Higher Education Faculty Research Articles

A Comparative Analysis of the Employment of Business Faculty With Ph.D.s and Those With D.B.A.s at Colleges and Universities in the University System of Georgia

Although the Doctor of Business Administration (D.B.A.) and Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degrees are classified as professional degrees and research degrees respectively, several institutions market the D.B.A. as a degree that prepares graduates for careers in higher education. The present study focuses on faculty in certain business disciplines within the 26 colleges and universities in the University System of Georgia. The analysis indicated that of the 368 full-time faculty in the selected business disciplines, 32 held D.B.A.s while 336 held Ph.D.s. Results indicated that while the D.B.A. is a viable degree for those wishing to have a career as higher education faculty, the Ph.D. is still considered the gold standard.

Assessment Model for Programmatic Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging Initiatives

The study of diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging, (DEIB) processes are an ever-evolving phenomenon that will continue to influence and change the world. These processes are becoming increasingly prevalent and are present in business and educational environments driven by societal demands, environmental awareness, and funding requirements. The next generation of business leaders has serious concerns about the environment they will soon inherit. Each generation has events that define them (Civil Rights Movements, Watergate, the Recession, the Clinton Administration and Y2K, the Great Recession, Global Warming and Climate Change). Today's students want to make a positive difference on Earth, unlike any generation in the past half-century. Furthermore, higher education faculty and administrators must meet the charge of effectively preparing post-secondary graduates to function in these initiatives.

Higher education faculty and job embeddedness: validation of the occupational embeddedness scale

ABSTRACT Occupational embeddedness is defined as what keeps people in their current occupation and is believed to have three dimensions: Fit (perceived compatibility), Links (ties to others), and Sacrifice (material or psychological losses upon career change). Occupational embeddedness is highly relevant for academic faculty in higher education, who have a large investment to earn an advanced degree only to enter a highly competitive job market. However, there is currently not a validated measure of occupational embeddedness. This study seeks to validate the Occupational Embeddedness Scale (OES; Ng and Feldman 2009) using a sample of 91 higher education faculty members in the United States. The participants had been in higher education for an average of 21.28 years (SD = 13.53). A confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed using maximum likelihood estimation and internal consistency was examined. Results indicated that due to the open-ended nature of the items comprising the Links dimension, that entire dimension necessitated deletion despite its theoretical importance. After Links was removed, a revised OES including just Fit and Sacrifice is proposed; this revised scale demonstrated acceptable-to-good model fit, factor loadings, and internal consistency. It is highly recommended that future research reintroduce the Links dimension to the OES with closed-ended Likert-type items.

Toward a Spacefaring Society: Enhancing Undergraduate General Education and Learning Outcomes with Space Policy Course Themes

Space education from a social science perspective, rather than exclusively Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) perspectives, is essential to prepare societies and workforces for humanity's spacefaring future. Interdisciplinary general education courses on space policy have the potential to reach students from more majors than single-discipline courses (such as political science) by enrolling a variety of STEM and business students (among other majors) interested in careers with the space bureaucracy and industry. A case study of a course titled “Toward a Spacefaring Society,” taught from political science, sociological, and economic perspectives, demonstrates through analysis of student assessment and evaluation data that the topic is effective at achieving valuable learning outcomes related to research, communication, methods, and theory in the social sciences. Use of a space theme in a general education course is a promising approach to space education because it differs from the previous emphases in space policy education, which stressed building space knowledge and support by liberal arts majors versus critical, analytical skills that benefit all majors and prepare students for future careers in the space field. Higher education faculty with space-related interests should continue to seek opportunities to offer space-themed courses, including those that fulfill general education requirements and achieve broader learning outcomes.

