CALL FOR PAPERS
"The Academy at Work"
Thought & Action, the NEA Journal of Higher Education
Deadline for submissions: March 1, 2006
A myriad of questions surround the academy as a workplace in the early
years of the 21st Century. Work for almost all Americans has changed for
the worse over the past decades-low-paying service jobs have replaced
good paying manufacturing jobs as the mainstay of the economy; fewer and
fewer employers provide health and pension benefits-and our campuses are
not immune. The traditional full-time, tenured professorship as an
employment category has been in steep decline for decades, while lower
paying academic staff positions and the campus contingent workforce
grow. Full-time, tenure-line faculty members now represent only
one-third of the academic workforce. Pay for full-time faculty and staff
is stagnant, while pay for contingent educators is woefully inadequate.
Employer-paid pensions and health insurance are under attack everywhere,
and accountability measures proposed by many legislatures are little
more than transparent attempts to weaken the autonomy professors have
traditionally had in their work. But issues of pay, benefits, and job
security-the traditional purvey of higher education unions-while
crucially important to the quality of life of those who work in higher
education are only part of the picture.
Equally important are questions involving academic work itself. How we
teach and whom we teach can no longer be taken for granted. Legislators,
pundits, and the media question the effectiveness of college teaching in
general. Forces outside the academy propose performance standards for
the college classroom. Within the academy itself, proponents of new
approaches to teaching question the efficacy of traditional teaching
strategies. Politicians and college administrators increasingly
challenge the tradition of faculty control of the curriculum.
Are we losing control? For the 2006 Thought & Action we are looking for
manuscripts to address issues of academic work, in the belief that
higher education faculty and staff should define the academy, rather
than to allow new definitions to be imposed from outside.
Authors should send submissions to the address below. Guidelines are
available at www.nea.org/ .
For more information contact:
Con Lehane, Editor Phone:
202-822-7214
NEA Higher Education Publications Fax:
202-822-7206
1201 16th Street NW E-mail:
clehane@nea.org
<st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Washington</st1:city> <st1:state w:st="on">D.C.</st1:state></st1:place> 20036-3290
_________________________________________________________
Truphena M. Choti
Graduate Assistant, Higher Education Publications
National Education Association
<st1:street w:st="on"><st1:address w:st="on">1201 16th Street, N.W.</st1:address></st1:street>
<st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Washington</st1:city>, <st1:state w:st="on">DC</st1:state> <st1:postalcode w:st="on">20036</st1:postalcode></st1:place>
tel: 202.822.7280
fax: 202.822.7206
e-mail: pubint3@nea.org