Results from Faculty Survey on Appropriate Service Assignments (Fall 2021)
The College Policy Committee designed and carried out an on-line Qualtrics survey of College NTT faculty members, with multiple goals. The goals of the survey were to inform the CPC's drafting of policies and guidelines regarding NTT service expectations, for promotion-related policies. Input from the survey will shape CPC views on how to recognize NTT faculty service.
The survey was distributed in Fall 2021 to all NTT faculty in the College of Arts & Sciences including NTT faculty in: lecturer, clinical, and research tracks, as well as to Professors of Practice, Research Associates, and Academic Specialists.
Response numbers:
- Professor of Practice/Research Associate/Academic Specialist: 27
- Lecturer/Senior Lecturer/Teaching Professor: 71
- Clinical Assistant/Associate/Full Professor: 14
- Assistant/Associate/Senior Researcher: 17
Survey topics:
- What types of service are you doing, or have you done?
- How much of your time goes into service in a typical week, and what would you think of as appropriate?
- What types of service are valuable and appropriate for someone in your position and rank, and what do you think of as inappropriate?
Most respondents report participating in service at their unit level. Types of service vary widely, and NTT faculty members at advanced ranks report participation in service at all levels of the university. An overview of service by position and rank reveals some patterns:
- Lecturers/Senior lecturers/Teaching professors report high rates of service on teaching-related committees.
- Senior lecturers and Clinical professors are heavily involved in peer review of teaching.
- Senior lecturers and Associate Research Scientists/Scholars contribute significantly to governance committees.
- Senior lecturers, Professors of Practice, Senior Research Scientists/Scholars and all Clinical professor ranks frequently report serving as directors or coordinators.
- Senior Research Scientists/Scholars and Professor of Practice often serve in technical or operations-related committees or roles.
Estimated weekly time spent on service varies significantly depending on NTT track. It is evident that service expectations increase with rank.
Many NTT faculty members who are in Research Scientist/Scholar positions are on soft money, precluding them from using any part of their work time for service. This skews the findings for estimated mean weekly hours of service work in the RSS ranks, which are as follows:
- Assistant Research Scientist/Scholar: 1.25
- Associate and Senior Research Scientist/Scholar: 2.5-3
- Research Associate: 1
All NTT faculty in Lecturer/Senior Lecturer/Teaching professors report that they participate in service; service is an expectation in these positions.
- Lecturer: 2.25
- Senior Lecturer/Teaching Professor: 2.77
- Some NTT lines have higher service loads related to the definition of the position:
- Clinical Assistant Professor: 3.25
- Clinical Associate Professor: 3.5
- Clinical Professor: 3.75
- Professor of Practice: 3.6
- Academic Specialist: 3.17
NTT faculty across all tracks and ranks reported widely varied forms of service within the university at unit, school/college, campus, and university levels. They also reported service to national organizations, to their professions, to academic publishing, to the state, to national grant agencies, and that list continues.
- Survey respondents viewed most of their service as an opportunity to contribute to the university's mission and as valuable and appropriate.
- Service opportunities can make good use of NTT faculty interests and expertise
- Service opportunities can encourage loyalty to the institution
- Service opportunities allow NTT faculty to integrate with other faculty members
- Survey respondents were critical of service responsibilities such as:
- Set-up and clean-up
- Unpaid but expected summer service
- Service for which NTT do the same work as TT faculty but do not get the same recognition
- Service that is not recognized in reviews and promotions
- Unfair distribution of service opportunities
- Exclusion from unit level service and governance
- Lack of NTT representation on committees
- Overloading NTT faculty with service duties, especially those that TT faculty reject doing