"This Would Not Count": Do Institutions of Higher Education Support Faculty as Public Intellectuals?

• In Event: Sheraton Roundtable Session Five
  In Roundtable Session: Sense-Making of Organizational Identities and Institutional Agents (Table 6)

Abstract

Institutions support traditional promotion and tenure (P&T) processes through teaching relief, including teaching relief, sabbaticals, and research/travel funds—but what about support of public intellectualism? Answering this question through intensive case study, we interviewed 14 tenure-track and tenured faculty to explore how they describe support from their institution when pursuing public intellectualism. Findings suggest institutions do not reward public intellectualism through P&T, and thus, faculty do not feel supported to produce public scholarship. Additionally, faculty often receive hateful correspondence with the public after producing public scholarship, but institutional support is absent, leaving faculty to defend themselves. Implications for faculty development, institutional P&T reform, and public intellectualism are addressed.

Authors

• M. Yvonne Taylor, University of Texas at Austin
  Presenting Author

• Zach Taylor, University of Southern Mississippi
  Presenting Author

• Joshua Childs, University of Texas at Austin
  Presenting Author