Inside Higher Education, DC
11-09-07
Faculty Productivity, Learning to Teach, Student Satisfaction
Why are some professors more productive than others? Do female professors
have different teaching styles than their male counterparts? Do students
experience the research university in different ways based on certain
demographic characteristics? These are a few of the questions explored in
research presented Thursday at the annual meeting of the Association for the
Study of Higher Education.
Here are a few of the findings.
Female Faculty Productivity: Critical Mass of People and Resources
Discussion of why women succeed in the academy — especially at the research
university level — continues to be important on many campuses. Many have
suggested that women are more likely to succeed if they aren’t in an extreme
minority in their departments. Stephen R. Porter, an associate professor of
education at Iowa State University, set out to use national survey data to see if
there is a link between the proportion of women in departments and their
productivity.
He found that there is a relationship, but it’s a simple one — and is most present
when resources aren’t.
Porter used data from a national faculty survey by the Higher Education
Research Institute, which asked professors a range of questions about their
departments, job satisfaction and working conditions. It also asked them about
demographics and about their research productivity, as measured in publications.
When factoring in various qualities that may affect productivity, Porter found that
at research and doctoral universities, there is a strong, positive impact on
productivity at departments where faculty members are unhappy with their space
for research and lab work (a proxy for resources).
As faculty members become more satisfied with resources, the impact on female
representation on female productivity goes down. “When resources are plentiful,
the gender composition of a department has little effect,” he found.
Men, Women and Learning to Teach
Jokes abound about how men who are lost won’t ask for directions, while women
will. Stereotype perhaps, but there may be some truth when it comes to learning
about teaching techniques.
Carrie B. Myers, assistant professor of education at Montana State University,
used survey data at a public university to see how faculty members inform their
decisions about teaching techniques. As expected, professors are most likely to
rely on colleagues for advice — and they are less likely to use official teaching
resources or consult experts. But female professors are more likely to use these
resources than are men.
In addition, the longer female professors teach, the more likely they are to seek
expert advice on teaching.
In her paper, Myers writes that this gender gap can be viewed as either a good or
not so good thing. From the perspective of the female professors’ students, it’s
positive: They are being taught by professors with more knowledge because of
their willingness to seek new ideas and techniques. But as long as higher
education remains a culture where some sectors do not value teaching, Myers
worries that the extra effort female faculty members put into teaching “many not
pay off” for them.
Student Satisfaction Gaps
Considerable scholarship suggests that students benefit from interaction with
faculty members beyond just listening to what is said in class. Young H. Kim of
Cerritos College and Linda J. Sax of the University of California at Los Angeles
set out to see whether there are significant gaps by demographic groups in
student satisfaction with faculty interaction. They used surveys of University of
California undergraduates and found that at research universities, there are
notable gaps.
In terms of race and ethnicity, they found that white students were by far the
most satisfied and Asian students the least satisfied.