Demographic and Job Satisfaction Characteristics of Florida Community College Faculty

Abstract

The demographic and job satisfaction characteristics of Florida community college faculty were studied in Florida's 28 community colleges. A total of 1,116 faculty responded in the fall of 1977 to an instrument developed to measure faculty characteristics and attitudes. The results showed that the Florida faculty is a satisfied faculty with over 95% reporting that they were satisfied with community college work as a career and with 72% stating that they plan to stay in the community college field until they retire. Second, it was found that faculty participation in in-service training programs had increased significantly since 1968. In 1977-1978, 69% of the faculty reported participation in one or more inservice programs while the 1968 percentage was 37%.It is concluded that periodic surveys in other community colleges and states similar to this one should provide useful information for the further development and improvement of community colleges.

The Collective Good: Unionization, Perceived Control, and Overall Job Satisfaction Among Community College Faculty

“…Studies conducted specifically with community college faculty consistently report moderate to high levels of satisfaction (Benoit & Smith, 1980;Hutton & Jobe, 1985;Finley, 1990;Diener, 1985) for both full and part-time faculty (Benoit & Smith, 1980;Antony & Valadez, 1998;Bowman, 1995;Flowers, 2005). Only one study (Hill, 1983) indicates lower levels of satisfaction.…”

“…Faculty report increased satisfaction (Ormsby & Ormsby, 1988;Benoit & Smith, 1980;Hill, 1982;Finley, 1990), decreased satisfaction (Borjas, 1979;Ladd & Lipset, 1973), or no significant difference in satisfaction (Ormsby & Watts, 1991). In an attempt to account for these unclear findings, scholars (Herzberg, Mausner, & Snyderman, 1959;Maslow, 1954;Vroom, 1964, Ladd & Lipset, 1973Ormsby & Watts, 1991;Hill, 1982;Hagedorn, 1994Hagedorn, , 1996Hagedorn, , 1998Hagedorn, & 2000Hagedorn & Sax, 1999;Rosser & Townsend, 2006) have sought to identify specific facets of faculty jobs that predict or influence satisfaction; often these researchers have come up with contradictory findings.…”

Community College Faculty Who Conduct Industry Training Activities: A Job Satisfaction Study

“…Chi-square tests of significance were used to measure the association between the following variables: age, education, ethnicity, faculty perceptions, gender, marital status, teaching preparation methods, and work load diversity. The purpose for choosing these variables has to do with the need for further demographical studies (Benoit & Smith, 1980;M. D. Hill, 1983;Kallerberg, 1977) and the need to measure faculty work load activities in job satisfaction studies (Austin & Gamson, 1983;Wendel, 1977).…”

“…The questionnaire used to measure faculty members' job satisfaction was constructed using other job satisfaction studies as guidelines for developing the survey (Benoit & Smith, 1980;Diener, 1985;Filan, Okun, & Witter, 1986;Friedlander, 1978;E. A. Hill, 1986;M.…”

An investigation of the relationship between characteristics of self-actualization and of job satisfaction of selected faculty in higher education

“…The two major areas of satisfaction were the same for both the 1978 and 1968 studies. The enjoyment of teaching and associating with and helping college-aged students were the first and second reasons given for satisfaction by the faculty members (cited in Benoit & Smith, 1980). Bess (1981) found that for most professionals, "intrinsic" satisfactions were the most valued factors in their motivation to work.…”