If you look at the IPEDS data from 2014, out of UChicago's approximately 2,200 full time instructional faculty, approximately 46% are in non-tenure track positions. These folks will never get tenure because their positions are not tenure-track. One obvious reason could be Chicago uses a large number of non-tenure track lecturers for its professional schools and they might be industry experts who bring real world experience to the class room. But Chicago also has a pretty large number of non-tenure track Profs (22% of all Profs on staff), Associate Profs(46% of all Assoc. Profs on staff) and Assistant Profs (55% of all Asst. Profs on staff) on its instructional staff.
I am assuming that many of these are focused on teaching rather than research. I was wondering how this will affect the educational experience at UChicago.
1) I assume this would improve teaching quality in undergraduate classes. These faculty members cannot ignore teaching and focus on research. Their jobs depend on teaching well.They can no longer hide behind tenure or teach in a lackadaisical way because they want to focus on their research.
2) Grade inflation/deflation. I would presume that since these faculty members would be evaluated primarily on their teaching skills, unless they are popular and generally easier on grading, they will get poor evaluations from students and this might affect their employment. Consequently grade inflation and not deflation will be more prevalent at Chicago in the foreseeable future
3) I wonder how this affects the faculty's ability to teach and say whatever they want in their classes. If they anger either the students or the administration with their views, they could easily be eased out. This could make them think twice before saying something controversial?
These are of course my speculations. What do others think?
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