The 1998 General Assembly directed the Council of Higher Education to study policies regarding the use of adjunct faculty at Virginia's colleges and universities. The study aimed to examine course loads and benefits and how these issues relate to faculty with joint appointments at several public institutions. Virginia's public higher education…

Essays argue that (1) unions can translate professional concerns into action; (2) unions need to concentrate more on the professional concern of improving education; and (3) only a national teachers union has the membership, staff, and strength to deal effectively with the multitude of concerns facing contemporary education. (MM)

Explores the relationship among teachers' cognitive styles, their preference of leadership styles, and their susceptibility to stress. Data from the self-reports of elementary teachers suggest that nonanalytic teachers prefer principals who stress process rather than task and appear less susceptible to occupational stress than the more analytic…

King's College (Pennsylvania) has redesigned its faculty reward system, mixing intrinsic and extrinsic incentives in three interrelated institutional initiatives related to general educational reform, senior faculty performance appraisal, and merit pay. An early result of the effort is a perceptible improvement in faculty motivation and…

Discusses previous job satisfaction research and reports a study of job satisfaction among Ohio academic library support staff using Paul E. Spector's Job Satisfaction Survey. The 434 responses indicate general satisfaction, with greater satisfaction among females, among those who work in public services, have less experience, or who work…

Three studies involving 79 teacher leaders, 4 school empowerment experts, and 387 secondary school teachers indicate that the 38-item School Participant Empowerment Scale (SPES) may tap 6 dimensions of empowerment within the school organization identified in the literature. The SPES effectively measures perceived empowerment in school settings.…

Discusses problem of socialization to school environment. Explains that the process can have a negative impact on teachers' attitudes toward social studies teaching and can result in noncreative teaching. Recommends methods for retaining the ideals learned in education courses. Suggests doing things in manageable steps, reserving time for…

A model of influences affecting early career teachers' job satisfaction was developed and tested. The path model, tested with 250 Black and 262 White teachers, indicated that influences leading to satisfaction differ across racial groups; and sexual differences should be considered in teacher induction and training. (TJH)

Reviews five dimensions (focus, scope, structure, process, and capacity) of an organizational design used by 20 New York districts planning for site-based management (SBM) implementation. The confusion surrounding devolution of decision making hinders districts' efforts to effect changes in intermediate variables (job satisfaction and staff…

Job burnout is a condition observed in recent years among a wide variety of helping professions. In this study, burnout was described as emotional exhaustion, job dissatisfaction, and the desire to leave the job and/or profession. To examine burnout in the profession of school psychology, a random sample of members (N=139) of the Illinois School…

A study of West Virginia elementary schools examined why similar types of elementary students differ greatly in academic achievement. In the first phase of the study, a comparison of 33 high- and 33 low-achieving elementary schools in West Virginia found that low-achieving schools had 2.5 times more low-income students than high-achieving schools,…

This publication reports on a 1994 forum on integrating research on college and university faculty and presents the commissioned papers and findings of the forum along with references to relevant research on faculty. A description of the forum notes that it addressed the lack of integration in current policy discussions about college and…

This study examined how sustained faculty participation produced substantial increases in external funding for a College of Education while the organizational climate of the college collapsed and faculty morale plummeted. The paper first offers a review of the literature on work motivation that provides a rationale for strategies for increasing…

This study addressed the issue of the changing role of the professoriate at institutions of higher learning. Three survey instruments were developed to measure major issues and trends--for undergraduate education students, for graduate education students, and for College of Education faculty at the University of Idaho--to determine if the issues…

This paper summarizes research on both organizational and individual characteristics positively correlated to teacher stress. Organizational characteristics are time constraints, workload, job demands, role conflict, role ambiguity, income, resources, class size, administrative bureaucracy, autonomy/participation in decision making, collegiality,…