Toward an Inclusive Faculty Community

Abstract

Today nearly three quarters of all college professors work off of the tenure-track, and thus exist in a university structure that was not constructed with them in mind, does not take them seriously, and, ultimately, offers them little more than the most tenuous and temporary of connections. This is hardly the model of a Christian community that the Catholic university aspires to be. Thus, this paper first seeks to unpack the historical legacy of the past four decades of contingent faculty growth, and then, offers a response by drawing upon Catholic Social Teaching and Christian scripture to inform a new model of faculty community that is inclusive and just to all faculty members.