Comments on: What does “Faculty” mean? (your opinions, please!)

By: Wilma

Wilma — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 02:24:12 +0000

I’m an english teacher in South Korea but i don’t know how to explain directly this word “faculty” to my co-korean teachers. It has several meanings. It depends upon how we used it in a sentence or in a different situation. It is rare and new word for them. It makes them confused so I ask your favor to please explain it concretely what does a faculty mean? What i have learned that it is a sysnonym of the word ” staff.” So i suggest our director to put a room sign as “Faculty Room” Is it correct? I hope this is correct because when i was still elementary until college i usually see the sign faculty room and that’s the room for teachers working in schools or in the institutes. I hope you will respond this question. I want to help and teach the korean students effectively. Have a good time and more power.

From: Wilma Delara Lee

By: rudibrarian

rudibrarian — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 17:24:33 +0000

Colleen,
Thanks for joining in!

I think that librarians forget that we have a subject domain: we are experts in locating and organizing information. That’s the subject area we all bring to the table, and many of us have further areas of specialization, such as pedagogy, database structure, user access. We may also be exert in the information universe of a particular subject or subjects — publishers, databases, navigating the LCSH for thorny topics….

All of that before any of the subject specializations we normally think of when discussing “expertise”.

I like your description of research! it is definitely far more engaging when you put it that way!

I think that the adjunct questions is ultimately the arrow to the answer: if adjuncts are full faculty, then faculty is really just about semester-long teaching. And librarians may not be able to make a good argument for their faculty status. If adjuncts are not generally considered full faculty, then faculty must mean more than just teaching, and librarians can make a solid case on that ground. We don’t have a lot of adjuncts here (too far away from a civilized place for folks to relocate for that kind of non-guaranteed work) so this is a somewhat abstract and academic a question for me at the moment. Food for thought, though.

By: Colleen

Colleen — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 17:12:06 +0000

A good question. I think active engagement is governance is crucial (though if you look at who shows up to Faculty Senate and such, most of the faculty might be disqualified on this one).

Defined area of subject specialization is useful…but what about librarians, who are technically jacks-and-jills-of-all-trades? (Or at least most trades, in a university system where we don’t have subject libraries).

Most PhDs get no training in teaching and pedagogy; they’re tossed into teh classroom as TAs and move on from there. Which I find disturbing.

Engaging in activities to improve the world (whether locally or globally) – or what use is research and teaching? As for research, perhaps “enlarging the body of human knowledge.” ‘Research’ simply put sounds like drudgery *grin*

Faculty – should they be on contract with their institution? Do you consider adjuncts full faculty? Just curious…

By: Anne-Marie

Anne-Marie — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 20:56:41 +0000

Hi – you probably already have a sense of what I think faculty means

Have you looked at the Boyer report (http://naples.cc.sunysb.edu/Pres/boyer.nsf/) yet? Is anything there useful? I have had our copy checked out for a while, because of project I’m doing on peer review, and haven’t gotten around to really digesting it yet. I know a lot of schools use the Boyer model to shape their p&t process, though.

I also thought of this post when I read this article – it does seem that in a world where accreditors, etc. are pushing us to define our mission and goals uniquely, that some campuses might start defining faculty and tenure uniquely too —

http://insidehighered.com/news/2008/01/10/siegal

I think there might be a little too much emphasis on teaching on the list above – for some campuses – certainly being well trained in teaching and pedagogy is an ideal, but it doesn’t define faculty on a lot of campuses I’ve been on. Even some of the most fabulous teachers I had had no formal *training* in teaching and learning.

Best,
Anne-Marie