Academic personnel, also known as faculty member or member of the faculty (in North American usage) or academics or academic staff (in British, Australia, and New Zealand usage), are vague terms that describe teachers or research staff of a

school A school is an educational institution designed to provide learning spaces and learning environments for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is sometimes co ...

college A college (Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offerin ...

university A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United Stat ...

or research institute. In British and Australian/New Zealand English "faculty" usually refers to a sub-division of a university (usually a group of departments), not to the employees, as it can also do in North America. Universities,

community college A community college is a type of educational institution. The term can have different meanings in different countries: many community colleges have an "open enrollment" for students who have graduated from high school (also known as senior s ...

s and even some secondary and primary schools use the terms ''faculty'' and ''professor.'' Other institutions (e.g., teaching

hospitals A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment with specialized health science and auxiliary healthcare staff and medical equipment. The best-known type of hospital is the general hospital, which typically has an emerge ...

or not-for-profit research institutes) may likewise use the term ''faculty''. The higher education regulatory body of

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area, the List of countries and dependencies by population, second-most populous ...

, University Grants Commission, defines academic staff as

teacher A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching. ''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. whe ...

librarian A librarian is a person who works professionally in a library providing access to information, and sometimes social or technical programming, or instruction on information literacy to users. The role of the librarian has changed much over time ...

s, and

physical education Physical education, often abbreviated to Phys Ed. or P.E., is a subject taught in schools around the world. It is usually taught during primary and secondary education, and encourages psychomotor learning by using a play and movement explorat ...

personnel. University Grants Commission (Minimum Qualifications for Appointment of Teachers and other Academic Staff in Universities and Colleges and other Measures for the Maintenance of Standards in Higher Education) Regulations, 2018
retrieved 06-09-2021. In countries like the Philippines, faculty is used more broadly to refer to teaching staff of either a basic or higher education institution.

Overview

In many universities, the members of the administration (e.g., department chairs, deans, vice presidents, presidents, and

s) are also faculty members; many of them begin (and remain) as professors. At some universities, the distinction between "academic faculty" and "administrative faculty" is made explicit by the former being contracted for nine months per year, meaning that they can devote their time to research (and possibly be absent from the campus) during the summer months, while the latter are contracted for twelve months per year. These two types of faculty members are sometimes known as "nine-month faculty" and "twelve-month faculty". Faculty who are paid a nine-month salary are typically allowed to seek external funds from grant agencies to partially or fully support their research activities during the summer months. Most university faculty members hold a Ph.D. or equivalent highest-level degree in their field. Some professionals or instructors from other institutions who are associated with a particular university (e.g., by teaching some courses or supervising graduate students) but do not hold professorships may be appointed as adjunct faculty. In North America, faculty is a distinct category from

staff Staff may refer to: Pole * Staff, a weapon used in stick-fighting ** Quarterstaff, a European pole weapon * Staff of office, a pole that indicates a position * Staff (railway signalling), a token authorizing a locomotive driver to use a particula ...

, although members of both groups are employees of the institution in question. This is distinct from, for example, the British (and European, Australia, and New Zealand) usage, in which all employees of the institution are staff either on academic or professional (i.e. non-academic) contracts.

References

{{Authority control Academic terminology

Overview

See also

References