Outlines strategies for teaching freshman composition courses and discusses the similarities between teaching graduate courses and teaching survey courses. Finds that (1) thinking, exploring, and testing ideas in the freshman composition classroom can provide material for research; and (2) teaching in the area of one's scholarship provides an…

Recounts experiences of the first year of teaching in a rural public university, after graduate study in Philadelphia. States that course loads are heavy because departments are small, and the English department teaches literature but also service courses. Finds the greatest difficulty to be in teaching students who just do not read. (PA)

Reports on a survey that sought data on three major kinds of variables with respect to English department heads: those contributing to administrative workload, those tending to reduce it or compensate in kind, and those compensating monetarily. (Author/GT)

Describes how chairs of English departments can help their departments prosper in economic hard times. (SR)

Examines the composition of the faculty and instructional staff in English, 1996-97 and examines the average percentage of undergraduate course sections taught. Analyzes the staffing of undergraduate courses in baccalaureate-, master's-, and doctorate-granting institutions. Considers the use of full-and part-time adjunct faculty members and the…

Describes the major changes made by the English department of the University of Louisville in terms of how they define themselves and their mission. Notes that in exchange for all full-time faculty teaching at least one section of first-year composition annually, the administration allocated seven new tenure-track positions in the English…

Urges that PhD-granting departments consider shrinking their graduate programs, thus reducing overproduction of PhDs and, by reducing the number of sections taught by graduate assistants, perhaps providing new tenure-track positions. Urges also that PhD-granting departments examine staffing practices in lower-level offerings and commit to engaging…

Discusses how chairs might use information from a survey documenting the types of support and compensation that chairs in the Association of Departments of English community receive to negotiate a compensation package that is best for them during their term of office but also takes into account such other considerations as opportunity costs…

Offers advice to English department chairs on the behavior of academic departments. (AEA)

Presents guidelines for maximum class size and workload in English. Presents recommendations for the number of students in writing courses and the number of students in literature courses. Considers recommendations for hours of instruction, variety of courses, variable workloads, administrative duties, and part-time and temporary appointments. (SG)

Discusses the author's experiences while teaching at Carleton College, a liberal arts college. Discusses the complexities behind the stereotype of the "liberal arts college." Presents reasons why the stereotype remains. (RS)

Provides an account of a successful staffing initiative at a PhD-granting institution, the University of Pittsburgh. States that the "Fix English" program aimed to improve the educational quality of undergraduate instruction by increasing full-time faculty involvement, correcting workload inequities, and bringing the English department's…

Describes specific experiences and benefits of teaching online. Considers how networking student learners to reduce teacher workload appears to be one of the most important functions for computer-based education. (SG)

Details the resolution passed at the Wyoming Conference on English, calling for major professional organizations in English, especially CCCC, to take steps to correct the exploitation of English faculty members, particularly writing teachers. (JC)

Sketches an abstracted and idealized profession of English--a profession that fosters no politics and entails no internal conflicts, and whose members care about language and its uses, about the transmission of knowledge and skills, and a capacity for pleasure in the text. (RS)