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In 1984, Ryan and Sackrey's "Strangers in Paradise" explored the challenges of the professoriate for those from working-class backgrounds. Nearly 40 years later, there is a substantial body of narrative and reflective writing by working-class academics. We present findings from analysis of 218 narratives from working-class academics. Through Ibarra and Obodaru's reconceptualization of liminality in contemporary careers, we demonstrate how those accounts inform our understanding of academic lives and careers. Findings suggest opportunities to better support working-class academics and the contributions they make towards disciplinary, institutional, and student goals and development.

Purpose: The purpose of this study, nested within a broader study about higher education leadership, was to generate knowledge about the ways in which doctoral education prepared people for leadership roles in postsecondary institutions within the USA. At colleges and universities, there is an interest in ensuring diverse leadership teams and welcoming campus environments. Yet, the research demonstrates challenges for and underrepresentation among higher education leaders. One point of intervention is doctoral programs in higher education and related fields, given the professional socialization, identity formation and knowledge acquisition that occurs through the doctoral journey. Design/methodology/approach: By conducting interviews with women who hold doctorates in the field of higher education and who took on new leadership roles at postsecondary institutions in the USA during the global health pandemic, the authors identified specific areas for which doctoral-level training and experiences may be helpful in supporting leader development. Findings: The authors identified specific areas for which doctoral-level training and experiences may be helpful in supporting leader development. Based on those findings, the authors offer initial propositions about how doctoral programs might support the development of equity-minded leaders in higher education, which should be tested and refined through further research, theory development and application to practice. Originality/value: This paper contributes by providing a focus on the ways in which doctoral programs can equitably train and develop equity-minded leaders for a range of career goals including but not limited to academic appointments in higher education.

Across disciplines, mid-career faculty may be motivated by internal and external factors to pursue financial support for their work. Yet, it is unclear how mid-career faculty navigate individualized realities to develop the necessary skills for success in this aspect of their careers. This chapter guides the reader through planning for the pursuit of funding at mid-career in ways that promote agency, vitality, and fulfillment. Rather than emphasizing strategies for securing grants, it focuses on a reflective practice that places at the foreground individual decision-making in alignment with personal goals, talents, and needed areas of development. The chapter includes an overview of challenges faced by mid-career faculty as well as growth-promoting models of academic careers, and then transitions to a reflective planning guide. It concludes with recommendations for key stakeholders in support of mid-career faculty.

Across colleges and universities, there is a need to foster campus leadership that is diverse, responsive, and effective. In the face of these needs, there is a lack of current research about how newly appointed campus leaders develop and enact their leadership practices in support of higher education institutions and their members. The purpose of this qualitative study, guided by Feminist Organization Theory, was to generate knowledge about women's approaches to new leadership roles in today's higher education environment. Interviews with women with scholarly backgrounds in higher education administration who had taken on new leadership roles generated the emergent Institutional-Individual Leadership Model, which should be tested and refined through further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research presented here contributes to research and practice focused on faculty leadership development by examining the leadership pipeline for mid-career faculty in a consortium of 13 liberal arts colleges. Research findings revealed that mid-career faculty members are in the leadership pipeline, with the department chair position serving as an entry point. However, leadership aspirations beyond the department chair position decline serving as a source of the leaking leadership pipeline. Differences were found by gender. Further, issues of lack of preparation for current and future leadership roles was connected to few mid-career faculty members aspiring to executive leadership positions. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

Learning more about the role of the academic department in LACs may improve faculty selection, development, support, and retention. Knowledge based on research about other institution types cannot be assumed to be generalizable to LACs. We know little about departmental contexts of faculty work in liberal arts colleges (LACs). The purpose of this exploratory qualitative study was to understand the department as an organizational context of faculty work in LACs, relying on the concept of positive organizational behavior. Findings from analysis of interview data from 55 liberal arts faculty members highlight the influence of three areas--culture, colleagues, and leadership.

