Promotion and Tenure Perceptions of University Aviation Association (UAA) Collegiate Aviation Administrators and Faculty

Abstract

The promotion and tenure process is often viewed as one of the most highly scrutinized and demanding periods in a faculty member’s career. This study reports collegiate aviation administration and faculty perceptions toward promotion and tenure workload components; including, the importance, or value of specific workload components considered during the promotion and tenure process for probationary faculty members. The study made use of an online survey. The online survey instrument was composed of 20 multiple-choice questions with space for additional comments. Two-hundred-twenty professional members of the University Aviation Association (UAA) formed the study population. Eighty-seven responded for a response rate of 39.5%. The results of this quantitative/descriptive research study re-affirm the notion that perceptions of workload items used to determine fitness for promotion and tenure are not uniform throughout collegiate aviation. One perception reported as a constant was the belief that all “three pillars,†scholarship, teaching and service possessed some degree of importance in the promotion and tenure process. A future research study comparing the perceptions of administrators versus that of faculty on the topic of promotion and tenure should be explored.