What do academics think about their "responsibilities" to the public? This chapter provides a view of "the public intellectual" by examining how academics construct their relationship to the public. Drawing on in-depth interviews with physicists at universities in the United States (US) and the United Kingdom (UK), we…

Any institutional approach to improving graduation rates must include faculty. Faculty, more than anyone else, deliver an institution's "promise," one course at a time. They also evaluate whether or not students have demonstrated sufficient mastery of the subject at hand to make "progress" toward their degrees. This article considers how…

Although faculty participation in administration evaluation will create some strains within traditional governance in higher education, it is argued that the benefits outweigh the disadvantages. (Author/LBH)

There is a link between faculty trust of administration and their subsequent levels of participation in the governance process.

Self-paced instruction as a teaching method can offer flexibility to students and academic institutions, but it must be accompanied by planning and development efforts to identify viable courses and instructors, ensure adequate support for the faculty, and ensure that support systems are responsive to student needs. (MSE)

The University of Montana's University Planning Council is an illustration of the integration of the planning and budgeting process into the institution's decision-making process, with broad constituent participation. (MSE)

Academic freedom cases from 1970-1990 filed with the American Association of University Professors, in which institutional managers dismissed faculty members for their participation in academic governance, are reviewed. It is concluded that such cases occur most often in less prestigious colleges with less regard for national standards of faculty…

On the premise that outreach and recruitment need to be seen as concomitants of quality education, the author suggests that both internal and external benefits can be derived from utilizing the natural constituencies of the institution--faculty, students, and alumni--before turning to private consulting agencies in business to recruit students.…

Administrators whose leadership style makes them problem-solving heroes or mediators may deprive faculty of pride and sense of control over the institution's future. The "team leader" style encourages the creativity needed for institutional renewal. (Author/MSE)

Academic freedom should protect faculty comments about tenure policy and decisions, faculty role in institutional governance, curriculum, academic standards, and issues influencing a professor's ability to teach and conduct research. Comments about working conditions and administrative practices unrelated to these professional functions should not…

Teaching improvement and institutional renewal efforts often face pessimism about change, if not suspicion and resistance, but faculty teams can overcome these problems through an action-oriented but low-profile "organic" approach. The need for personal invitations by colleagues is shown. (Author/LBH)

Faculty will participate in renewal when there is clear evidence that opportunity exists for change in the structure and functioning of academic programs and services and that status quo management may damage the institution's integrity. Faculty must also understand the scope and application of financial information shaping the resource flow. (MSE)

Cultural and symbolic processes--that is, communication--quite frequently play as important a role as structural issues in enabling effective governance.

If we deconstruct the university--and set aside the trendy rhetoric of a multiversity--are we not actually approaching a "strativersity," a hierarchy of teaching that imposes a hierarchy of learning? In this article, the author discusses the ways in which typical contingent working conditions may undermine student learning conditions. Highlighted…