Using a conceptual framework constructed around self-efficacy, this study explores specific recruitment programs that may contribute to the development of self-efficacy for students of color in the geosciences. This mixed methods study of geoscience education includes quantitative analysis of the Summer Experience in Earth and Mineral Science Program and qualitative analysis of the Summer Research Opportunity Program. Findings identify programmatic components that fostered self-efficacy, thus contributing to students? continued interest in careers in geoscience. This study has potential implications for higher education institutions interested in cultivating programs that attract, support, and retain students of color through various stages of the geoscience education pipeline.

This article presents findings from an exploratory study of whether and how gender-based patterns were present in faculty members' departmental networks. A network analysis approach was used to identify if women and men had ties to their departmental colleagues in similar patterns and for similar purposes. Findings from the analysis of network survey and interview data with 19 faculty members in two academic departments suggest that some participants held gendered expectations of collegial support and that perceptions of gender roles may have influenced departmental work and relationships. Gender was salient for women in ways that did not shape the experiences of men in the same departments. There was a tendency for participants to connect to colleagues who were women for teaching-related purposes more than for research purposes or other reasons. Faculty members' relationships with their colleagues may be shaped by their own gender-based assumptions and behaviors as well as those of their colleagues. These differences across gender led to different networks of relationships for various functions of colleagueship, which participants used to obtain different resources that were important for their career success.

This research explores faculty development through the lens of academic division as an important, career defining characteristic of the professoriate. Relying on data from a longitudinal, mixed-methods study, the authors examined faculty development trends and needed supports in a consortium of 13 liberal arts colleges (LACs). As part of this research, the authors feature the Alignment Framework for Faculty Development in Liberal Arts Colleges to help administrators, faculty developers, and faculty members situate faculty development efforts at the intersection of institutional goals and priorities and individual needs. Implications for research and practice are offered.

We conducted a content-analysis of the websites of 100 institutional members of the Council of Undergraduate Research in order to examine the relationship between messages communicated on websites as compared to messages expressed within institutional procedures and policies. Findings show that public research institutions were more likely than baccalaureate institutions to have an Office of Undergraduate Research. Further incentives and supports provided by such offices are predominantly directed to students. Lastly, our analysis of promotion and tenure policies reveals that only 14 institutions out of the 100 in our sample explicitly mentioned mentoring undergraduate researchers in the evaluation criteria for faculty members. We offer implications for research and practice.

The overarching purpose of this monograph is to move the mentoring conversation forward by offering an updated synthesis of the undergraduate mentoring scholarship published between 2008 and 2015. The compendium of research reviewed provides practitioners and researchers with an evidence-based view of the influence of mentoring on the academic and social integration of undergraduate students. The authors sought to address four specific goals: (1) Identify and understand how empirical knowledge and theory have advanced since the last comprehensive review; (2) Identify and provide clarity about the characteristics that serve to meaningfully distinguish mentoring relationships and programmatic efforts; (3) Integrate theory and research in a way that could provide tentative hypotheses regarding the relationship between the various characteristics and outcomes of mentoring; and (4) Offer evidence-based practices for the administration of formal mentoring programs. Contents of this monograph include: (1) Executive Summary; (2) Foreword; (3) Introduction; (4) Synthesis of Recent Empirical Findings; (5) Contextualizing Mentoring Relationships; (6) Established and Emerging Mentoring Frameworks; and (7) Conclusions and Recommendations. Name and subject indexes are included.

Academic mobility is an increasingly crucial topic to the current and future dynamics of doctoral study and the professoriate. Much of the research has focused on US, UK and European contexts. This research explores academic mobility and the manifold issues that arise between the jurisdictions of Canada and the US, in ways that parallel and diversify previous research based on various understandings of mobility. The qualitative perspective is grounded in a reflective narrative approach that enables exploration of powerful themes. The findings indicate that there are costs, tensions and benefits to academic mobility that serve to emphasise specific personal and professional elements to the pursuit of academic life that need explicit articulation. These findings encourage additional scholarly and practical attention to the changing nature of doctoral study and of academic work and life across jurisdictions.

