Statement of Principles on Family Responsibilities and Academic Work

The statement that follows was approved in May 2001 by the Association’s Committee on the Status of Women in the Academic Profession and its Subcommittee on Academic Work and Family. In June 2001 the Association’s Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure endorsed the substance of this statement. The committee noted that the statement is a departure from the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure, but one that provides an important relief for probationary faculty in their child-rearing years. In November 2001 the AAUP Council adopted this statement as Association policy. Statistical information in the report was updated in 2014.AAUP Council adopted this statement as Association Policy.

In 1974 the Association issued a statement, Leaves of Absence for Child- Bearing, Child- Rearing, and Family Emergencies,¹ which presciently called for

[a]n institution’s policies on faculty appointments [to be] sufficiently flexible to permit faculty members to combine family and career responsibilities in the manner best suited to them as professionals and parents. This flexibility requires the availability of such alternatives as longer- term leaves of absence, temporary reductions in workload with no loss of professional status, and retention of full-time affiliation throughout the child- bearing and child- rearing years.

Since 1974 there have been significant demographic and legal changes affecting the academic profession. Notably, the percentage of women faculty has increased: in 1975 women made up 22.5 percent of full-time faculty, while in 2000– 01, women constituted 36 percent of full-time faculty, according to the AAUP’s Annual Report on the Economic Status of the Profession, known as the “compensation survey,” which is published in the March–April issue of the Association’s journal, Academe.²  Many of the policies promoted in the AAUP’s 1974 statement are now federal law, such as the Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978, which prohibits discrimination based on pregnancy, and the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993, which provides for up to twelve weeks of unpaid leave a year for employees (women and men) to care for a newborn or a newly adopted child; to care for a parent, spouse, or child with a serious health condition; or to deal with the employee’s own serious health condition. Accordingly, the Committee on the Status of Women in the Academic Profession revisited the 1974 statement to address some of the current issues facing faculty members as they seek to integrate their family obligations and their work responsibilities in today’s academic community.

Although increasing numbers of women have entered academia, their academic status has been slow to improve.³ Women remain disproportionately represented within instructor, lecturer, and unranked positions: more than 57 percent of those holding such positions are women, according to the AAUP’s annual compensation survey. In contrast, among full professors, only 26 percent are women, and 74 percent are men. Women remain significantly underrepresented at research institutions; this is in stark contrast to their significant representation at community colleges. The proportion of full- time women faculty at two- year institutions increased from 38 percent in 1987 to approximately 50 percent in 1998. At the same time, among full professors at doctoral institutions, the proportion of faculty members who are women is only 19 percent. A salary advantage held by male faculty members over female faculty members exists at all ranks and institutional types. The salary gap is largest at the rank of full professor where, for all institutional types combined, women are paid, on average, only 88 percent of what their male colleagues are paid.⁴ Most important, the percentage of women who hold tenured positions remains low. The 2000– 01 AAUP compensation survey reported that among full- time faculty women, only 48 percent are tenured, whereas 68 percent of full-time men are tenured.

The conflict between work and family obligations that many faculty members experience is more acute for women faculty than for men. Giving birth and raising children are distinctive events. Only women give birth, and it is an event that interrupts the career of a higher percentage of professors than any other “physical disability” or family obligation. Eighty-seven percent of women become parents during their working lives.⁵ Pregnancy, childbirth, and child rearing are also age-related, and most commonly occur during the same years that college faculty are seeking tenure in their jobs. In 1995 the average PhD recipient was thirty- four years old.⁶ Although many men take substantial responsibility for the care of children, the reality is that women still assume more responsibility for child rearing than do men:

Raising a child takes 20 years, not one semester. American women, who still do the vast majority of child care, will not achieve equality in academia so long as the ideal academic is defined as someone who takes no time off for child-rearing. With teaching, research, committee assignments, and other responsibilities, pre-tenure academics commonly work many hours of overtime. Defining job requirements in this way tends to eliminate virtually all mothers, so it is not surprising the percentage of tenured women in U.S. colleges and universities has climbed so slowly.⁷ 

Thus, the development and implementation of institutional policies that enable the healthy integration of work responsibilities with family life in academe require renewed attention.

