Nontenure-Track Faculty and University Status

Abstract

These words are echoed in the documents of many universities. Schools and colleges of pharmacy have hired many nontenure-track faculty members over the past decade mainly to meet the expanding needs for experiential instruction. The latest AACP Profile of Pharmacy Faculty reports that 40% of 3798 full-time faculty members at our schools and colleges are on a nontenure track. This documents a consistent yearly increase and doubling of nontenure-track faculty representation over the past decade, from 22% in 1991-1992. As schools and colleges plan further increases in class sizes, the number of nontenure-track faculty members in our institutions will further increase. The need for nontenure-track faculty members, particularly clinical faculty members, is apparent; however, many of our universities hold the contradictory stance of defending the importance of tenure while expanding the ranks of nontenure-track faculty members. The continuation of the tenure system along with the denial of its “protection” from “dismissal except for cause” for many of our faculty members is difficult to justify, but my purpose is not to debate the merits of tenure in our universities but to question the inequities that are fostered when differences between nontenureand tenure-tracks go beyond protection from dismissal. “Protection” may not be the critical issue since our organizations have formal systems for personnel review, appeals, and due process that protect all faculty members from dismissal without cause.