Last month, ADEA released a new report on the
2022-23 full- and part-time U.S. dental school faculty. The interactive report
compares the 2022-23 results with 2018-19 data, the latest year available and a
good marker for the period before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. The
sources of this analysis are the 2018-19 ADEA Survey of Dental School Faculty
and the 2022-23 ADEA Dental School Faculty Salary and Demographic Census.
The interactive report may be accessed at ADEA.org/2023-Faculty-Positions.
Some of the key points include (see the interactive charts
and download the data at the links above):
- There were more
full-time faculty in the South and Northeast and faculty in private dental
schools in 2022-23 than in 2018-19. While the majority of faculty were part-time
(51%) in 2018-19, full-time faculty represented the largest share four years
later. Dental schools in Northeast and South added faculty at a higher rate
than average, with their total percentage increasing from 53% to 58% over the
analyzed period. Private schools added more faculty than public schools, driven
partly by the new dental schools. Four of the five new dental schools
accredited between 2019 and 2022 are private.
- The proportion of
dental school faculty with tenure or tenure track continued to decline. Close to one in five
faculty were in this category in 2018-19, dropping to 17% four years later.
Looking at primary discipline trends, Basic Sciences faculty recorded the
largest drop among primary disciplines between 2018-19 and 2022-23. ADEA
Faculty Census started collecting the clinician status of faculty in 2021-22.
Almost half of all clinicians in 2022-23 were assistant professors. For most
academic ranks with non-administrative duties, the proportion of faculty with a
foreign dental degree as their highest degree decreased over the past four
years.
- The trend of more women
faculty and younger women than men faculty persisted in 2022-23. Women accounted for
more than four in 10 faculty members in 2022-23—more than four years before.
Women dental school faculty were significantly younger than their men
counterparts. Overall, women accounted for the majority of faculty for every
decade of age between 20 and 49 years, with men being more numerous after 50
years old in 2018-19 and 2023-23.
- The percentage of
historically underrepresented race and ethnicity (HURE) faculty has not changed
significantly during the period. 2022-23 has a large percentage of faculty
(23%) for which their dental school did not report their race and ethnicity
and/or legal status. With almost one in four faculty members lacking disclosed
race, ethnicity, and/or legal status information in the 2022-23 ADEA Faculty
Census, any calculated differences in race and ethnicity estimates should be
interpreted with caution.
- Both the new faculty
rate and the faculty separation rate were on an upward trend in 2022-23
relative to 2018-19.
In 2022-23, 11% of faculty were hired in that fiscal year, significantly higher
than the 9% rate of 2018-19. The rate was higher both for full-timers and part-timers. When it comes to separations, the rate went
up, but just from 7% tot8%, driven by the increase of a higher percentage of
full-time faculty leaving in 2022-23 than four years before.
Some notes about the responding schools: Sixty-six (66)
schools of the 71 accredited dental schools in the United States provided
information on their full- and part-time faculty to the 2022-23 ADEA Faculty
Census, an estimated 85% of the faculty. In 2018-19, the ADEA Survey of Dental
School Faculty received data on all full-and part-time faculty from 63 of the
66 U.S. accredited dental schools, which reported an estimated 91% of the full-
and part-time faculty in dental schools in the United States. For more detail,
see the Methodological Appendices in the report.
For more information, please contact ADEA Office of
Educational Services research team at adeadata@adea.org.
Published on September
11, 2024