Clifton F. Conrad

Institutional Inbreeding Reexamined

Data from the 1977 Survey of the American Professoriate were used to examine the relationship between origin and productivity and institutional rewards. The analyses indicated that inbred and noninbred faculty were not significantly different on standard measures of scholarly productivity. However, when an adjustment was made for the confounding effects of time allocation, the groups could be differentiated, and inbred faculty were found to be more productive in all areas of scholarly research. Despite the results on productivity, the analyses showed that inbred faculty are paid significantly less than noninbred faculty.

Meditations on the Ideology of Inquiry in Higher Education: Exposition, Critique, and Conjecture

Abstract: This paper, presented as the ASHE presidential address, looks critically at four conventional beliefs that guide research in higher education. These beliefs concern stakeholders, aims of inquiry, paradigm and modes of inquiry, and inquiry perspectives. The author contends that higher education should be viewed not as a narrow academic discipline but as a field of study in which the major stakeholders—scholarly peers, administrators and faculty, and the educated public—provide the lodestar for inquiry.

Correlates of Departmental Quality in Regional Colleges and Universities

This article isolates correlates of departmental quality at the masters and doctoral level in regional colleges and universities. The 45 departments in the sample represent 14 public institutions in two states and include departments in biology, chemistry, education, history, and mathematics. In addition to simple correlation, the analysis is based on multivariate linear regression. Departmental quality is found to be correlated with individual and combined measures of faculty (scholarly productivity, grantsmanship, age and tenure status, geographical origin of highest degree, and teaching workload), students (number and ability), program (proportion of institutional degree programs at the advanced graduate level and curricular concentration), and facilities (library size). The findings suggest that the factors associated with graduate departmental quality are more multidimensional in regional colleges and universities than in highly ranked research universities.

A Theory of Mandated Academic Change.

During the past decade, colleges and universities have been subject to a rapid expansion and intensification of external pressures for major policy changes. Among the most influential of the forces for academic reform are mandates emanating from the federal legislative and judicial branches of government. Not only have recent federal mandates affected policies and decision making, they often have struck at the very core of cultural, social, institutional, and personal value systems. The probability that such governmental involvement will decrease in the future appears remote. Federal mandates often require sweeping changes that can be expensive for institutions to implement and difficult to administer and enforce. Unfortunately, the literature on mandated academic change is woefully inadequate in providing both government and college officials with useful guidelines for providing successful leadership in implementing mandates in institutions of higher education. Grounded in empirical evidence, the theory presented in this article identifies the processes and procedures that can help lead to effective educational change precipitated by governmental directives. There are four major frameworks that have guided research on academic change: the complex organization [2, 7, 18], the diffusion of innovations [5, 11, 14, 15], the planned change [8, 10, 12], and the political [1, 3, 9]. Each model has focused on a particular aspect of change (formal organization, communication, planning, power), but none of these research frameworks has led to a general theory of aca-

Objective and Reputational Rankings of Ph.D.-Granting Departments of Sociology, 1965–1982

Abstract From its inception in 1965 until 1975 when it stopped publishing such studies, The American Sociologist (TAS) published numerous quality rankings of Ph.D.-granting sociology departments and several articles that compared different rankings. During these years TAS published far more rankings of sociology departments than did any other journal This article reviews these studies as well as the rankings of sociology departments found in three major multi-disciplinary rankings (Cartter, 1966; Roose and Andersen, 1970; Jones, Lindzey, and Coggeshall, 1982). It discusses the major methodological approaches used in these studies and reviews the debate among scholars regarding the most appropriate ways to rank departments. An analysis of the various objective and subjective rankings reveals that there is an elite group of seven departments that consistently rank at the top regardless of the ranking method employed.

A Typology of Disability Harassment in Secondary Schools

The purpose of this exploratory study of disability harassment was to develop a typology of disability harassment experiences anchored in the perspectives of students with disabilities who have experienced harassment in urban, suburban, and exurban-rural schools. Based on focus group interviews with four groups of young people with various disabilities and two groups of parents of students with disabilities, the authors identified six major types of disability harassment and placed them on a continuum from least assertive to most aggressive. For each of the six types, signature behaviors were identified as was their respective frequency. Based on their findings, the authors propose several practical strategies for secondary schools (Grades 6—12) aimed at helping to address the multiple faces of this formidable challenge.

Current Views of Departmental Quality: An Empirical Examination.

Abstract: This article examines systematically four different views of quality: a faculty view, a student view, a resource view, and an outcomes view. In varying degrees the research literature is found to lend empirical support to all four views. A recent study which incorporated each of these four views is introduced in order to reexamine the merits and limitations of each perspective. The ensuing discussion considers the theoretical and practical problems encountered in dealing with the elusive concept of quality and suggests the kinds of actions colleges and universities can take to improve program quality.

Research Note: Dimensions of Program Quality in Regional Universities

This study replicated and extended research by Conrad and Blackburn on program quality in regional universities. The sample doubled the number of departments, increased the number of institutions and programs, and added an additional state, for a total of three states in this study. The same general variables emerged as the strongest predictors, but strengths were lower. When “state” did not load in the regression analysis, the inference was that generalizability is warranted.

Institutional Origin: Labor Market Signaling in Higher Education

In response to the need for further research on promotion and tenure decisions, this study examined one of the criteria used in these decisions: inbreeding. Based on an analysis of the academic marketplace modifying Spence’s theory of job market signaling behavior, the following research hypothesis guided the study: female inbred faculty have patterns of productivity that are significantly different from the patterns of productivity of male inbred faculty. Significant differences between the groups in the study were found, including the major finding that inbred women are more productive in traditional areas than inbred men.

Black Male Success in STEM: A Case Study of Morehouse College.

The purpose of this study is to enhance our understanding of how a Historically Black College and University (HBCU) is cultivating Black male achievement in STEM. In this in-depth qualitative case study, we explore 2 resource-intensive and successful STEM pathway programs at Morehouse College, the only all-male HBCU in this country, as an opportunity to examine the cultivation of Black male STEM scholars. Our study was guided by 2 overarching questions: What opportunities for participation in a rigorous STEM education do the programs provide? What individual and institutional practices contribute to STEM student persistence and learning?