Certainly much has been written in the library literature
over the years on the issue of faculty rank and status for librarians. A recent article in the Chronicle of Higher
Education titled As Their Roles Change, Some Librarians Lose Faculty Status, by
Sydni Dunn prompts me to make comments on this issue. The article states that at the University of
Virginia future librarians will be classified as university staff while current
employees will retain faculty status.
The advantage of faculty status is that after a librarian has
attained tenure he/she has job security.
Those librarians feel “more professional” than their colleagues who are
staff. On the other hand going through
the tenure process creates anxiety. The
tenure requirements vary at different universities. At some colleges publications demonstrating
empirical research are required for tenure. While at other universities
publications are helpful but job performance and professional activities are
used in the evaluation for tenure.
Since I have been exposed to both situations, I am
commenting based on my experiences. Here
at NJIT we have professional status. Our
raises are determined though job performance.
Activity in professional organizations and publishing are encouraged,
but are not absolute requirements for the job.
After six years we are granted “Contractual Expectation” which I define
as “quasi tenure.” We can only be
terminated for documented misconduct or poor performance.
I prefer the “professional staff” status since I feel that
the tenure process creates so much tension.
I have observed many tenure track librarians spending much time going to
professional meetings. This takes time
away from helping library patrons.
Tenure track librarians are often allowed release time to do their
research. Thus less time is spent
helping their students. In my opinion
much of the library literature is very self-serving. I read many papers and feel that they just
don’t prove anything.
The article in the Chronicle states that a survey done by
Lisa Hinchliffe at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign states that
nearly two-thirds of the 1600 institutions that responded have faculty
status. 36% have tenure or on the tenure
track while 28% have faculty status but are off the tenure track. The remaining third don’t have faculty rank
or status.
I guess this issue can be debated indefinitely.
