were used to develop a model support system for new faculty. Data were collected from an online survey sent to 191 tenure-track faculty…

As anyone who has ever defended a thesis or been on a tenure track must know, American institutions of higher education have rigorous and finely calibrated ways of according respect to those who work in them. What they do not have enough of is respect from those beyond their gates. The author argues that the system that created the two-tiered…

This monograph provides a portrait of non-tenure-track faculty, describes studies of their experiences, and proposes plans of action. Much of the research, particularly early on, tried to provide a picture and description of this faculty that have been largely invisible for years. Therefore, "Portrait of Non-Tenure-Track Faculty" focuses on the…

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…

The American Association of University Professors statement concerns policies and practices that open senior academic appointments to persons with reduced workloads and salaries without loss of status. (MSE)

A paradigm shift in the use of faculty appointment types is occurring in academia. Using National Study of Postsecondary Faculty data, this study examines the influence of appointment type on faculty productivity--research and education--and commitment at Research and Doctoral institutions. All full-time faculty and a subset based on experience…

This case presents an educational leader attempting to institute cultural change in a university department that has long been marked by turbulence, turmoil, and trauma. The case examines the well-intentioned efforts of the newly appointed department chair, John Nitsky, in his quest to "reculture" the department. (Contains 2 notes.)

In an effort to understand the persistent lack of representation of females in senior ranks at top research universities this study examined the attitudes of female assistant professors toward 14 possible impediments to their gaining tenure. Subjects were tenure-track assistant professors in a large, public research university where women are…

This study explored how junior faculty perceive the academic tenure system impacting on their personal and professional lives and how they cope with the process. Using theoretical principles rooted in the tradition of phenomenology, the study conducted three in-depth phenomenological interviews with 18 assistant professors who explored, recreated,…