This article focuses on the challenges faced by faculty members in a consortium of 13 Liberal Arts Colleges (LACs). We present findings, by academic rank, from a mixed-methods study of faculty development needs and experiences within the consortium. Relying on human resource principles, we advocate a greater focus on the development of the person, rather than task-specific skill improvement, as a means of creating faculty development programming that is particularly tailored to the rank-based needs of faculty members. We offer recommendations to achieve this focus amidst the unique faculty development challenges and opportunities available at LACs.

Using an alignment framework, the authors explore faculty development initiatives in liberal arts colleges in order to understand the connection between organizational priorities and processes as connected to faculty members' stated needs. The study draws on mixed-methods data from The Initiative for Faculty Development in Liberal Arts Colleges (IFDLAC), including survey and interview data from the 13 member institutions of the Great Lakes Colleges Association (GLCA).The authors offer future implications for faculty development practice.

In this article, we consider the role of departmental contexts and relationships in faculty work within liberal arts colleges. Knowledge about how departmental networks relate to success and satisfaction may inform the work of those who support faculty work in liberal arts colleges, as well as other institution types. Analysis of quantitative and qualitative survey data from faculty members at 13 liberal arts colleges in the US suggests that informal departmental relationships influence faculty experiences. Findings suggest that departmental leaders and colleagues are sources of professional development and support, but that counter-productive behaviours interfere with such support and foster negative workplace cultures.

This paper explores fit as an important theoretical construct in the study of doctoral education and doctoral student development. We discuss how research based on three types of fit (person-environment fit, person-culture fit, person-vocation fit) may provide critical insights into the doctoral student experience, and offer a framework based on antecedents and outcomes to support future research. We conclude with an application of this framework to two understudied populations of doctoral students and future research directions.

In this study, we sought to contribute to research about the high-impact practice of undergraduate research from the understudied faculty perspective. We relied on focus group data from faculty members (N = 41) across five institutions to better understand the supporting and inhibiting factors that contribute to faculty members' engagement in mentoring undergraduate research. We offer implications for research and practice.

For students who view themselves as different from the majority and those in positions of influence, doctoral education may present challenges beyond the typical pressures and stresses of the graduate student experience. In this article, we report findings from a qualitative study of otherness as described by 31 full-time doctoral students in two academic departments within one university. We explore identity-based otherness and its related outcomes for students and the academy. Findings from our analysis of interview data indicate that doctoral students experience otherness across a diverse range of characteristics related to professional, relational, and personal components of their identities. Findings also indicate that experiences of otherness may prevent students from viewing themselves as accepted and supported members of departmental, disciplinary, and professional communities. We conclude with implications for research and practice.

This article describes the evolution of a faculty scholarship symposium within the school of education at a regional comprehensive university. The article outlines the initial structure and goals of the symposium as well as the development of the model over time. The influence of leadership, culture, and individual goals and backgrounds are explored through a discussion of opportunities and challenges embedded in the initiative. The aim of the article is to provide administrators and faculty members with an understanding of one approach to cultivating scholarly motivation and productivity among faculty members in similar disciplinary and institutional contexts.

This article relies on data from surveys and interviews to explore the networking behaviors and strategies of early-career faculty members within the contexts of their academic departments. Findings suggest that faculty members' approaches to interactions and relationships with colleagues may be conceptualized according to a continuum of behavior, based on their political awareness of interactions and their strategic engagement in them, interactions as a means of impression management, the cultivation of relationships for symbolic inclusion in networks, and the presence of functional patterns in network. The article concludes with recommendations for future research.

A growing body of research demonstrates that many college environments present challenges for black professors, particularly as they face institutional and personal racism. While scholars have linked these experiences to their attrition, this qualitative study explores black professors' larger range of responses to difficult professional environments. Twenty-eight black professors employed at two large public research universities participated in this study. Findings indicate that in addition to institutional departure, black faculty respond to personal and institutional racism though a form of psychological departure and acts of critical agency, specifically forming external networks, aiming to disprove stereotypes and engaging in service activities. Thus, institutions must be mindful of the full range of responses to the racism that black professors face, not assuming the climate is hospitable simply because faculty are not leaving the institution. Rather, campuses must improve their campus environments through ongoing strategic initiatives focused on cultural change. (Contains 2 tables.)

