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…

Neoliberal reform of the university sector has resulted in increasing numbers of academics employed on casual or fixed-term contracts. While there is an emergent body of literature on issues of precarity in the academy, relatively little attention has been paid to the roles and responsibilities of those tenured academics who employ and…

Context: As instructional part-time, non-tenure-track faculty (NTTF) come to constitute an increasing proportion of all teaching faculty in the United States, significant research has investigated the experiences and perspectives of these essential higher education workers. In past decades, a subset of this work has sought to typologize this…

The number of PhDs awarded in chemical engineering is disproportionate with the number of tenure track positions available; an overview of the contributions that can be made by teaching-focused faculty is presented. Statistics are provided for the number of chemical engineering faculty in the US by rank, position and gender. Based on literature…

Using data with detailed instructor employment information from a state college system, this study examines disciplinary variations in the characteristics and effects of non-tenure-track faculty hired through temporary and long-term employment. We identify substantial differences in the demographic and employment characteristics between the two…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to study employee engagement in higher education by examining full-time non-tenure track faculty members' perceptions at a North East US state public university. Design/methodology/approach: The authors used semi-structured face-to-face personal interviews with 11 non-tenure track full-time university faculty.…

This article delves into student course feedback using publicly available data from the University of North Texas. It examines factors influencing elevated student course evaluation ratings in the Information Technology and Decision Sciences department. The study reveals a positive relationship between higher response rates and better evaluation…

This article explores how researchers adapt to disruptions that cost them access to their field sites, advancing a uniquely sociological perspective on the dynamics of flexibility and adaptation in qualitative methods. Through interviews with 31 ethnographers whose access was preempted or eliminated, I find that adaptation varied systematically…

Securing a first academic job in the United States as a young professional can be a very time consuming and stressful process. Candidates must carefully apply and then typically navigate off- and on-campus interviews. Although there is some literature dedicated to aiding in this process, some areas are not extensively discussed, such as contract…

This quantitative, non-experimental study was conducted to examine if there was a relationship between four aspects of the professional learning environment and tenured and non-tenured teachers' self-regulated learning in the workplace. The four aspects of the professional learning environment include: opportunities for professional development,…

The goals of higher education--engaging the hearts and minds of our next generation, advancing novel and pragmatic solutions to the most pressing local and global problems--call for great passion and skill. That's not the whole formula, though. Diversity performs its own powerful role. College faculties that represent a diversity of expertise,…

This article centers the counternarratives of four Asian American motherscholar teacher educators presented as letters to our children in which we apply tenets of AsianCrit to parenting and education, with racial realism at the forefront. Using Asian Critical Theory and motherscholar research to frame our analysis, themes within and across the…

Despite institutional claims to value increased racial diversity in higher education, Black women in faculty roles perpetually navigate oppressive cultures across all institutional types. The ability to build and foster mutually beneficial interracial mentoring relationships is vitally important to move beyond performative diversity and build…

Nontenure track (NTT) faculty make up 73% of faculty at universities and colleges across the United States and nearly 67% of the faculty workforce at Masters colleges and universities (Larris, 2018). There are myriad reasons for this growth, including financial pressures placed on universities and incentives to be more marketable and competitive…

Part-time non-tenure track faculty, also referred to as adjunct faculty, are the fastest growing instructional group in higher education, but they are provided minimal professional support from their employing institution(s). This lack of support is a problem because working conditions shape instructors' investment and efficacy of performance in…