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Processes and Pathways: Exploring Promotion to Full Professor at Two Liberal Arts Colleges in the United States

Catherine White Berheide

Susan Walzer

Gender Transformation in the Academy

ISBN: 978-1-78441-070-4

Publication date: 6 October 2014

Abstract

Purpose

This research explores whether gender affects faculty satisfaction with opportunity for advancement in rank at two elite liberal arts colleges in the United States.

Methodology

We analyze survey data from associate and full professors to identify predictors of satisfaction with advancement. Focus group and interview data supplement our interpretations of regression results.

Findings

The two colleges differ in the impact of gender, rank, perceptions of the full professor promotion process, and quality of department relationships on satisfaction with advancement. At one college, there is no gender difference, while at the other, women are less satisfied than men. The effect of gender at this college is fully mediated by department relationship quality.

Research limitations

This cross-sectional study was conducted at only two colleges. Interpretations of the quantitative results are inductively generated and not tested in the analysis.

Practical implications

We make recommendations to improve processes and pathways for promotion that recognize the role of department climates in fostering or hindering career progression. Gender may be less salient in contexts in which associate professors have positive department relationships and in which promotion criteria value their administrative service and other institutional contributions sufficiently.

Originality

Previous research about promotion to full professor has focused on research universities while we examine the issue at liberal arts colleges, institutions that emphasize undergraduate study.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

Acknowledgments

This research is based upon work supported by NSF under Grant Numbers 0820080 and 0820032. We want to acknowledge the work of Ilona Abramova and Christina Gomes, the undergraduate research assistants for this phase of the project, as well as a co-Principal Investigator, Cay Anderson-Hanley, and the other undergraduate research assistants, Tara Kelley, Emily Cooper, Joelle Sklaar, Rena Linden, and Kayleigh Kahn, who worked on the larger research project. None of this work could have been carried out without the invaluable aid of two administrative assistants: Anita Miczek and Linda Santagato. We would also like to thank Alice Dean, Kimberley Frederick, Holley Hodgins, Muriel Poston, Monica Raveret Richter, Barbara Danowski, Kristin Fox, Suthathip Yaisawarng, and especially Brenda Johnson for their contributions to the larger NSF project. Thanks are due also to Todd Benson at COACHE. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the view of COACHE, NSF, or Skidmore College.

Citation

Berheide, C.W. and Walzer, S. (2014), "Processes and Pathways: Exploring Promotion to Full Professor at Two Liberal Arts Colleges in the United States", Gender Transformation in the Academy (Advances in Gender Research, Vol. 19), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 177-198. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1529-212620140000019008

Publisher

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Emerald Group Publishing Limited