Standard Number 3.7.1: The institution employs competent faculty members qualified to accomplish the mission and goals of the institution. When determining acceptable qualifications of its faculty, an institution gives primary consideration to the highest earned degree in the discipline in accordance with the guidelines listed below. The institution also considers competence, effectiveness, and capacity, including, as appropriate, undergraduate and graduate degrees, related work experiences in the field, professional licensure and certifications, honors and awards, continuous documented excellence in teaching, or other demonstrated competencies and achievements that contribute to effective teaching and student learning outcomes. For all cases, the institution is responsible for justifying and documenting the qualifications of all its faculty.

Full Compliance

Three of the Credential Guidelines pertain to Georgia Southern University. These are as follows:

The Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia outlines the minimum qualifications for faculty employment in the Board of Regents Policy Manual , § 803.0102 . These qualifications are as follows:

Furthermore, initial appointees to the associate or full professorial rank at research and regional universities require the terminal degree in the appropriate discipline or equivalent in training, ability, or experience. Likewise, the Board of Regents stipulates that promotions to the rank of associate or full professor at research and regional universities require the earned doctorate or its equivalent in training, ability, and/or experience. (See Board of Regents Policy Manual , § 803.08 .) In the University System, all full-time faculty appointments, non-tenure track faculty appointments, appointments for retired faculty, and promotion actions require Board of Regents approval (See Academic Affairs Handbook , § 1.07 ). Part-time faculty appointments require University System Office approval.

In addition, the Board of Regents is actively committed to the continued professional growth and development of its personnel. (See Board of Regents Policy Manual , § 802.18 ) The University System provides numerous avenues of support to faculty for professional development including tuition remission and reimbursement. Several Georgia Southern faculty members have taken advantage of this program and earned doctoral degrees. In addition, several other faculty members are actively pursuing doctoral studies.

The Board of Regents' requirements ensure that Georgia Southern University adheres to the SACS standards, employing a highly qualified faculty with 72.1% of Fall 2003 full-time faculty holding doctoral degrees.

(n=463/642). [Source: Georgia Southern University 2003-2004 Fact Book , p. 69] Of the remaining full-time faculty, 25.7% hold master's degrees (n=165/642), 1.4% hold education specialist degrees (n=9/642), and .6% hold relevant professional degrees (n=4/642).

To further ensure full compliance with SACS standards and guidelines on faculty qualifications, Georgia Southern University (Office of the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs) maintains a credential database that includes all employees who have faculty rank. This database tracks the teaching subject area as well as all academic degrees each faculty member holds. The University routinely runs queries from the database to compare the teaching CIP code to the highest degree CIP code for each active faculty member. Comparisons are drawn to fourth CIP code digit. For those faculty whose highest degree CIP code is not in the same area as the teaching subject field, Georgia Southern provides a justification explaining why these faculty are qualified to teach in this area, considering competence, effectiveness, capacity, other relevant degrees and course work, relevant work experiences, professional licensure and certifications, honors and awards, continuous documented excellence in teaching, and other demonstrated competencies and achievements. The data for Spring 2004 including all part-time, adjunct, and full-time faculty are presented in the attached table. (Note: 47 of the faculty listed in this table teach only the University's Orientation course which is a basic skills class and does not require subject matter expertise. All of these faculty hold at least a master's degree.)

This database is also used to monitor faculty teaching without at least the master's degree. For Spring 2004, the University employed eight faculty members who held bachelor's degrees only. Three of these are adjunct faculty employed in the Department of Military Science as part of the University's ROTC program. They maintain full, active status in the United States Army. A fourth faculty member teaches only equestrian physical education activity courses, while the remaining four faculty have outstanding professional experience and training that directly relates to the areas in which they teach. Justifications for these eight faculty members are provided in the attached table.

Similarly, the University maintains data on the percentage of undergraduate student credit hours taught by faculty holding terminal degrees. In all but one of the University's 81 undergraduate degree programs (Fall 2003), the University complies with the SACS standard that a minimum of 25% of these courses must be taught by faculty holding the terminal degree. The exception occurs in the BS in Fashion Merchandising & Apparel Design program which fell to 13% (n=3 faculty) in Fall 2003. In this case, non-compliance resulted from a Fall 2003 buy-out of a full-time, doctorally prepared faculty member. (See attached table.)

³⁸ Standards (b), (c), and (f) are not applicable to Georgia Southern since the University does not offer associate's degrees. Additionally, graduate assistants do not have primary teaching responsibilities in academic classes.