The Interim Chief Academic Officer’s Leadership Role in Supporting Long-Term Faculty Development and Institutional Acadeic Vitality at Liberal Arts Colleges

Article by: Dr. Edgar B. Schick

Interim Presidents and Chief Academic Officers (CAO’s) recommended by The Registry are carefully “paired” with colleges and universities to maximize their effectiveness in resolving critical issues confronting an institution. For example, they may be asked to offer creative solutions to enhance faculty development and positive faculty morale when professors call for reductions in teaching loads. An interim academic leader from The Registry, who brings insights gained through successful service over the years at multiple institutions, can consult afresh with other administrators and with faculty in making proposals for discussion, analysis, and trial implementation, especially if faculty workload issues are unresolved irritants.

Ideally, faculty workload arrangements should enhance a college’s academic vitality – for both students and faculty – while fitting institutional mission and the realities of a college’s resources. Rarely do faculty proposals for reductions in teaching loads identify how they would strengthen educational vitality in a typical, predominantly undergraduate college with its emphasis on excellent teaching.

Faculty career pathways at undergraduate colleges today are largely at one institution. This is in contrast to mobility among research universities by “star” scholars, which may stimulate their intellectual or artistic excitement. Still, at the typical liberal arts college faculty and administrators can, working together, provide opportunities for faculty renewal: faculty and institutional academic vitality is a shared priority of faculty, administrators, and trustees.

Enhancing student learning may not be the only argument used by faculty when proposing reductions in teaching loads. Faculty also argue that additional time, outside the classroom, is needed for research, student advisement, and service. Of these, research expectations for faculty may be the most sensitive point, but time for service and advising can also be topics.

Pressure to “publish or perish” at undergraduate colleges may be less than that at research universities, but so, too, are the resources – financial support and time. Still, faculty should be encouraged and supported to plan their professional development, within an institutional mission and resources, in an administrative/faculty partnership, designing multi-year activities and the evaluation of their achievements. Such an approach could even serve as an alternative to performance evaluation of tenured faculty.

With the guidance of an experienced interim CAO, faculty members could develop their plan[s] for future semester[s]/aca­demic year[s] and present proposals for approval and, perhaps, additional support.

• A plan would identify timelines for progress reports and possible modifications, and include a report to the faculty and the institution’s leadership at its conclusion.
• As the project draws to a conclusion, the faculty member would prepare and submit a new plan which might be in a similar – or substantially different – area of interest.
• On-going or final reports could serve as justification for promotion, for compensation increases, or for future paid/sabbatical leaves, also contributing to positive morale.
• Drawing on substantial experience at other colleges, the interim CAO might suggest plans focusing on any of the fol­lowing areas, among others:
  • planning by a faculty member to initiate and evaluate innovative educational offerings for oneself or for a larger curriculum, such as distance learning, “up-side-down” course structures, multi-cam­pus/interinstitutional courses or programs, etc.;
  • leading a larger project on campus, such as overseeing a major reaccreditation;
  • planning for, initiating, guiding, and evaluating a service project in the area or region, perhaps involving a consulting role at an agency, tied to a faculty member’s expertise, possibly integrating student internships or community service-learning projects;
  • planning, implementing, and participating in more effective student advisement and counseling, to promote student intellectual growth through larger educational projects and increase student retention and degree completion;
  • preparing for a transition in a faculty member’s academic discipline [“re-tooling”] as new curricular opportunities arise;
  • planning or continuing a significant multi-year research or creative arts project, perhaps having begun during a sabbatical leave or being partially funded by a grant;
  • proposing and implementing a faculty-sharing agreement with an academic partner, including conducting one’s teaching assignment at multiple colleges on an interim basis, to promote expanded intellectual and curricular opportunities; and/or
  • focusing on teaching a normal instructional load, instead of, before beginning, or after having completed one of the options listed above.

In addition, an interim CAO might suggest two additional arrangements to encourage faculty professional development and success.

• New faculty might receive a one course reduction in their first semester to assist them in acclimating.
• Faculty on the tenure track might receive a one course reduction during the academic year in which they prepare their dossier in support of the granting of tenure.

This model could add to the workload of academic administrators – deans and department chairs.  But it would also bring them and their faculty colleagues into closer, more frequent and fruit­­ful partnerships and, one would hope, contribute to good faculty morale. Steps like these can show faculty that the administration truly cares about their professional growth, while changing arguments about workloads into discussions about ways in which, together, in non-adversarial relationships, they can advance the core raison d’étre of the academy itself.

While some version of this model might well be suggested by an interim, its implementation could offer longer-lasting benefits to an institution’s faculty and its students.  That is, after all, precisely the very tangible advantage offered to a campus by an interim CAO identified and placed by The Registry.