Career and Work Patterns

Career and Work Patterns
Faculty prepare for their teaching careers by earning (almost universally) graduate degrees.
Their “career” patterns can be characterized by examining their employment history. “Work”
patterns can be described by what individuals do in their present positions. This section reports
on degrees earned by community college faculty, their career histories, and work patterns and
activities.
Highest Degree Earned.14 In most two-year institutions faculty are expected to hold a master’s
degree or higher in the subject field in which they teach, and this is the case in accounting as
well. Data from NSOPF indicate that the large majority accounting faculty at two-year colleges
held the master’s as their highest degree (Table 14).
As of 2004, 11.2% held the doctorate or first professional degree, just over 70% a master’s
degree, and 18.3% a baccalaureate or less. The proportion holding a master’s degree or higher
increased, while the proportion holding less than a master’s degree decreased. (This compares
to 48.2% of accounting faculty at four-year institutions holding the doctorate or first professional
TABLE 12
Mean Basic Salary (in constant $) from Institution, Accounting Faculty
at Two-Year Institutions, 1993–2004
1993 (Inflated) 2004 Change
Part-time $7,176.32 $8,157.40 +13.6%
Full-time $49,353.78 $53,622.8 +8.6%
TABLE 13
Mean Total Individual Income (in constant $), Accounting Faculty
at Two-Year Institutions, 1993 (inflated)–2004
1993 (Inflated) 2004 Change
Part-time $65,371.61 $53,486.80 -18.2%
Full-time $62,011.74 $70,528.70 +13.7%
14 The NSOPF survey includes the J.D. (or L.L.B.) as a “first professional degree.” The M.B.A. is included among
master’s degrees.
Accounting in Community Colleges: Who Teaches, Who Studies? Leslie
20 American Accounting Association
TABLE 14
Percent of Accounting Faculty in Two-Year Institutions Holding Indicated Highest Degree,
1993–2004
1993 2004
Ph.D. or first professional 9.60% 11.22%
Master’s 60.80% 70.47%
Baccalaureate or less 29.60% 18.31%
TABLE 15
Percentage of Accounting Faculty in Two-Year Institutions with Doctorate
or First Professional Degree by Full- or Part-Time Status
1993 2004
Part-time 8.3% 10.4%
Full-time 12.7% 12.8%
Total 9.7% 11.2%
degree.) Table 15 breaks down the highest degree held by part- and full-time faculty at two-year
institutions. Full-time faculty were slightly more likely to hold a doctorate or first professional
degree, and the higher degrees were slightly more prevalent for both full- and part-time faculty
in two-year institutions in 2004 than in 1993.
Perhaps more importantly, only half of the accounting faculty at two-year institutions report
holding their highest degree in accounting. (Faculty in two-year institutions may have more
incentives to earn advanced degrees in education than in their teaching field; 6.2% of full-time
accounting faculty at two-year institutions report their highest degree in education compared to
1.1% of full-time accounting faculty at four-year institutions.) For both survey years, almost
exactly half (Table 16) reported that their highest degree was in accounting. More (37% versus
32%) earned their highest degrees in another business field in 2004 than in 1993. (Although it is
not traceable, it would seem likely that this reflects an increase in numbers of those holding
MBAs teaching accounting). Commensurately fewer earned degrees in fields other than accounting
or business in 2004 than in 1993.
Table 16A shows that accounting faculty at two-year institutions were less likely to have
earned their highest degree in accounting than faculty at four-year institutions.
Careers. Data on career history are inconsistent between the two NSOPF survey years included
in this comparison, but some inferences are possible. On average, accounting faculty in twoyear
institutions hold their jobs for substantial periods of time. Table 17 shows that full-timers
have typically held their jobs for about 12 years, while part-timers have typically held theirs for
TABLE 16
Field of Highest Degree Earned, Accounting Faculty in Two-Year Institutions, 1993–2004
1993 2004
Accounting 51.3% 50.8%
Other business 31.6% 37.3%
All other fields 17.1% 11.9%
Accounting in Community Colleges: Who Teaches, Who Studies? Leslie
American Accounting Association 21
TABLE 16A
Field of Highest Degree Earned, Accounting Faculty
at Two-Year and Four-Year Institutions, 2004
Two-Year Four-Year
Accounting 50.8% 62.4%
Other business 37.3% 27.5%
All other fields 11.9% 10.1%
about 7 years. (These figures differ very little from those for accounting faculty at four-year
institutions.)
Continuity of Employment. Full-time faculty at two-year institutions show considerable longevity
(stability) in their positions, while part-timers are more likely to have assumed their positions
more recently. Almost 40% of all part-time two-year faculty reported two years or less of
experience in their current positions. (About 49% of part-time accounting faculty at four-year
institutions also report two years or less of experience, but they constitute a far lower proportion
of all faculty teaching accounting. About one-third of all accounting faculty at two-year institutions
may have little teaching experience.) Figure 6 shows the distribution of “years held current
job” for both groups as represented in the data from the 2004 NSOPF.
