Exposing ideology within university policies: a critical discourse analysis of faculty hiring,promotion and remuneration practices

Using critical discourse analysis (CDA), this paper exposes the neoliberal ideology of the knowledge-based economy embedded within university policies, specifically those that regulate faculty hiring, promotion, and remuneration in two national contexts: Turkey and Mexico. The paper follows four stages of CDA: (1) focus upon a social wrong in its language aspect; (2) identify obstacles to addressing the social wrong; (3) consider whether the social order in a sense ‘needs’ the social wrong; and (4) identify possible ways past the obstacles. The analysis demonstrates that the global, marketized climate of higher education has impacted Turkish and Mexican universities to such a degree that they have become increasingly corporate in their practices of management. The resulting effect is the creation of a performance culture that robs faculty of their professionalism. This paper uncovers this disadvantaged positioning of faculty and posits modest proposals for change.     

高校教师聘任中的利益关系及其制度调整

利益关系及其调整是审视教师聘任制改革的一个独特视角。高校教师聘任中存在教师个体、学术群体和高校行政人员三个行动者,他们有着各自的利益诉求。理想的教师聘任制要能够协调各主体之间的利益关系。目前高校教师聘任制改革存在学术评议机构泛行政化、行政权力膨胀等弊端,损害了学术利益和教师个体利益,并使其得不到保障。教师聘任制存在的问题要求从深层次上进行高校治理变革,可以采取分权、改造利益代表制度、提升权力主体的道德自主性等措施。     

耶鲁大学教师聘任制度剖析

耶鲁大学教师聘任的学术标准相当严格,终身岗位候选人需要具备位于该学科领域世界前列的实力。文理科教授会的教师岗位应聘者要通过学系、学科组块、文理科教授会等各个层面的聘任委员会的审核。教师岗位的分配实施“一当二”的政策,并由教务长、耶鲁学院院长、研究生院院长等组成的班子决定。耶鲁大学的教师聘任标准和整个聘任过程实际上由学者掌控。     

Market conditions,productivity, and promotion among university faculty

This paper contrasts the performance levels and promotion experiences of 371 faculty members under three different market conditions reflecting the supply and demand for university faculty (buyer's market, seller's market, and stable market). The central questions examined are, What is the effect of market conditions upon (1) the length of time it takes for promotion; (2) the promotion rate; (3) the productivity of assistant and associate professors before each promotion; and (4) the productivity of full professors after attaining that rank? Findings are most consistent with a market model indicating that faculty promoted during a buyer's market remain in rank longer before being promoted and exhibit a greater rate of productivity than faculty promoted during other market conditions. There is also support for the elite model in that the impact of “tight” market conditions on productivity is greatest for faculty below the rank of full professor.     

高校教师聘任制中的若干关系

高校教师聘任制涉及社会生活、社会文化的方方面面,牵一发而动全身,必须认识和处理好其中的若干关系。制度约束行为,思想规导制度,首先要厘清规导教师聘任制的相关理念。实施教师聘任制具有学术和效率双重目标,但学术目标是大学坚守的生命线,效率目标应为学术目标服务。由于学术职业的特殊要求,教师聘任制中要形成甄选机制,以达到优化的目的。在聘任制过程中应处理好应然和实然的关系,逐步从实然达到应然。     

Age 70 retirement for faculty: An institutional approach

Postponed faculty retirements, combined with declining student enrollments and persistent inflation, are causing increasing concern in higher education. The 1978 Amendments to the Age Discrimination in Employment Act establish the mandatory retirement age at 70, but exempt tenured faculty from this provision until 1982. The legislation focuses attention on the retirement aspect of the problem, and researchers are busy analyzing the issue to help the industry plan for the impact of the new law.Most analysts approach the task from the aggregate perspective, and apply industry norms to individual institutions. The variations among institutions undermines the validity of this approach. This article demonstrates the problems of the aggregate analysis, and offers an alternative for individual institutions.     

Simulation of institutional incentive plans for faculty early retirement using a behavioral model of retirement decision-making

This paper uses coefficient estimates from a model of retirement decision-making for faculty members in higher education institutions to simulate the impact of financial incentives for early retirement. The results suggest that plans can be designed to induce relatively large numbers of faculty members to retire prior to the mandatory retirement age. However, the costs of hiring replacements plus pension subsidies can be substantial, especially if the subsidies are directed toward faculty members with relatively low salaries. Hence, institutions wishing to provide open positions to hire new faculty may prefer different incentive plans than those whose goals do not require filling each position with a new faculty member.     

提升大学教师教学能力的技术选择及策略

社会发展和大学教学改革的不断深入,迫切需要不断提升大学教师的教学能力。绩效技术是提升大学教师教学能力的一种有效的技术方法,利用这种技术方法,应从树立大学教师教学能力持续提升的理念,建立科学的教学能力动态绩效分析系统,持续诊断教师"教学能力差距",形成提升大学教师教学能力的动态协同机制,设计提升教师教学能力的有效干预措施和模式等方面入手。     

Differences in cost,tenure ratio,and faculty flow as a result of changed mandatory retirement ages

The present study uses the USC Faculty Planning Model to determine the impact of changes in the mandatory retirement age. Analysis was performed for three faculty groups, differing in age and rank distributions, and with three different policy scenarios (representing low turnover, high turnover, and retrenchment). Results indicate that the impact of changes in retirement age will vary considerably depending upon the initial faculty age and rank distributions and, to a lesser extent, upon the policy assumptions made.     