The Association suggests that the following principles and guidelines be used to construct appropriate policies and practices regarding family leaves, modified teaching schedules, “stopping the tenure clock,” and institutional assistance for family responsibilities. The policies fall into two categories: (1) general policies addressing family responsibilities, including family-care leaves and institutional support for child and elder care; and (2) more specific policies, such as stopping the tenure clock, that specifically relate to pretenure faculty members who are primary or coequal caregivers for newborn or newly adopted children, responding to the special and age-related difficulty of becoming a parent during the pretenure years.

Transforming the academic workplace into one that supports family life requires substantial changes in policy and, more significantly, changes in academic culture. These changes require a thorough commitment from the leaders of educational institutions as well as from the faculty.⁸ No template of policies fits every institution, but it is essential that the priorities, workloads, rewards structure, and values of the academy permit and support an integration of family and work. Without such support, the commitment to gender equity, for both women and men, will be seriously compromised.

Because of the unique characteristics of academic life, particularly the flexibility of schedules, tremendous potential exists for achieving a healthy work-family integration. At the same time, academic culture poses a special challenge. The lack of a clear boundary in academic lives between work and family has, at least historically, meant that work has been all pervasive, often to the detriment of family. As Lotte Bailyn of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology accurately observed:

The academic career . . . is paradoxical. Despite its advantages of independence and flexibility, it is psychologically difficult. The lack of ability to limit work, the tendency to compare oneself primarily to the exceptional giants in one’s field, and the high incidence of overload make it particularly difficult for academics to find a satisfactory integration of work with private life. . . . It is the unbounded nature of the academic career that is the heart of the problem. Time is critical for professors, because there is not enough of it to do all the things their job requires: teaching, research, and institutional and professional service. It is therefore impossible for faculty to protect other aspects of their lives.9 

As educational institutions seek to support faculty members in integrating work responsibilities and family life, they should recognize that families are varied and that they change in structure and needs over time. Therefore, institutions should adopt policies that contemplate, for example, the existence of blended families created by divorce and remarriage, and policies that include domestic partners, adopted and foster children, and other household members who live in a family group. Administrators and faculty members should be alert to the many forms that discrimination may take against those with a variety of family responsibilities throughout their careers.

Family-Care and Disability Leaves

Federal and state laws provide for a variety of paid and unpaid leaves for family responsibilities. These legal requirements establish minimum benefits only. The Association encourages institutions to offer significantly greater support for faculty members and other academic professionals with family responsibilities.

Pregnancy Disability Leave
Under the federal Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978, which is part of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, universities as employers must provide the same disability benefits for pregnancy and childbirth as they provide for any other physical disability. If professors are entitled to paid disability leaves under institutional benefit programs, then women professors are entitled to paid pregnancy leaves. Physicians routinely certify six to eight weeks as the physical disability period for a normal pregnancy and birth. Some states, local governments, and, where applicable, collective bargaining agreements, go beyond federal law and require pregnancy disability leaves regardless of the availability of other disability leaves. The AAUP recommends that all educational institutions offer paid disability leaves for pregnancy.

Family Care Leave
The federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) requires employers with fifty or more employees to provide unpaid leave to both women and men for care of newborn or newly adopted infants, or for the care of children, spouses, or parents with serious health conditions. Employees can take up to twelve weeks of FMLA leave within a twelve-month period.

Although the FMLA is an important first step, it is inadequate, because it does not require that such family-care leave be paid, and it fails to provide for leave to care for same-sex or other domestic partners, and other ill family members who are not spouses or parents. In addition, the twelve- week annual time limit may, in certain circumstances, be inadequate. (Some states, local governments, and collective bargaining agreements provide more generous family leave.) The Association encourages both public and private educational institutions to go beyond the minimum coverage prescribed by the FMLA and provide also some form of paid family-care leave. (There are a number of ways institutions may finance the cost of family leave. For example, some institutions provide faculty members with the option of using their paid annual or sick leave concurrently with their unpaid leave.)

Emergency Care and Other Short-Term Leave
Family emergencies can be disruptive professionally as well as personally. Nevertheless, they can be accommodated based on familiar models of sick leave. Options include extending sick leave to include leave to care for an ill family member in cases of short- term illnesses not covered by the federal FMLA or other laws. Other alternatives include allowing use of short-term emergency leaves for contingencies connected to unusually adverse weather conditions or other emergency situations, such as the unavailability of usual child- or elder-care services.