FIGURE 6
Years in Current Job; Full- and Part-Time Accounting Faculty in Two-Year Institutions, 2004
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
0 to 2
3 to 6
7 to 10
11 to 14
15 to 18
19 to 22
23 to 26
> 26
Years in current job.
Percent of faculty in interval.
Part‐time
Full‐time
TABLE 17
Mean Years in Current Job, Accounting Faculty in Two-Year Institutions, 1993–2004
1993 2004
Part-time 6.62 7.41
Full-time 13.16 12.75
Accounting in Community Colleges: Who Teaches, Who Studies? Leslie
22 American Accounting Association
The majority of part-time accounting faculty in two-year institutions have held previous jobs
in fields other than education. About 58% had worked outside education in 1993, and 76% had
done so in 2004. Fewer than half (34% in 1993 and 44% in 2004) of the full-time faculty had
worked outside education. So, as has often been contended, part-time faculty may bring a broader
and deeper range of practical or clinical experience (in place of advanced degrees) to the classroom.
A similar pattern was observed among accounting faculty at four-year institutions, with
part-timers far more likely to have worked outside education. The difference between backgrounds
of two-year and four-year faculty is important because two-year students are far more
likely to take their courses from part-timers, and may therefore have more exposure to the practical
and clinical aspects of the field (and commensurately less to the more theoretical, researchbased
aspects).
Tenure. Tenure or eligibility for tenure is far less common among two-year faculty than among
those at four-year institutions. Only 22% of accounting faculty at two-year institutions were
tenured or eligible in both 1993 and 2004. Part-timers are almost never eligible for tenure; only
1% reported being eligible (or tenured) in 1993, while 6% were in 2004. Only about half (52% in
2004, down from 65% in 1993) of the full time accounting faculty at two-year institutions were
tenured or eligible in the most recent survey. That compares to about 83% of full-time accounting
faculty at four-year institutions in both 1993 and 2004 surveys. Tables 18 and 19 report the
distribution of tenure among part-time and full-time accounting faculty (respectively) in twoyear
institutions.

CARACTÉRISTIQUES OF ACCOUNTING FACULTY AT TWO-YEAR COLLEGES

II. CARACTÉRISTIQUES OF ACCOUNTING FACULTY
AT TWO-YEAR COLLEGES
Faculty who teach accounting at two-year institutions are mostly part-time, increasingly female,
Caucasian, married with children, hold master’s degrees or less, and are often teaching in
a field in which they have not earned their highest degree. They also tend to be otherwise employed
and have multiple sources of income.
Gender. In 1993, roughly 70% of community college accounting faculty were males (Table 6). By
2004, there were about 1400 fewer male accounting faculty, but about 500 more females. The
proportion of males had dropped to 58%.
Perhaps more interesting, the genders differed in their employment pattern; males were much
more likely to be part-time by 2004. In fact, there were only about half as many full-time male
accounting faculty in 2004 as in 1993. Women, on the other hand, were almost twice as likely to
be full-time in 2004 as in 1993 (Table 7).
Ethnicity. Accounting faculty in two-year institutions were overwhelmingly White, and remained
so between 1993 and 2004 (Table 8). There was an uptick in the percentage of those identifying
themselves as Black, and a decline in those identifying as Hispanic. Whites constituted about
85% of all accounting faculty at two-year institutions in 2004, Blacks constituted 10.6% (more
than double their proportion in 1993), Hispanics declined from 5.3% to 1.0%, and Asian/Pacific
TABLE 7
Part- and Full-Time Status of Community College Accounting Faculty
by Gender, 1993–2004
Percent Percent
Change in Change in
1993 2004 Part-Time 1993 2004 Full-Time
Part-Time Part-Time Faculty Full-Time Full-Time Faculty
Male 3551 2968 –16.4% 1749 932 –46.7%
Female 1594 1459 –8.5% 706 1341 +89.9%
TABLE 6
Gender of Community College Accounting Faculty, 1993–2004
1993 2004 Percent Change
Male 5300 3900 –26.4%
Female 2300 2800 +21.7%
Total 7600 6700 –11.8%
Percent male 69.7% 58.2%
TABLE 8
Race/Ethnicity of Accounting Faculty in Two-Year Institutions (percentages), 1993–2004
Asian/ American Indian/
White Black Hispanic Pacific Islander Alaska Native
1993 85.6% 4.3% 5.3% 3.3% 1.6%
2004 85.2% 10.6% 1.0% 3.2% 0%
Accounting in Community Colleges: Who Teaches, Who Studies? Leslie
16 American Accounting Association
Islanders constituted 3.2%. American Indian/Alaska Natives declined from 1.6% to 0. Accounting
faculty in two-year institutions are distributed roughly in proportion to their ethnic distribution
at four-year institutions.
