Increasingly, our students are under prepared both academically and socially for the rigors of the academic enterprise. At the same time, they seek specific workplace preparation that demands sophisticated cognitive skills and professional behaviors. Faculty are now called upon to actively engage students in meta-cognitive processes and workplace training. While the preceding overview of the new realities of community college teaching require that we reconceptualize the nature and organization of faculty work, we must be vigilant about protecting those aspects of the role that are central to our learning mission and which make being a faculty member an attractive career choice. Above all, we must preserve the significant role teachers play in students' formative experiences, especially in the cultivation of open minded inquiry.
People enter teaching to make a difference in individual lives and in the life of the community.
Community Colleges, like other academic institutions, create a safe harbor for the free exchange of sometimes-competing ideas and conflicting values. In addition to preserving an institutional commitment to intellectual inquiry, community colleges must continue to nurture faculty participation in and contributions to their academic disciplines. Although our missions rarely include original research, many of our faculty make substantial contributions to their fields in the form of scholarship, textbook publishing, and ongoing participation in the professions. These activities are important markers of our status in higher education and need to be maintained. For many faculty, the independence traditionally afforded the job is its principal attraction.