Search for: All records

The route to tenure is often clear and well-defined, while the path to full professor is notoriously described as ambiguous and elusive, which raises questions and uncertainty on how to be promoted. In order to explore institutional concerns expressed by associate professor women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) and social and behavioral sciences (SBS) regarding the pathway to full professor, interviews were conducted with members of the Belayers Network at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs (UCCS). The Belayers Network consists of STEM and SBS associate professor women and is designed to support their promotion to full professor through opportunities to come together for informational, tangible, and emotional resources. An instrumental case study with a pragmatic theoretical lens was employed for this study. Interviews were analyzed inductively and resulted in five themes: (1) Full professor promotion criteria are ambiguous; (2) Teaching and service expectations are too high; (3) Lack of research collaborators inhibits scholarly output; (4) Scarce research-related resources are a persistent struggle; and (5) Mentoring and support are absent. The academy may find it instructive to understand better associate professor women’s institutional concerns about the pathway to full professor and possible ways to offset the obstacles toward achievement. Additionally, pragmatic solutions and implications are offered to mitigate these concerns in the context of UCCS. This research is sponsored by a National Science Foundation ADVANCE Adaptation Award. 

This instrumental case study (Stake, 1995) explores the external factors that influence international science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) postdoctoral scholars in the United States to pursue a career in STEM. Interviews with 20 international STEM postdoctoral scholars were analyzed deductively to shed light on their unique backgrounds and experiences. Three themes emerged: (a) parents were highly encouraging, (b) a love of science was nurtured in school, and (c) they were eager to engage in and promote scientific innovation. These findings illustrate the ways in which family, schools, and community influence the STEM career trajectories of international postdoctoral scholars 

This instrumental case study explores the messages STEM postdoctoral scholar women received and understood from faculty about having children and an academic career. Of concern, women with children are less likely than men with children or individuals without children to be offered tenure-track positions or to be promoted. This reality suggests academic motherhood is in opposition to professional legitimacy in higher education. Furthermore, postdoctoral scholars who are mothers are more likely than their peers to cite children as their primary reason for not entering the faculty job market. Through inductive and deductive methods, interview transcripts of 22 demographically diverse STEM postdoctoral scholar women were analyzed using the ideal worker conceptual framework. Two themes were identified: (1) messages interpreted as disparaging suggest to STEM postdoctoral women they must sacrifice the choice to have children for an academic career and (2) messages interpreted as supportive promote the belief that academic motherhood is achievable. These findings illustrate a systemic conflict for STEM postdoctoral scholar women who have children or are considering becoming mothers in the future. Due to disparaging messages from faculty, most interviewees felt the constraints of ideal worker norms; however, through supportive messages from faculty, particularly positive modeling, these women saw the feasibility of having children and a successful academic career without the necessity of conforming to these norms. Inclusive, family friendly higher education policies and practices must be instituted to ensure more women enter and thrive in the STEM professoriate, and women who have or desire to have children are not marginalized. 

This phenomenological study explores the mentoring needs of 13 Black and Latinx engineering postdoctoral scholars with an adaptation of the ideal mentoring model used as the conceptual framework. A documented four-stage process of phenomenological data analysis was employed to examine the interview data: epoché, horizontalization, imaginative variation, and synthesis. The phenomenon’s essence is Black and Latinx engineering postdoctoral scholars have primary and secondary mentoring needs pertaining to their immediate career acquisition of a position in the professoriate. Primary mentoring needs include expanding their professional networks and support in crafting competitive application packages and coaching on work-life balance. Secondary needs consist of enhancing and promoting their technical skills, as well as acquiring political guidance on matters of race/ethnicity in academia.