高校教师聘任的制度设计——基于学术职业管理的研究

高校教师职业是学术职业,高校教师聘任的制度设计,要遵循学术职业的特点。在教师聘任的制度设计中,要根据学术发展的需要设置岗位;根据学术职业的特点,将"有固定期限"聘任和"无固定期限"聘任作为一种制度设计,建立学术职业"准入"制度;根据学术自由的要求,在评价考核中,采取发展性评价,改进学术评议机构,保证学术评议的独立性;根据学术平等的要求,采用集体合同与契约合同相结合的办法,依法规范教师聘用合同;根据学术公正的要求,建立一个"中立"的、组织健全的争议处理机构,协调教师之间、教师与学校之间的争端,维护教师的权益,推进学校的发展。     

Economic issues in faculty retirement plans in American higher education institutions

Almost every faculty member in an American college or university has a contractual arrangement for retirement income. In recent years a number of factors have encouraged both faculty members and institutional administrators to consider the features of their retirement plans including changes in the assets in which funds are accumulated while the faculty member is working, options for payout at retirement, early retirement incentives, and whether it will be legal to have a mandatory retirement age. This paper explores these issues and suggests possible changes in retirement plans and employment contracts as a result of them.     

Steady state effects of a later mandatory retirement law for tenured faculty

Recently a new law was enacted that would raise the mandatory retirement age from 65 to 70 for all occupational groups except tenured faculty in higher educational institutions. The exception for faculty, which extends to 1 July 1982, was granted because tenure holding professors enjoy a measure of job security that is unknown outside the academic sphere; this uniqueness led many to feel that an extension of faculty lifetime careers could possibly have very serious effects on the fiscal and academic health of colleges and universities, and that a delay was necessary in order that the situation could be carefully researched. This paper analytically investigates these conjectures and rigorously shows that they have been greatly exaggerated. By using a four stage model of the tenure system, it is easy to show the effect of progressively later retirements on the tenure ratio, flow of new faculty, and faculty salary budget. As many researchers would intuitively feel, neither early nor late retirement has an unusually disruptive effect on any of these critical variables.     

A faculty views its retirement benefit plan: An empirical observation and analysis

What is the level of a faculty's knowledge of its pension plan, and what are its attitudes toward and opinions of its benefit plan? A questionnaire solicited data from one faculty in order to investigate these questions, as well as to measure the effect of marital status, the number of years employed, and proximity to retirement on the responses.     

On the use of student ratings of faculty in determination of pay,promotion and tenure

Student ratings of faculty have traditionally been obtained in a manner designed to be useful to the individual faculty member or to other students. It is now sometimes proposed that the resulting data be used to determine faculty pay, promotion, and tenure. Recent articles and the reviews of past literature on ratings are analyzed to determine whether student ratings are usually associated with teaching effectiveness, whether they are sometimes biased by irrelevant factors, whether faculty can effectively revise their behaviors to improve their ratings, and whether improved ratings result in improved teaching effectiveness. The results tend to indicate that student ratings of faculty as they are currently collected cannot be trusted for considerations of pay, promotion, and tenure.     

The use of a parity-equity model to evaluate faculty salary policies

A parity-equity model was developed for estimating the influences of a comprehensive list of factors classified as rational or nonrational equity and parity (marketplace). In a multiple regression analysis of faculty salaries for two years, the parity-equity model accounted for 86% of salary variance: over 60% by professional rank; approximately 16% by other rational equity factors; 3% by college and departmental parity; 3% by college and department affiliation; and 1% by nonrational equity factors. This model is recommended for studying, year-to-year changes in salary policies and for checking the importance of each factor in salary increase deliberations.     

An objective approach to faculty promotion and tenure by the analytic hierarchy process

This paper proposes a novel evaluation approach for the selection of candidates for promotion and/or tenure. The decision problem is conceptualized as a hierarchy of factors and a mathematical procedure known as the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) is used for successively weighting or prioritizing factors at each level of the hierarchy, in order to arrive at a final composite set of weights for each potential candidate, listed as alternatives at the final level of the hierarchy. The procedure and its mathematical basis are explained and illustrated using hypothetical data. It is argued that the AHP can aid university decision makers in arriving at objective and consistent decisions on faculty tenure, which at present appear to be largely subjective and informal.     

Reactions of professors to retirement: A comparison of retired faculty from three types of institutions

Dorfman et al. (1982) compared the professional activities of retired professors from liberal arts colleges, a comprehensive university, and a major research university. This companion piece based on the same survey compares the professors' reactions to retirement. Results show that a majority of faculty from all types of institutions plan for retirement, are positive about retirement, and give suggestions for institutional retirement policy. The retired professors recommend the following: (1) help in planning, (2) more information about retirement, (3) support for continued work, (4) gradual retirement. Major differences among institutions are the following: (1) comprehensive university faculty plan for retirement more than do faculty from the other institutions, (2) faculty from both universities begin financial planning at a younger age than do faculty from the liberal arts colleges, (3) research university faculty miss work and like having time to spend on professional activities more than do faculty from the other institutions.     

The use of a Markov model in assessment of alternate faculty personnel policies

This study demonstrates the usefulness of the Markov modeling technique for analysis of alternative faculty personnel policies at a university. The necessary faculty flow model and transition matrix are developed with limited resources and only two years of time-series data. By making adjustments to the input vector (those entering the university) and the transition matrix, faculty personnel policy decisions are simulated and their outcomes, in terms of important faculty characteristics, are determined. Six hiring and retirement policies at a major university are assessed utilizing this procedure. The results that are presented provide an illustration of the nature of the information which can be obtained from this procedure.     

日本促进大学教师专业发展的FD制度及其启示

日本的大学正在实施旨在促进教师专业发展的FD制度,其目的是唤起大学对教师教学能力更多的关注,树立教师的专业发展意识,提高教师的教学能力。FD制度的实施给日本大学教育力建设带来积极的影响,对我国大学教师专业发展具有启示作用。