Longer-Term Leave for Child Rearing or Other Family Responsibilities
Institutions frequently grant extended unpaid leaves of absence to faculty members for a variety of purposes.¹⁰ Rearing children should be recognized as one appropriate ground for a leave of absence, and such leaves should be available to both men and women on the same terms and conditions as other unpaid leaves of absence. Other family responsibilities, such as caring for an ailing family member, should also be considered a legitimate reason for allowing unpaid leaves of absence.

The timing and duration of such leaves should be determined by mutual agreement between the faculty member and the administration. Faculty members on family leaves should receive consideration with respect to salary increments, insurance coverage, retirement annuities, and the like, comparable to the benefits available to faculty members on other types of unpaid leaves, such as those for public or private service outside the institution. Individual and administrative obligations connected with such leaves, including the timing of a tenure decision, should be those set forth in the applicable provisions of the AAUP’s Statement of Principles on Leaves of Absence (1972).¹¹ 

In accommodating the family needs of faculty members, whether through paid or unpaid leaves of absence of short or long duration, institutions should be careful in assigning the duties of the faculty member on leave. To avoid creating resentment among faculty members toward the professor on leave, disproportionate burdens should not be placed on other faculty members.

Active Service with Modified Duties

Many institutions of higher education have responded to the need for faculty to take care of newborn or newly adopted children by creating modified duty policies to allow faculty to obtain relief from some teaching or service obligations while remaining in active-service status. Active-service status allows faculty members to continue research or other obligations and receive full pay. For example, the University of California system’s “active service–modified duties” policy allows faculty partial or full relief from teaching for one quarter (or semester) if the faculty member has “substantial responsibility” for care of a newborn or newly adopted child under the age of five. This period of modified duties is not considered a leave, and the faculty member receives full pay.¹² Other universities allow faculty to reduce semester- or year- long teaching loads for child- care purposes with proportional reductions in pay.13 

In 1974 the AAUP recommended in Leaves of Absence for Child- Bearing, Child- Rearing, and Family Emergencies that “[t]he alternative of temporarily reduced workload should be available to faculty members with child- rearing responsibilities.” Subsequently, in 1987 the AAUP recognized in Senior Appointments with Reduced Loads14 the importance of “policies and practices that open senior academic appointments to persons with reduced loads and salaries without loss of status.” The statement acknowledged that such “[m]odified appointments would help meet the special needs of individual faculty members, especially those with child- rearing and other personal responsibilities.” The AAUP now recommends that the possibility of appointments with reduced loads be extended to all full- time faculty members, irrespective of their tenure status. The AAUP encourages institutions to explore the possibility of adopting policies providing for short-term periods of modified duties at full pay for family responsibilities.

The Tenure Clock

The resolution of pre-tenure family-work conflicts is critical to ensuring that academic opportunities are truly equitable. Such conflicts often occur just when the research and publication demands of the tenure process are most onerous, and when many faculty members have responsibilities for infants and young children. Institutions should adopt policies that do not create conflicts between having children and establishing an optimal research record on the basis of which the tenure decision is to be made.

Tenure remains a fundamental requirement for protecting academic freedom. The administration and the faculty of an institution must determine the specific academic standards governing the tenure decision at their institution. Academic standards, however, can and, in this instance, should be distinguished from the amount of time in which an institution’s academic standards can be met.¹⁵ Specifically, institutions should allow flexibility in the time period for achieving tenure to enable faculty members to care for newborn or newly adopted children.

A probationary period of seven or fewer years allows faculty members to establish their record for tenure. Historically, this probationary period was based on the assumption that the scholar was male and that his work would not be interrupted by domestic responsibilities, such as raising children. When the tenure system was created, the male model was presumed to be universal.¹⁶ It was assumed that untenured faculty— whether men or women— were not the sole, primary, or even coequal caretakers of newborn or newly adopted children.17 An inflexible time factor should not be used to preclude women or men who choose to care for children from pursuing tenure within a reasonable period of years. One study found that 80 percent of “leadership campuses” enable faculty members to exclude a certain amount of probationary time for specific reasons, such as the birth or adoption of a child.¹⁸ 

