Can “collegiality ” be measured?: Further validation of a faculty

The professoriate has been debating the value of adding collegiality as a fourth criterion in faculty evaluations. Collegiality is considered to be any extra-role behavior that represents individuals ’ behavior that is discretionary, not recognized by the formal reward system and that, in the aggregate, promotes the effective functioning of the educational organization. The AAUP recommended against including collegial behaviors in faculty evaluations stating that the inclusion could hinder academic freedom by not allowing for dissent and that the construct of collegiality is amorphous which prevents the creation of an effective tool available to evaluate collegial behavior. Despite this opinion, faculty members continue to be denied tenure because they were cited as lacking civility. Efforts by researchers have been made to address the concern expressed by the AAUP about the amorphous nature of the construct by delineating the indicators associated with collegial behaviors. Initial efforts led to the creation of a list of collegial indicators validated by Research I and Research II professors who provided the basis for a subsequent assessment constructed based on the validated indicators. The current study has extended the validation of the indicators to a sample of Master’s university professors. Results suggested that there was agreement in representativeness of collegiality between university types. These results have further reduced the amorphous nature of the construct and allows for an expanded use of the assessment in faculty evaluations