Institutional reliance on tenure-line faculty reached a historic low after the Great Recession in 2009, remaining at approximately a third of all faculty through 2022. Postsecondary institutions have steadily increased their reliance on full-time adjunct faculty over the last two decades. Part-time adjuncts, meanwhile, were hired in great numbers…

Student Evaluations of Teaching (SETs) are a ubiquitous tool in higher education. Though they are not effective means of evaluating teaching ability, they are useful in formative teaching development of a teaching career. We characterise the current formative use of and attitudes towards SETs by instructors across all disciplines (STEM and…

This study explored the extent to which faculty job satisfaction varied by faculty rank and tenure status. 118 Faculty members with varying ranks and tenure statuses from four higher education institutions participated in the study. Surveys were utilized to collect results. Descriptive statistics, and one-way ANOVAs, were utilized to analyze…

Black women in higher education routinely face and combat intersecting structural inequities to accomplish their goals in their roles as students, staff, administrators, and faculty members. Black women have also consistently found ways to create pathways to support one another in navigating multiple structural inequities in academia to achieve…

The world of the modern academy relies heavily upon contingent faculty in the teaching and training of students. Theological studies readily evidences this practice in innumerable ways. While the contingent faculty member is intrinsic to the mission of many modern schools, this piece ponders whether or not a trade-off exists in the quality of…

Almost three-quarters of instructors in America's higher education system are contingent faculty. Colleges and universities have increasingly relied on them as a flexible and cost-saving way to provide instructional services. Concerns over poor working conditions, low wages, and lack of job security have led to ongoing discussions about whether…

Historically, gender norms have allowed faculty who were men to remain an ideal worker by being dedicated to work regardless of family status because they had a wife to keep up the domestic and childcare duties (Tierney & Bensimon, 1996; Wolf-Wendel & Ward, 2006). Although both men and women have served as faculty members and parents, the…

Plenty of research tells us that culture is the most essential ingredient in a healthy organization, yet there are many colleagues who wonder whether research has a healthy place in their campus cultures. The reflections here - originally offered during a discussion at the CCCU's International Forum in 2022 - offer some suggestions for nurturing…

Non-tenure-track (NTT) faculty--typically contingent faculty hired on fixed-term contracts--know that budgets tightened during the pandemic likely mean fewer jobs, with little or no hope of professional advancement. Cost-conscious administrators often resist extending benefits to such instructors or look to trim those already in place, leaving…

Student retention, success, and the teaching and learning process should be the focus of community colleges. Employee job satisfaction contributes to this success. Consistency in faculty employment comes in part from job satisfaction, which leads to higher success rates for the students. The literature indicates a connection between shared…

An academic career at a community college is in a number of ways quite different from a career at a four-year university. From the emphasis on teaching and pedagogy to the absence of the "publish or perish" imperative (at least in most parts of the country), community college professors often navigate an array of challenges different…

Open inquiry and engagement with a diverse range of views are long-cherished and central tenets of higher education and are pivotal to innovation and knowledge creation. Yet, free inquiry on American campuses is hampered by a climate that constrains teaching, research, and overall discourse. In "Unassailable Ideas," Ilana Redstone and…

Faculty members play a crucial role in higher education, contributing to knowledge dissemination and offering solutions to societal issues. However, policymakers often view higher education as an industry and overlook the consequences of funding cuts, neglecting the faculty's role in student success and institutional mission. Temporary faculty…

This qualitative study of students in mid- and later-life (MLL; age 40 and older) sought to address the role faculty play in facilitating student success and how institutions support faculty, especially adjunct faculty. Adjunct faculty teach a majority of classes at community colleges but are not provided the same professional development…

This paper considers the professoriate of the past and present in an attempt to provide a vision for the future. Contingent labor has become nearly half of the instructional workforce at colleges and universities in the United States. What does this reliance mean for the professoriate moving forward? If colleges and universities continue to see…