Of 351 faculty, 281 (80%) were currently tenured and 68 (19%) were tenure-track; two did not answer the question. When analyzed by gender, only 61 (69%) women as compared to 214 (85%) men reported currently having tenure. Additionally, a comparable percentage of STEM faculty (80%) and non-STEM faculty (81%) reported currently having tenure.
Of the 265 faculty who responded to the question of whether they had tenure prior to coming to UIC, 65 (24.5%) reported that they did. Two hundred respondents (75.5%) did not have tenure when hired at UIC. Twenty-seven of the 133 STEM faculty (20.3%) and 37 of the 127 non-STEM faculty (29.1%) reported having tenure prior to coming to UIC. When stratified by gender, 17 of the 57 women (29.8%) and 48 of the 203 men (23.6%) reported having tenure before coming to UIC. There were no statistical differences in the proportion of men and women faculty that were tenured when they joined UIC.
Sixty-two faculty reported that they were either currently going through the tenure process or planning to go through the tenure process. When stratified by gender, there were 26 women and 33 men, and when stratified by discipline there were 33 STEM faculty and 29 non-STEM faculty.
(a) The Tenure Process Scale
We assessed the tenure process by asking a series of six questions pertaining to faculty satisfaction and understanding of the tenure process as it related to the faculty member’s primary department. Faculty rated the degree to which they agreed or disagreed with each item on a scale of 1 (strongly agree) to 6 (strongly disagree). We used factor analysis to create a scale to combine all the items: the Tenure Process Scale. Table 27 presents the items that were included in the scale, the item total correlations, and the overall alpha. All six items were included in the scale with an overall alpha of 0.81 and a mean item total correlation of 0.42.
Overall, faculty reported satisfaction with their ability to understand the process and to receive feedback; however, they were dissatisfied with mentoring, assistance, and reduced workload related to trying to achieve tenure.
We used the ANOVA procedure to test for differences in the mean scale scores by gender and discipline. We did not detect any statistically significant differences. However, it is important to note that the small sample cell sizes (smaller number of women in the sample) may have limited our ability to detect a difference.
Table 27. The Tenure Process Scale
Question Mean SD
Inter-item Correlation
37a. I was satisfied with the tenure/promotion process overall. 2.40 1.60 .60 37b. I understood the criteria for achieving tenure/promotion. 2.03 1.33 .47
37c. I received feedback on my progress toward tenure/promotion. 2.40 1.48 .67 37d. I received reduced teaching or service responsibilities so that I could build my
research program.
4.23 1.86 .57
37e. I was told about assistance available to pre-tenure/promotion faculty (e.g., workshops, mentoring).
3.81 1.94 .60
37f. A senior colleague was very helpful to me as I worked towards tenure/promotion. 3.01 1.90 .55 Reliability Coefficient Alpha = .81.
Table 28. Mean Scores for Tenure Process Scale, by Gender and Discipline, Controlling for Rank
STEM Discipline Non-STEM Discipline Total by Gender Gender Mean SD n Mean SD n Mean SD n
Male (n=149) 2.82 1.17 93 2.81 1.05 56 2.81 1.12 149 Female (n=37) 3.48 1.41 9 2.77 1.11 28 2.94 1.21 37
TOTAL by Discipline (n=186) 2.87 1.20 102 2.80 1.06 84 2.84 1.14 186
No significant differences.
(b) Tenure Clock
Faculty at UIC have the option to roll back the tenure clock. There were three questions related to tenure rollback: whether faculty had ever stopped the clock, whether such a request had ever been denied, and whether they had chosen not to stop the clock even though they wanted to do so.
i. Rolling back the tenure clock.
Of 267 faculty who responded to the question, 35 (13%) reported stopping or rolling back their tenure clock, and 231 (87%) reported not stopping or rolling back their tenure clock. When stratified by gender, 22 of the 69 women (32%) and 13 of the 198 men (7%) reported stopping or rolling back their tenure clock. There was a significant effect of gender (p<.001) and discipline (p<.001). Seven of the 144 STEM faculty (5%) and 28 of the 127 non-STEM faculty (22%) reported stopping or rolling back their tenure clock. This suggests that women and faculty from the non-STEM disciplines were more likely to roll back or stop the tenure clock. However, it must be noted that since the percent of women utilizing the tenure rollback is greater, the discipline difference may be a reflection of the lower percent of women in the STEM disciplines.
ii. Reasons for rolling back the tenure clock.
Of the 35 faculty who stopped the tenure clock or had a tenure rollback, 27 faculty responded to the questions giving the main reasons for doing so. The main reasons given by 12 faculty (44%) were pregnancy, child rearing, and family. An additional 10 faculty members (37%) said they needed to complete publications, dissertations, or fellowships. Other reasons given included the 1999
suspension of all research involving human subjects at UIC, the need to compensate for a large teaching load, change of institution, and being hired without a completed dissertation (ABD).
iii. Consequences of rolling back the tenure clock.
Only 22 faculty responded to the questions on consequences of taking a tenure rollback or stopping the tenure clock. Of these 22 faculty, 13 (59%) said they faced no negative consequences. Three faculty said that it took longer to get tenure as a consequence. One faculty member perceived that a negative tenure decision was partly because of the rollback. Two other faculty members
reported being regarded as inadequate by colleagues and were considered as having received special treatment. Finally, two faculty members reported being allowed to come up for early promotion. Thus, while a majority of respondents reported no untoward consequences from using this policy, a small number felt there were some negative ramifications.
iv. Denial of request to roll back the tenure clock.
Only one of the 35 faculty who reported requesting a tenure rollback or stopping the tenure clock was denied the request to stop the tenure clock.
v. Chose not to roll back the tenure clock despite a desire to do so.
Of 258 faculty who responded to this question, 13 (5%) reported choosing not to stop/roll back the tenure clock even though they might have wanted to, and 245 (95%) reported not wanting to do so. Stratifying by gender showed that of the 13 faculty, 6 were women and 7 were men faculty. However, as a percentage, 6 of 68 women (9%) and 7 of 190 men (4%) reported choosing not to stop/roll back the tenure clock even though they wanted to. When a similar stratification was done by discipline, 6 of 139 STEM faculty (4%) and 7 of 122 non-STEM faculty (6%) reported choosing not to stop/roll back the tenure clock. The cell sizes were too small to run any statistical tests.
Summary
In summary, far more women than men have used tenure rollback, although we observed few differences between men and women faculty on (a) their level of satisfaction with the tenure process, (b) whether they had ever been denied the request, and (c) whether they had chosen not to stop the clock even though they wanted to. It is important to note that the small number of women may have limited our ability to detect any differences.
Other research has suggested that the number of children faculty have and having a spouse who works full-time or part-time are important factors influencing the tenure process. An analysis was run to test whether these factors made a difference in our sample. There were no significant differences, which again may be due to the fact that there were small sample sizes limiting our ability to detect any differences.