Black Joy: Love, Intimacy, and Sexuality Amongst Black Intellectuals in the Academy

When I was in graduate school, I met a Black man! Before I knew his name, or anything about him, I was drawn to his energy. It was a chance meeting outside the Black Cultural Center. Little did I know then, God had a plan for this man and I. Eventually, I met this man. His name was Lewis. Only later did I remember the chance encounter. At first, we connected professionally based on our shared research about the Black community in Columbus, and we met … at the Black Cultural Center. The chance meeting, and our first meeting, however, would set the stage for our intellectual triumphs, professional challenges, community strength and most importantly, our shared love, intimacy and sexuality. While there is a body of literature that has examined the lived experiences of Black scholars in the academy, none of it has elucidated Black love, intimacy, and sexuality amongst two Black academics in Predominately White Institutions (Christian, 2017; Hendrix, 2021; Kuradusenge-McLeod, 2021; McFerguson, 2022; Mukandi & Bond, 2019; Stewart, 2020; Ward Randolph, 2010). This autoethnographic article explored love, intimacy and sexuality in the academy amongst two Black scholars. In this treatise, the author's musings focus on the love, intimacy and sexuality she shared with her late husband, a political scientist. She illuminated the significance of love, intimacy and sexuality in fostering productivity in the academy, how African American intellectuals addressed challenges through intimacy, and how love, intimacy and sexuality served as a protective and restorative shield that strengthened their communal bond in the hostile environment often accosting Black faculty in higher education which can amount to "state-based racist violence" (Mukundi & Bond, 2019, p. 254). In turn, shared love, intimacy and sexuality amongst these two academics highlights the need for them in the lives of Black faculty as a buffer against institutional violence in PWIs (Varel, 2018).

Problems and Countermeasures of Internationalization of Faculty in Higher Education

The internationalization of university faculty is crucial to the development of university education, and our universities are aware of this and have been actively importing, exporting, international exchange and cooperation from abroad according to the national policy and their own development needs. However, there are still many problems facing the internationalization of China’s university teaching staff. Therefore, with the continuous development of our government’s study abroad and the implementation of exchange and cooperation programs between provinces, this creates favorable conditions for the internationalization of faculty in our universities, as well as takes a series of measures to attract and cultivate internationalized talents as a way to strengthen the internationalization of faculty. This paper analyzes the problems of internationalization of faculty construction and proposes corresponding countermeasures.

A Path Toward Equity for Women Faculty in Higher Education

A Path Toward Equity for Women Faculty in Higher Education

Another reason academic libraries should love the NEH: Or what I did last summer

This essay is an implicit argument for academic librarians to seek out and participate in National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) Summer Seminars and Institutes for Academic Faculty. It takes the form of my account of the NEH Seminar that I attended for four weeks in July 2022. The seminar was called Printing and the Book During the Reformation: 1450–1650, and it was aimed at higher education faculty. Since attending my first NEH Summer Institute in 2007, I’ve felt like this is a scholarly activity that librarians have not pursued as readily as others in the academic community, almost certainly because of the amount of time it takes, which is admittedly a challenge. Nevertheless, the payoff is worth it for participants and their organizations, especially for the three reasons I mention at the end. This seminar took place at The Ohio State University and consisted of 16 participants from colleges and universities across the United States. With only a couple exceptions, all of our seminar activities took place in the Thompson Library and mostly in the Rare Books and Manuscripts Library (RBML), or the glass-fronted classroom at the opposite end of the first floor.

Affective Commitment among Faculties According to Academic Qualification and Faculty Group in Higher Education in Nepal

This article deals with the fundamental issues of affective commitment of faculties in higher education in Nepal. The main objective of this study is to investigate the relationship between faculty’s academic qualification and faculty group on affective commitment in faculty in higher education organizations. This follows a questionnaire survey of variables with a five-point Likert and uses mean, standard deviation, t/f test and Cronbach’s Alpha for analytical tools. The analyzed result shows a positive relationship between academic qualification and affective commitment. The analysis shows that higher qualification groups (PhD and M.Phil) are more emotionally attached than fewer qualification groups. The study shows no significant effect of faculty group on affective commitment. The sectoral sampling adequacy and a number of organizations represented in a survey may limit the general implication of results despite its analytical soundness. Moreover, may this study be originally picturesque and construes pre-cast for the future scenarios of the studied issues.

