Collaborative Research: HSI Conference: Exploring the Realities of Contingent Latinx Faculty in STEM

With support from the Improving Undergraduate STEM Education: Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI Program), this HSI Conference project aims to more deeply explore across Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSI), the realities of contingent (part-time, contract-bound, or non-tenure track) Latinx faculty with various research and teaching roles. This collaborative project consists of a two-part conference focusing on the experiences of Latinx faculty in STEM, one part for faculty members themselves, and one for their administrators.

This work will explore the working realities of contingent faculty who represent over 46% of the employed faculty in higher education systems. In particular, we will seek to understand the challenges many contingent faculty, primarily from the Latinx communities, experience in the California State University (CSU) system. CSU schools collectively form one of the largest pools of HSIs in the nation in terms of Latina/o undergraduate enrollment in HSIs.

This work will contribute to a fairly untapped and underexplored area of research to help uncover the hidden barriers that prevent the success and navigation of these individuals in their professions. Although this conference proposal is primarily focused on Latinx contingent faculty in STEM, the anticipated work and results will serve as a baseline for future research as well as policy-informed initiatives to support the success of these faculty, and by extension their students.

The aims of this project are to (1) coalesce both HSI, Latinx contingent STEM faculty, and administrators to examine the hidden realities of Latinx contingent faculty in STEM; (2) to qualitatively analyze the conference discussions using STEM education research methods and evaluate and analyze conference outcomes from a policy perspective (led by RAND Corporation) to co-generate a policy brief to share with STEM deans and HSI administrators; and (3) develop an infographic summary to disseminate results to organizations and stakeholders with an interest in issues of Latinx contingent faculty in STEM and policy reform. The research methods will be purely exploratory and qualitative in nature using case study research approaches.

Qualitative data will be analyzed through thematic and emerging coding techniques and be used toward the development of a codebook and dissemination products that inform the dissemination products (e.g., policy brief). With the support of RAND Corporation, a policy think tank, we will not only disseminate the work through academic journals but reach a wider academic audience of ways to support contingent faculty, which in turn are in the frontlines of supporting undergraduate (and often marginalized) students in STEM.

The HSI Program aims to enhance undergraduate STEM education, broaden participation in STEM, and build capacity at HSIs. Achieving these aims, given the diverse nature and context of the HSIs, requires innovative approaches that incentivize institutional and community transformation and promote fundamental research (i) on engaged student learning, (ii) about what it takes to diversify and increase participation in STEM effectively, and (iii) that improves our understanding of how to build institutional capacity at HSIs.

Projects supported by the HSI Program will also draw from these approaches to generate new knowledge on how to achieve these aims.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.