Little research and practice has focused specifically on Stage 2 of the doctoral student experience--the critical transition from "dependence to independence". In the United States, a student completes coursework, passes candidacy exams, and begins the dissertation proposal process during Stage 2. Given the distinct experiences associated with this stage, it is important for researchers, faculty and administrators to understand each stage fully. Our goal is to shed light on how students begin to enact the academic career during this critical transition by specifically exploring the role of relationships in the identity development process. We rely on a theoretical framework that brings together sociocultural perspectives of learning and developmental networks to reveal a connection between relationships and learning. This study highlights the effects of relationships and interactions on particular strategies and experiences associated with Stage 2 of doctoral education, and therefore students' identity development and transition to independence.

This article describes a mixed-methods approach to integrating the methodological tools of social network analysis and qualitative research to explore intersectionality as it pertains to faculty experiences in institutional contexts. These research strategies, employed at the individual and aggregate levels, can be useful tools as institutions aim to promote better individual and institutional outcomes of faculty members' experiences within the local context of the academic department. Studies exploring faculty interactions and relationships at the individual level would enhance understanding of how professors' identities shape their experiences, and the consequences of identity for the formation of social networks and relationships. (Contains 1 figure and 3 tables.)

This article investigates how informal positions of power emerge within a community of practice and how positions of power influence communication and understanding about key issues. Findings from a study of one community of practice reveal Janusian leadership within the group and the effects of emergent, informal power roles on group goals, adding to theoretical knowledge about small groups, academic peer groups, and communities of practice.

Studies of doctoral education have included an interest not only in processes, structures, and outcomes, but also in students' experiences. There are often useful recommendations for practice within individual examinations of the doctoral experience, yet there remains a need to strengthen the application of lessons from research to the behaviors of students and others engaged in the doctoral process. This paper is the first to synthesize research about doctoral education with the particular aim of informing practical strategies for multiple stakeholders. In this article, we summarize findings from a literature review of the scholarship about doctoral education from the past 15 years in a stage-based overview of the challenges of doctoral education. Our aim is to apply theory to practice through the systematic consideration of how research about doctoral education can best inform students and those who support them in the doctoral journey. We first present an overview of the major stages of doctoral education and related challenges identified in the research. We then consider key findings of that research to offer recommendations for doctoral students, faculty members, and administrators within and across stages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose -- The aim of this conceptual paper is to explore Mentor-protégé fit as important to the selection and development of successful doctoral student-faculty mentoring relationships. We suggest that the student-faculty relationship in doctoral education is an additional and previously untested type of Mentor-protégé fit. Design/methodology/approach -- Generated from an existing framework of identity in the academy, we explore how three types of identity (professional, relational, personal) may influence students' fit assessments as they seek to initiate and develop relationships. Findings -- We offer propositions for research to further explore the potential application of the proposed framework to knowledge generation about the doctoral student experience. Originality/value -- While the research about doctoral education has considered all three aspects of students' identities individually, it has not explicated the ways in which these intersecting identities relate to students' needs and expectations related to mentoring, their choices related to mentor selection, or the effectiveness and outcomes of mentoring relationships in fostering success and satisfaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As part of a longitudinal study, we examined Stage 3 of the doctoral student experience by further testing and refining the notion of a parallel process of identity development as student and scholar in doctoral education. We relied on a framework that integrates developmental networks and sociocultural learning to explore the types of learning and interactions students engage in to persist through Stage 3. Our results indicate that this identity development process is prompted by two program milestones in Stage 3: the dissertation and the search for employment. In comparing the experiences of students who pursued faculty appointments with those who pursued administrative careers, we found similarities and differences. We discuss these results and offer future directions of research and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]