ONLINE TEACHING PREPAREDNESS AND STRESS PROFILE: A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF SECONDARY AND HIGHER EDUCATION FACULTY EXPERIENCES IN THE PHILIPPINES

The shift of education to online learning requires every educator to adjust; but the adjustment causes teachers to feel stress and requires preparation. This study purposively explores and compares the online teaching preparedness and stress profile of 100 secondary and 200 higher education faculty. The study uses a sequential explanatory research design consisting of a survey followed by interviews. The results reveal that higher education faculty are better prepared to teach online than secondary education faculty. The lack of emergency response to power service interruption and low internet connectivity are the major problems faced by the participants. Secondary and higher education faculty have the same level of stress from online teaching. It was concluded that educators at both private public and private institutions can aid teachers in combating the challenges of teaching online, online teaching devices, relevant educational technology tools, and faculty training and workshop on stress management. Investigating teacher development positively affects the learning achievement of the students.

How women of colour engineering faculty respond to wage disparities

ABSTRACT Women of Color (WoC) engineering faculty in higher education differ in their approaches to coping with inequities and salary disparities. This study draws upon McGee's Stereotype Management [McGee, E. O. 2016. “Devalued Black and Latino Racial Identities: A By-Product of College STEM Culture?” American Educational Research Journal 53 (6): 1626–1662; McGee, E. O. 2020a. Black, Brown, Bruised: How Racialized STEM Education Stifles Innovation. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press. https://www.hepg.org/hep-home/books/black,-brown,-bruised#] and Identity Taxation [Hirshfield, L. E., and T. D. Joseph. 2012. “‘We Need a Woman, We Need a Black Woman': Gender, Race, and Identity Taxation in the Academy.” Gender and Education 24 (2): 213–227] to understand how WoC in Engineering respond to race and gender-based salary disparity in engineering higher education. Results reveal that WoC contend with identity taxation that forces them to navigate gendered negotiation systems to achieve salary parity. The racial backgrounds of WoC appeared to influence how they managed the impacts of pay inequity. Stereotype management emerges as a form of identity taxation that WoC use to navigate their academic environments. Our research suggests that, rather than confronting their structural racism, institutions of higher education place the onus on scholars of colour to use strategies to protect themselves from the reality of race/gendered wage disparity.

The great resignation in higher education: An occupational health approach to understanding intentions-to-quit for faculty in higher education

The increase of resignations in education has continued to trend upwards, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic. The present study's aim was to develop a comprehensive investigation of key predictors and motivations for leaving academia. The key factors associated with intent-to-quit were: low perceived organizational support, high exhaustion, and low compassion satisfaction. Additionally, high rates of depression and anxiety were worse for faculty intending to leave academia. To improve retention, it is recommended that higher education institutions commit to increase support to faculty and to improve overall working conditions, in order to advert the predicted impending Great Resignation within academia.

Supporting Higher Education Students with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder through Universal Design for Learning

Students with diverse learning needs are becoming more prevalent in higher education institutions. There has been a substantial rise in the number of adult learners with ADHD (American College Health Association, 2021). To ensure the support and achievement of neurodiverse learners, especially higher education students with ADHD, higher education faculty should implement strategies within their courses to support all learners. One framework frequently utilized in K-12 settings is Universal Design for Learning (UDL). UDL provides access to content by focusing strategies on engagement, various means of displaying content, and supporting learners in demonstrating their learning in a way that best supports their learning needs (CAST, 2018). Specific UDL strategies that would have a positive impact on learners with ADHD are discussed.

Technologies as Tools to Increase Active Learning During Online Higher-Education Instruction

Higher education (HE) faculty are increasingly teaching online. For many faculty, this represents a new instructional mode that comes with its own set of challenges but also with new instructional possibilities. One challenge is identifying innovative and effective active learning methods that academically engage online students. Along with other benefits, students learn more with instruction that includes active learning opportunities rather than simply passively attending, whether learning face-to-face or online. Fortunately, HE faculty have at their disposal numerous technology tools to increase active learning in their synchronous, asynchronous, and hybrid online courses. This technology presents several active learning technologies organized under these online instructional methods: content presentations, game-based and gamification activities, peer collaboration, and multimedia. Mostly, the technologies reviewed are free or relatively low-cost and easy to use, with some available within typical HE learning management systems.