The 1974 AAUP statement Leaves of Absence for Child- Bearing, Child- Rearing, and Family Emergencies provided for “stopping the tenure clock” for purposes of child bearing or rearing when a professor takes a full or partial leave of absence, paid or unpaid. The AAUP now recommends that, upon request, a faculty member be entitled to stop the clock or extend the probationary period, with or without taking a full or partial leave of absence, if the faculty member (whether male or female) is a primary or coequal caregiver of newborn or newly adopted children.19 Thus, faculty members would be entitled to stop the tenure clock while continuing to perform faculty duties at full salary. The AAUP recommends that institutions allow the tenure clock to be stopped for up to one year for each child, and further recommends that faculty be allowed to stop the clock only twice, resulting in no more than two one- year extensions of the probationary period.²⁰ These extensions would be available whether or not the faculty member was on leave.

In extending the probationary period in recognition of the time required for faculty members to care for newborn or newly adopted children, institutional policies should clearly provide that the tenure candidate be reviewed under the same academic standards as a candidate who has not extended the probationary period.²¹ Institutions should guard against imposing greater demands on a faculty tenure candidate as a consequence of his or her having extended the absolute time from the year of appointment to the year of tenure review.²²  To ensure that any modification of the probationary time limits does not create or perpetuate historic gender discrimination, administrations should monitor tenure decisions to ensure that different standards are not imposed in practice through the application of policies that appear neutral. Institutions should also take care to see that faculty members are not penalized in any way for requesting and receiving extensions of the probationary period.

When a faculty member requests and receives an extension of the probationary period, the appropriate university official should clearly inform the faculty member, in writing, that existing academic standards will govern the future tenure decision. Administrators and faculty members are encouraged to disseminate the stop- the- tenure- clock policy widely, and to monitor the policy’s use by both women and men.

The stopping of the tenure clock should be in the form of a clear entitlement under institutional policies, rather than in the form of an individually negotiated agreement or informal practice. Written employment policies designed to support the raising of children should not create a separate “track” that may stigmatize faculty members. Studies of junior tenure-track faculty indicate that the pressures result not only from time demands created by conflicting responsibilities, but also from uncertain or conflicting expectations on the part of senior faculty concerning the standards for tenure. On some campuses, an implicit model of total dedication still exists, requiring faculty members to demonstrate that work is one’s primary, even sole, commitment. Such expectations must be clarified and modified to recognize the realities of the lives of faculty members who wish to raise children while pursuing an academic career.23 

Additional Institutional Support

Child Care

Although many institutions recognize the need for child care, fewer offer or subsidize it.²⁴ The AAUP recommends an institutional commitment to the provision of quality child care for the children of faculty and other academic professionals. As with other benefits, recommendations on the extent and form of such institutional support (whether through subsidized on- campus care or through a benefit plan) should be sought from an appropriate body of the faculty in consultation with other groups on campus, such as staff and students.

Child care is an issue for both men and women. The AAUP believes that for faculty members with child-rearing responsibilities to participate successfully in teaching, research, and service to their institution, they must have access to quality child- care facilities. Furthermore, the availability of child care is a crucial issue in recruiting and retaining faculty. Employers in and out of academe have found that the provision of on-site facilities has led to stronger and more contented families and increased productivity.²⁵ Some of the benefits that accrue for faculty parents from child-care arrangements on campus include the ability to be reached easily in an emergency, the time and money saved in transportation, and the opportunity to share an occasional lunch or other daytime activity with their children. Faculty members derive peace of mind from knowing that their children are receiving quality care and that the facility has long- term stability. If the institution has an early childhood education program, the opportunity to use the facility for training students provides an additional benefit and contributes to high standards of child care.

Universities and colleges should assume a share of the responsibility for the provision of child-care services. Some institutions, because of their size or other considerations, may choose not to support on-site child care. Such institutions should explore alternatives, such as cooperative arrangements with other nearby employers, resource and referral services, and financial assistance.

Elder and Other Family Care

Increasingly, faculty members are called upon to care for elderly parents and other family members. This tends to be more characteristic of mid-career or senior faculty than of junior faculty.²⁶ Some faculty members may also be “sandwiched” between responsibilities for children and parents at the same time.