Age. Figure 2 shows that the age distribution of accounting faculty at two-year institutions shifted
upward, consistent with indicators of aging found in earlier studies in this series.
The shift was particularly apparent among part-time faculty, with a sharp decline in faculty
between the ages of 40 and 50, and a tripling of those over the age of 55, as shown in Figure 3.
The age distribution of full-timers shifted upward, but mainly with respect to the mode
(Figure 4); overall, the mean age of part-timers was three years lower than that of full-timers in
1993, but a year higher in 2004 (Table 9).
The principal finding in this section is aging among male accounting faculty. Nearly 45%
were 55 or older in 2004, while only 16% were 44 or younger. Among females, 17% were 55 or
older, while 43% were 44 or younger. Figure 5 illustrates the disproportionately older distribution
of males and younger distribution of females. About 41% of males report planning to retire
“from all paid employment” within 10 years of the survey. An increasing number of women are
teaching accounting in two-year institutions, not just as part-timers, but increasingly in full-time
TABLE 9
Mean Age of Accounting Faculty in Two-Year Institutions, 1993–2004
Mean Age, 1993 Mean Age, 2004
Part-time 45.53 51.67
Full-time 48.95 50.82
0
500
1000
1500
2000
2500
0 to 30
31 to 35
36 to 40
41 to 45
46 to 50
51 to 55
56 to 60
> 60
Age in years.
Number of faculty in interval
Total, 1993
Total, 2004
FIGURE 2
Age Distribution of Accounting Faculty in Two-Year Institutions, 1993–2004
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American Accounting Association 17
FIGURE 3
Age Distribution of Part-Time Community College Accounting Faculty, 1993–2004
0
200
400
600
800
1000
1200
1400
1600
0 to 30
31 to 35
36 to 40
41 to 45
46 to 50
51 to 55
56 to 60
> 60
Age in years.
Number of faculty in interval
Part‐time, 1993
Part‐time, 2004
FIGURE 4
Age Distribution of Full-Time Accounting Faculty at Two-Year Institutions, 1993–2004
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
0 to 30
31 to 35
36 to 40
41 to 45
46 to 50
51 to 55
56 to 60
> 60
Age in years
Number of faculty in interval
Full‐time, 1993
Full‐time, 2004
positions. There were 22% more women teaching accounting at two-year institutions in 2004
than in 1993, but about 16% fewer women teaching accounting at four-year institutions in 2004
than in 1993.
Accounting in Community Colleges: Who Teaches, Who Studies? Leslie
18 American Accounting Association
Other Employment. Most part-time accounting faculty at two-year institutions have other employment,
as does an apparently declining proportion of full-time faculty. Table 10 shows, however,
that a substantial shift took place between 1993 and 2004. An increased proportion of both
part- and full-time faculty reported that their teaching job was their only job. Consistent with
this trend, many fewer part-timers reported holding other full-time jobs in 2004 than reported
doing so in 1993. Table 11 shows that although over 84% held other full-time jobs in 1993, fewer
than half did so in 2004.
Sources of Income. Accounting faculty at two-year institutions earn substantially less, on the
whole, than do accounting faculty at four-year institutions. In 2004, full-time accounting faculty
TABLE 10
Percentage of Accounting Faculty at Two-Year Institutions Reporting “Other Employment”
than their Teaching Job, 1993–2004
1993 2004
Part-time 88.60% 72.70%
Full-time 34.50% 21.10%
Total 71.10% 55.20%
TABLE 11
Full- or Part-Time Status of Other Jobs Held by Part-Time Accounting Faculty
in Two-Year Institutions, 1993–2004
1993 2004
Other job part-time 15.8% 52.2%
Other job full-time 84.2% 47.8%
FIGURE 5
Age Distribution of Accounting Faculty in Two-Year Institutions by Gender, 2004
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
0 to 30
31 to 34
35 to 39
40 to 44
45 to 49
50 to 54
55 to 59
> 60 Age in years
Percent of respondents in interval
Male
Female
Accounting in Community Colleges: Who Teaches, Who Studies? Leslie
American Accounting Association 19
at two-year institutions averaged $53,622.80 in basic salary from their employing institutions
(Table 12). Full-time accounting faculty at four-year institutions averaged $83,011.20 in the same
year. Part-time accounting faculty at two-year institutions averaged $8,157.40 in basic salary, while
part-timers at four-year institutions averaged $11,973.90. In rough terms then, two-year accounting
faculty make about two-thirds the basic salary made by four-year accounting faculty.
Part- and full time faculty look more alike in income when all sources are included in the
analysis. Table 13 shows that part-timers actually earned slightly more in total income than fulltimers
in 1993, but they had lost considerable ground (measured in constant dollars), both absolutely
(–18%) and relatively to full-timers by 2004. These trends are likely affected by the substantial
drop in percentage of part-time faculty holding other full-time jobs (Table 11), which, for
most, would presumably be their main source of income.