Integrating Part-Time Faculty into the Academic Community

This article presents seven ideas on how to integrate part-time faculty into the academic community and help them deal with their feelings of isolation and loneliness. The key role of faculty develop-ment program directors is identified as well as specific strategies for working with part-time faculty. These ideas are based upon the author's experience as both a part-time and full-time faculty member, as well as a director of faculty development programs, and upon several surveys conducted among part-time faculty. In the 1980s, the number of part-time faculty at colleges and univer-sities, both public and private, has increased. While full-time faculty increased from 400,000 to 550,000 from 1980 to 1989, part-time faculty increased from 150,000 to 350,000 during that same time period (Polishook & Nielsen, 1990). If this trend continues, before we enter the twenty-first century, part-time faculty will become the ma-jority of instructors at colleges and universities in the United States