Just as the Association recommends an institutional commitment to providing quality child care, it also strongly recommends an institutional commitment to supporting faculty members in providing quality care to elderly parents or to other family members. Colleges and universities should consider affording financial support to faculty members to cover expenses necessary to allow family members to attend existing centers and programs that provide for elder care or the care of family members with special needs. Institutions should consider providing benefit plans that afford faculty members various options in meeting their family responsibilities.

Flexible Work Policies and Schedules

In addition to formal leave policies, faculty members and academic professionals should have flexibility in scheduling to enable them to respond to family needs as they arise. Flexible work policies allow faculty members to participate in a child’s scheduled school activities or to handle the conflicts between school and academic calendars. Colleges and universities should, to the extent possible, coordinate academic-year calendars with other local educational institutions, or provide child-care support when conflicts occur. ²⁷ 

Both child and other family-care needs of faculty members should be included among the many legitimate considerations in scheduling classes, meetings, and other faculty obligations.28 Likewise, institutional financial support for the expenses of providing substitute care should be considered when faculty members attend professional conferences.

Conclusion

Because institutional policies may be easier to change than institutional cultures, colleges and universities should monitor the actual use of their policies over time to guarantee that every faculty member— regardless of gender— has a genuine opportunity to benefit from policies encouraging the integration of work and family responsibilities. The goal of every institution should be to create an academic community in which all members are treated equitably, families are supported, and family-care concerns are regarded as legitimate and important.

A more responsive climate for integrating work and family responsibilities is essential for women professors to participate on an equal basis with their male colleagues in higher education. Recognizing the need for broader and more inclusive policies represents a historic moment of change. The Association encourages both women and men to take advantage of legal and institutional change so that all faculty members may participate more fully in the care of their children, and may provide the necessary care for parents and other family members.

Notes

1. AAUP Bulletin 60 (June 1974): 164– 65. Back to text

2. In data collected for the 2013– 14 AAUP report, women made up 43 percent of all full-time faculty members (John W. Curtis and Saranna Thornton, “Losing Focus: The Annual Report on the Economic Status of the Profession, 2013– 14,” Academe 100 [March– April 2014]: 35, survey report, Table 12). Back to text

3. Robin Wilson, “Percentage of Part-Timers on College Faculties Holds Steady after Years of Big Gains,” Chronicle of Higher Education, April 23, 2001. According to the 2013– 14 AAUP report, women held exactly 57 percent of full- time instructor, lecturer, and unranked faculty positions. Women were 29 percent of full professors overall, and 24 percent of full professors at doctoral universities. Among the full-time faculty members in associate’s degree (or “two-year”) colleges, 53 percent were women (John W. Curtis and Saranna Thornton, “Losing Focus: The Annual Report on the Economic Status of the Profession, 2013– 14,” Academe 100 [March– April 2014]: 35, survey report, Table 12). Back to text

4. Marcia Bellas, AAUP Faculty Salary and Faculty Distribution Fact Sheet, 2000–2001 (April 2001). Data from the 2013–14 AAUP report show that women full- time faculty members continue to experience a salary disadvantage at all ranks and all types of institutions. The salary gap remains largest at the rank of full professor, with women receiving salaries that are 87 percent of those of men (survey report: 26, Table 5). Tenure rates for both men and women have declined since 2000–2001, but the gender gap remains: 45 percent of women full-time faculty members have tenure, compared with 62 percent of men (survey report: 34, Table 1). Back to text

5. Jane Waldfogel, “The Effect of Children on Women’s Wages,” American Sociological Review 62 (1997): 209. Similarly, 81 percent of men become fathers at some point in their lives. See Nancy E. Dowd, Redefining Fatherhood (New York: New York University Press, 2000), 22. Men, however, do not give birth, and some become fathers at later ages, some even after retirement. Back to text

6. Robert Drago and Joan Williams, “A Half-Time Tenure-Track Proposal,” Change (November– December 2000): 47–48. In 2012, the median age for doctorate recipients was 31.8 years (“Survey of Earned Doctorates, 2012,” National Science Foundation, http:// www. nsf.gov /statistics /srvydoctorates /, Table 27). Back to text

7. Ibid. Back to text

8. Cornell University provides an example of such an institutional commitment: “Cornell University is committed to policies, practices, and programs supportive of the members of its diverse community as they traverse the interlocking worlds of work and family. The University encourages, at all levels, an environment which is supportive of and sensitive to the needs and mutual dependence of the workplace and working families.” Back to text

