Experiences, Challenges, and Prospects Among Tenure-Track Latina Faculty in Academia

• In Event: Roundtable: Experiences, Challenges, and Prospects Among Tenure-Track Latina/o Faculty in Navigating Academia

Abstract

Despite making dramatic strides in earning higher education degrees, only four percent of tenured or tenure-track female faculty members in the United States are Latina and only three percent of female full professors are Latina. As the minority and sometimes the only Latina faculty member at their institution, Latinas face unique challenges in developing an identity for themselves that stands apart from their ethnicity and sex. While educational institutions continue to make changes to their hiring process in order to increase the number of female and minority applicants, there is little being done in terms of providing faculty members with advice and support after they are hired. In order to improve the retention rates of female and minority faculty members, this paper seeks to explore some of the unique challenges and issues that Latinas face and offer recommendations on practices being considered at some institutions to improve retention rates.

Author

• Janice Anne Iwama, American University