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Proportion on Tenure Track Drops
By Gwendolyn Bradley
The proportion of new faculty appointments that are on the tenure track continues to shrink while the number of appointments that are either part time or at for-profit institutions grows, according to a report released in May by the U.S. Education Department. The report, Staff in Postsecondary Institutions, Fall 2003, and Salaries of Full-Time Instructional Faculty, 2003-04, is based on 2003 data gathered from over 6,500 institutions. Comparisons between the 2003 data and previously published data show that between 1995 and 2003, the number of part-time faculty appointments grew by 43 percent. Part-time appointments now account for 46 percent of the faculty. Contin-gent faculty (part- and full-time faculty off the tenure track) now account for 65 percent of all faculty in degree-granting institutions.
The data also show a dramatic increase of 46 percent in all positions in the for-profit sector. Ninety-nine percent of faculty at for-profit institutions are in contingent positions, often part time. And among full-time faculty at for-profits, about 3 percent are tenured, compared with 48 percent at public institutions and 40 percent at private nonprofit institutions.
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