9. Lotte Bailyn, Breaking the Mold: Women, Men, and Time in the New Corporate World (New York: Free Press, 1993), 51. Back to text

10. This section incorporates portions of the text of the AAUP’s 1974 “Leaves of Absence for Child-Bearing, Child-Rearing, and Family Emergencies.” Back to text

11. AAUP, Policy Documents and Reports, 11th ed. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015), 317–18. Back to text

12. Similarly, the School of Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology provides that the school “will normally offer a one-semester release from teaching and administrative activities at full pay to faculty members who act as the primary caretaker at home for a new child.” The University of Michigan also provides for “modified duties for childbearing,” which

enable a faculty member to recover fully from the effects of pregnancy and childbirth by allowing a pregnant faculty member, on request to her dean, [to] be granted a period of modified duties without a reduction in salary. At a minimum, modified duties means relief from direct teaching responsibilities for the academic term that includes the actual sick leave time the faculty member expects to take in connection with the birth. This policy is available to non-tenured as well as tenured faculty, but is available only in conjunction with pregnancy or childbirth. The tenure clock is not stopped during the period of modified duties unless the faculty member also has an appointment of less than 80 percent during the time she is on modified duties. Back to text

13. For example, the Wayne State University AAUP-AFT collective bargaining agreement (1999b–2002) provides for modified duty assignments at full or partial pay, depending on whether a full or reduced teaching load is arranged. Back to text

14. Policy Statements and Reports, 169. Back to text

15. The AAUP statement “On Crediting Prior Service Elsewhere as Part of the Probationary Period,” ibid., 167–68, recognizes that “in specific cases the interests of all parties may best be served through agreement at the time of initial appointment to allow for more than four years of probationary service at the current institution (but not exceeding seven years), what ever the prior service elsewhere.” Just as adjustments may be made to the probationary clock regarding prior service, so, too, should institutional policies allow for adjustment of the probationary period for the “specific cases” of faculty members who are primary or coequal caregivers to newborn or newly adopted children. Back to text

16. As Susan Kolker Finkel and Steven G. Olswang have noted, the traditional tenure system was based on a model designed for men who were professors with wives at home caring for children. See Finkel and Olswang, “Child Rearing as a Career Impediment to Women Assistant Professors,” Review of Higher Education 19 (1996): 130. Accordingly, few of the early women professors married or had children. See Jessie Bernard, Academic Women (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1964). In 1973 the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education wrote,

Probably the most serious handicap facing married women desirous of a teaching career in higher education, especially in research-oriented universities, is that in the very age range in which men are beginning to achieve a reputation through research and publication, 25 to 35, married women are likely to be bearing and rearing their children.

Opportunities for Women in Higher Education; Their Current Participation, Prospects for the Future, and Recommendations for Actions (New York: McGraw Hill, 1973), 139–40. Back to text

17. Nor did the traditional tenure system take into account the increased likelihood of medical problems associated with delayed childbirth or the age- related obstacles to adoption. See Amy Varner, “The Consequences and Costs of Delaying Attempted Childbirth for Women Faculty” (2000), and Joan Yang, “Adoption Issues for Faculty” (2000).

In 1995 the median age for the completion of a PhD was thirty-four, which places the age of tenure at around forty; thus, “[a]sking women to delay having children until such a late age seems unfair and unkind,and involves health and infertility risks.” Drago and Williams, “A Half-Time Tenure-Track Proposal.”

A recent University of Michigan report found that the university’s “women assistant professors were more likely than men either to have children prior to beginning their academic careers or to delay child bearing and rearing until after they receive tenure or until they are well established in their careers.” University of Michigan Faculty Work-Life Study Report (Ann Arbor: Regents of the University of Michigan, 1999), 18.

