[Faculty] CALS Support of Career Track Faculty

[Staten, Michael E - (statenm)]

Everyone,

This evening I'm sharing with you a statement of support for our Career Track faculty that I delivered during the open comment session of today's UA Faculty Senate meeting.   Please see the text below.

I want to echo the last line of the statement:  Career Track faculty are full partners in our efforts toward building a better University of Arizona, and I sincerely hope that you see yourselves that way.  Both Career and Continuing faculty have distinct roles to play, and need each other in building a sustainable model for delivery on our mission.

Many thanks to all of you!

Mike


Statement read by CALS Associate Dean Mike Staten, during UA Faculty Senate Open Session, November 1, 2021

I would like to share with you the following statement on behalf of CALS Leadership, to formally acknowledge and praise our Career Track faculty. As CALS Associate Dean for Instruction and a fellow faculty member, I am very aware of the tremendous impact Career Track faculty have on our students.  They are quite literally shaping the future of Arizona, and enabling thousands of young people to launch successful careers and elevate their lifetime income trajectories.
In CALS, Career Track faculty comprise just over ¼ of all Faculty FTE but deliver the majority of student credit hours taught by the college.  This is by design.  We hire our Career Track faculty for their technical subject matter expertise and for their excellence in the classroom. Many have already established research careers but discovered a passion for teaching along the way. In these Career Track positions we’ve asked them to specialize in teaching and focus their time on developing and delivering new courses.  We’ve placed our trust in their professionalism and competence.  And that trust has been well rewarded, as CALS instruction has flourished in both quantity and quality over the past 6 years.
Given their outsized role in delivering our courses, Career Track faculty also bore the brunt of the pandemic shift to online delivery, and led the way for their tenured and tenure- track colleagues in adopting new instructional technology to convert their courses to Live Online and hybrid delivery.  Many Continuing faculty have told me they are eternally grateful for the coaching they received from their Career Track colleagues over the past 18 months.  If there was ever a question of Career Track faculty being viewed by their tenured colleagues as playing a lesser role in the core mission of CALS, that was thoroughly dispelled by the experience of the pandemic.  Our Career Track faculty are experts at instruction, and we are grateful to have them.
As we emerge from the pandemic, it would be entirely appropriate for the Faculty Senate to recognize the important contribution of Career Track faculty to this university’s mission.  I would especially like to call out the approximately one dozen Career Track faculty from across campus who have been instrumental in the recent General Education Curriculum Refresh. Their expertise, insights, and passions for doing right by our students have been exemplary and deserve special recognition.  Speaking directly now to all Career Track faculty across this campus, I sincerely hope that you see yourselves as full partners in our efforts toward building a better University of Arizona together.
Thank you.


Michael Staten | College of Agriculture and Life Sciences
Bart Cardon Associate Dean for Career and Academic Services
Professor, Agricultural and Resource Economics
The University of Arizona
Forbes Hall, Room 211
The University of Arizona
PO Box 210036
Tucson, AZ 85721-0036
PHONE: 520.621.1932
statenm at email.arizona.edu<mailto:statenm at email.arizona.edu>
www.mikestaten.com<http://www.mikestaten.com>



 <https://mail.catnet.arizona.edu/owa/redir.aspx?C=IhgSDS1aM0-pCxLd45SX6QGVXkA_Y9AICxoYjhJJjkGPbEiiVeur7Ss2XRc_SwTxACxOMDV7S6Y.&URL=https%3a%2f%2fwww.facebook.com%2fCreditWiseCats>   <https://mail.catnet.arizona.edu/owa/redir.aspx?C=IhgSDS1aM0-pCxLd45SX6QGVXkA_Y9AICxoYjhJJjkGPbEiiVeur7Ss2XRc_SwTxACxOMDV7S6Y.&URL=https%3a%2f%2ftwitter.com%2fCreditWiseCats>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://list.cals.arizona.edu/pipermail/faculty/attachments/20211102/342052df/attachment.htm>