When “Technology Saves Us”: Exploring and Theorizing Pandemic Pedagogies in Adult ELT Contexts

<em>Educators continue to grapple with the ever-changing dynamics of COVID-19 and its effects on teaching and learning. As such, this study contributes to the limited research on the challenges and supports of English language teachers (ELTs) who work with adult learners. Much of the research on teaching during the pandemic has amplified the voices of students, K-12 teachers, and higher education faculty who teach in disciplines where courses are often already offered in online or hybrid formats. In this paper, the researchers highlight the experiences of ELTs in global settings during the onset of the pandemic, when school closure was a necessity and emergency remote teaching was seemingly the only alternative. Utilizing qualitative methodology, data was collected via questionnaires. The researchers provide a thematic analysis of teacher participants’ coping strategies, fears, hopes, challenges, and successes of what is termed ‘pandemic pedagogies for ELT’. The findings suggest that despite the ability for technology to save us, there is a need for more effective ways of responding to and caring for the English language teaching communities amid a global pandemic.</em>

Expanding Higher Education for the Public Good: Ghanaian Stakeholders’ Perspectives on the Quality Dimension

This study examined the views of twenty-three stakeholders connected to the Higher Education (HE) sector in Ghana, to understand the links they make between HE and the fulfilment of the public good. The study, which was conducted in 2018, was purely qualitative, employing individual interviews and focus group discussions. The results showed that stakeholders make strong links between the quality of inputs into HE, the approaches used in imparting and assessing relevant knowledge and skills, and the quality of graduates. They also drew links between the quality of HE, the products and their ability to serve the public good in addressing the problems of the society. The implication is that the quality of an institution is measured by the quality of investments made into it, the quality of faculty and instruction and its ability to serve the public good. The study recommends that HE institutions should design programmes that regularly develop the pedagogical competence of HE faculty to make HE pedagogy more relevant to societal needs. It also makes a case for the provision of academic/remedial support for students who may be underprepared for HE, while ensuring that the quality of HE practitioners and participants is of an acceptable standard. Lastly, higher education institutions should create conditions that can bring about innovations in funding, good governance and accountability.

Mental health among higher education faculty, administrators, and graduate students, Teresa Heinz Housel

Mental health among higher education faculty, administrators, and graduate students, Teresa Heinz Housel

A multi-faceted evaluation of the impact on students of an Australian university-wide academic language development program

In response to the ongoing need to support all students’ academic language development throughout their university studies, the academic language and learning team at an Australian university has established the Academic Language Development (ALD) program. This program screens all commencing students at the university and offers an innovative whole-of-institution approach to discipline-specific language development. The purpose of this paper is to report on a large-scale, long-term and multi-faceted evaluation of the ALD program, considering the impact of attending compulsory language development tutorials on 3922 students, the majority of whom were L2 users of English. Surveys have been carried out and data collected on academic language development, academic outcomes, student perceptions of their confidence, and other gains from attending the tutorials. A particular focus of this analysis is on the affective aspects of language development. In addition to developing academic language proficiency, the findings show that students benefited in multiple ways from the ALD program. Key themes emerged from the data around confidence, agency, and social connections, as well as a greater ability to navigate the university landscape. This paper offers an innovative approach to the evaluation of language programs that will be relevant to those teaching and researching linguistically diverse cohorts across faculties in higher education.

Intentional and unintentional benefits of minority writing accountability groups.

A faculty position can be a balancing act. Many new faculty, particularly minorities, struggle due to a lack of mentorship. Writing accountability groups (WAGs) offer new faculty an opportunity to glean advice from mentors and improve their writing skills and enhance their career development in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).

Progress Monitoring Data for Learners With Disabilities: Professional Perceptions and Visual Analysis of Effects

This study serves as an initial attempt to establish content validity for graphs likely to be included in trainings targeting progress monitoring for professionals serving learners with or at risk for disabilities. We created a survey containing 32 graphic displays of hypothetical learner data. These surveys were administered to a sample of special education teachers, behavior analysts, higher education faculty, and related service providers. Survey respondents rated each graph on its likelihood of being encountered in practice and whether a graph depicted a therapeutic effect. Results indicated that graphs displaying a therapeutic effect were most likely to be encountered and that graphs with variable data in either a baseline or intervention condition were associated with incorrect visual analysis determinations. Implications of our findings are discussed with respect to personnel who develop and provide trainings on analyzing learners’ progress monitoring data.