In a survey of 124 women assistant professors in 1996, 43 percent viewed time required by children as a serious impediment to tenure; among those with children under age six, the figure rose to 82 percent. Finkel and Olswang, “Child Rearing as a Career Impediment to Women Assistant Professors,” 133. Back to text

18. “Leadership campuses” are defined as the ninety-four campuses that were in the top 25 percent of respondents to a survey on “family-friendly” policies conducted by the College and University Personnel Association (CUPA). The report found that “these policies were put into effect in order to recognize that circumstances beyond the faculty member’s control may hinder the performance of responsibilities such as teaching, research, and service to the school or community.” Dana E. Friedman et al.,The College and University Reference Guide to Work- Family Programs (Washington, DC: CUPA Foundation, 1996), 120. Back to text

19. A growing number of institutions of higher learning already provide policies that extend the pre-tenure clock without requiring the faculty member to be on leave. For example, the University of Michigan faculty handbook provides for automatically stopping the tenure clock upon faculty request for up to one year for child rearing: “The one-year exclusion for pregnancy, childbirth, and related medical conditions is automatic on request, but requests must be made prior to the initiation of the tenure review.” Similarly, the University of California policy provides that “the Chancellor may grant to a faculty member who has substantial responsibility for the care of a newborn child or newly adopted child under the age of five up to one year off the tenure clock for each birth or adoption, provided that all time off the tenure clock totals no more than two years. . . . [T]he campus will accept no requests to stop the tenure clock after the tenure review has begun.” Back to text

20. One survey found that of those higher education institutions that offer “stop-the-tenure-clock” policies, “nine out of ten allow the exclusion of up to two semesters.” See Friedman et al., College and University Reference Guide to Work-Family Programs. The University System of Georgia recently amended its board of regents policies on tenure to “enhance the family-friendly work environment.” In so doing, it adopted a stop-the-tenure-clock policy that provides that “the total time granted for suspension of the tenure clock . . . shall not ordinarily exceed two years.” Back to text

21. Institutions should inform external reviewers that the candidate’s probationary period has been extended under institutional policy and that the candidate’s record should be reviewed as if he or she had only the normal probationary period. Back to text

22. The 1997–2000 Master Agreement between Northern Michigan University and the university’s AAUP chapter provides that “the taking of [family] leave shall not otherwise prejudice future tenure or promotion consideration.” Similarly, Pennsylvania State University’s policy provides that a “staying of the provisional tenure period should not penalize or adversely affect the faculty member in the tenure review.” In addition, the University of Wisconsin policy provides that if “the faculty member has been in probationary status for more than seven years, the faculty member shall be evaluated as if he or she had been in probationary status for seven years, not longer.” Back to text

23. Similar requests should be considered during the pre-tenure period. So, for example, requests by tenure- track candidates to extend the time period for a third-year review, because of the birth or adoption of a newborn child for whom he or she is the primary or coequal caregiver, should be considered and, if granted, clearly documented so that the candidate is reviewed under the proper standard. Back to text

24. This section incorporates the substance and most of the text of the AAUP’s 1989 statement “Faculty Child Care,” Academe 76 (January–February 1990): 54. Back to text

25. In 2001 there were approximately 2,500 campus-based child care centers in the United States, according to the National Coalition for Campus Children’s Centers. Back to text

26. Elder-care responsibilities appear to fall most heavily on tenured professors, especially tenured women faculty. Thirty-seven percent of employees who assume elder-care responsibilities are fifty or older. See James T. Bond, Ellen Galinksy, and Jennifer E. Swanberg, 1997 National Study of the Changing Workforce (New York: Families and Work Institute, 1997). Back to text

According to the National Academy on Aging, 72.5 percent of all informal caregivers are women. See Amy Varner and Robert Drago, “The Changing Face of Care: The Elderly” (2000). Accordingly, career advancement may be jeopardized by such caregiving responsibilities, including the continued advancement of women faculty. See M. M. Robinson, B. L. Yegidis, and J. Funk, Faculty in the Middle: The Effects of Family Caregiving in Universities, Wellesley College Center for Research on Women, Working Paper 296 (Wellesley, 1999). Back to text

27. The University Park campus of Pennsylvania State University and the town of State College, for example, coordinate their spring breaks to enable faculty parents to care for their children during the break. See Final Report to the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation for the Faculty and Families Project, Pennsylvania State University, Work- Family Working Paper #01- 02 (State College, 2001). Back to text

28. A 1996 study found that two-thirds of women and close to one-third of men experienced family difficulties when faculty meetings were scheduled after 5 p.m. on weekdays or during the weekend. See Linda P. Fried et al., “Career Development for Women in Academic Medicine,” Journal of the American Medical Association 276 (September 1996): 898–905. Back to text