Date of Award
5-1-1990
Document Type
Dissertation - NSU Access Only
Degree Name
Doctor of Education
Department
Center for the Advancement of Education
Abstract
Bauder College is one of the fifty-two proprietary schools owned and operated by National Education Corporation (NEC). The basic philosophy of the corporate owned schools is career education. Each school's purpose, within the NEC chain, is to produce graduates who are highly skilled to pursue their career choice in industry. Two important elements vital to achieve this goal are: hands-on experience, and a faculty that has been selected from industry. Although the faculty at each location consists of highly skilled professionals, few are trained educators. The purpose of this study was to investigate the faculty development programs at the fifty-two campuses of NEC. In addition, it was to design a model faculty development program at the Bauder College campus. The focus of the study was to better address the importance of a faculty development program and to design a model program. Therefore, it was necessary to answer the following major research questions: (1) What programs of faculty development. exist at the other NEC campuses? (2) What are the overall benefits of faculty development programs? (3) Why should teacher competency be an important part of a faculty development program? (4) What procedures can be established to help train the new faculty members? (5) How can a professional faculty development program be described? (6) What should the roles of faculty and the corporation be in the process? (7) What recommendations can be made for the implementation of a corporate faculty development program? (8) How can a faculty development program be described? (9) What steps should be taken to evaluate a faculty development program? The study was descriptive in nature and, ex post facto in design. It was assumed that the data collected would represent an accurate description of the faculty development programs at the fifty-two NEC schools at a particular point in time. The instrument used to investigate the faculty development programs at the fifty-two campuses of NEC is the Professional Development Questionnaire: Post-Secondary Occupational Technical (OT) Faculty survey developed and validated as part of a National Center for Research Education project. The surveys were mailed to the education directors at each of the fifty-two schools. The analysis of the data indicated that twenty-one percent of the schools have a professional faculty development program, and forty percent of the schools do not. Although the overall response rate was sixty-three percent, the no response rate was thirty-seven percent. The major conclusion generalized from the research was that few professional faculty development programs exist within the chain of NEC schools, and that faculty could benefit from a program that would encourage professional growth. Specific recommendations were of a programmatic nature and designed specifically for the improvement of faculty and practice. It was recommended that a comprehensive model faculty development program be implemented at Bauder College. It was further recommended that an advisory panel be organized to review and assess the recommended model faculty program. The results of this survey helped to identify exemplary faculty development programs. From this information and a review of the literature, a model faculty development program was designed based upon the data obtained in the areas of: professional responsibilities, teaching competency, and aspects of institutional development. The proposed faculty development program to be implemented at Bauder College will be presented to the advisory panel for its review.