National report: Colleges relying more heavily on part-time professors

Faculty compensation and tenure are important issues in the world of academia - nationally and in Iowa - but growth in one doesn't necessarily indicate growth in the other.

And commitment to tenure seems to be slipping, according to the American Association of University Professors' 2015-16 annual report on the economic status of the profession. That report, made public today, revealed erosion of the tenure system, even as full-time continuing faculty members saw an inflation-adjusted salary bump of 2.7 percent from the 2014-15 school year.

Salary levels for those faculty members increased nearly 3 percent between 2013-14 and last year, the first time since the Great Recession an annual increase has topped 2 percent.

But the AAUP report cautioned those jumps can be misleading and warned of fewer full-time ranked faculty positions. Over the past four decades, according to the report, the proportion of the academic labor force holding full-time tenured positions has dropped 26 percent, and the proportion holding full-time tenure-track positions has dropped by half.

Iowa's public universities also have seen downward trends in tenure and tenure-track positions - with the combined portion of total tenured faculty at the University of Iowa, Iowa State University and the University of Northern Iowa dropping from 48.4 percent in the 2012-13 school year to 46.3 percent in 2014-15, according to the most recent Board of Regents report on the topic.

The portion of non-tenure-track faculty at the three institutions increased from 37.4 percent to 39.5 percent during that same period.

UI Graduate College Dean John Keller recently said losses in tenured faculty positions have changed the career paths for many doctoral students.

Today's AAUP report argues those changes represent growing reliance on part-time faculty, 'creating an exploitive, two-tiered system.”

'It has also eroded student retention and graduates rates at many institutions,” according to the report.

The national AAUP espoused the tenure system as protecting academic freedom, facilitating shared governance, spurring research innovation and bolstering student learning. And it suggested the system 'must be rebuilt if the United States is to remain a leader in higher education.”

At the UI, members of the AAUP chapter long have stressed the value of tenure and concerns around its erosion, particularly with new UI President Bruce Harreld.

Before starting Nov. 2, Harreld expressed support for the tenure system, and just days into his presidency asked lawmakers for $4.5 million more in state appropriations next year, which he vowed to use for a 'faculty vitality” initiative. That proposal aimed to retain faculty by 'increasing salaries of tenure-track faculty who are nationally competitive in their fields of study and whose salaries are well behind their peers.”

Although Gov. Terry Branstad has recommended allocations far below the three universities' requests, Harreld has continued to express concern about UI faculty pay. At a recent town hall meeting, Harreld reported the university has dropped 20 places in national faculty salary rankings, and he also stressed the need to recruit and hire faculty in 'key areas of excellence.”

Today's AAUP report suggests combating the slide in tenured faculty by converting part-time, non-tenure-track positions to full-time, tenure-track roles.

'Higher education is at a crossroads,” according to the report. 'We can continue down the current path of increasing reliance on contingent faculty positions and accept the negative consequences, or we can take bold steps to rebuild the tenure system that made American colleges and universities the best in the world.”

Expanding tenure, according to the report, would benefit the economy by improving job security, allowing faculty to 'mentor students and junior colleagues more effectively,” and encouraging greater instructional and research-related risks.

Such risks, according to the report, would improve the educational experience and produce breakthrough research.

The AAUP proposes making the shift to more tenure-track roles at an average additional cost of 2 percent of institutional expenditures a year.

'While it is certainly possible to grant tenure status without changing faculty salaries, and some faculty activists have proposed exactly that, we focus here on the cost of raising the compensation of faculty in converted positions,” according to the report.

The report outlines the potential impact of changing faculty appointment types, showing - for example - 57 percent of surveyed full-time faculty members said they took greater risks in their research, 'knowing that the results might take a long time to collect,” compared with 27 percent of part-time faculty.

In fact, the report showed significant gaps in risk-taking, institutional support perceptions and even basic instructional and research activities between faculty members who are full time and those working part time.

'The decline of the tenure system did not occur overnight,” according to the report. 'If U.S. higher education is to retain its global advantage in instructional and research innovation over the next decade, it will need to commit itself to a full-time academic labor force that can, in turn, commit to academic excellence.”