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Promoting Professional Education at the Small Liberal Arts College

Although there are hundreds of small-school journalism educators in the United States, very little is known about them. A literature search turns up virtually nothing about these educators, most of whom toil at small colleges lacking even a major in journalism, let alone a department or school of journalism or mass communication. Even the landmark 1987 study of journalism educators by Weaver and Wilhoit excluded them by virtue of the researchers' decision to look only at institutions with journalism and mass communication departments or schools offering undergraduate degrees in those majors.(1) In addition, Weaver and Wilhoit, in compiling their survey population, chose to ignore faculty members of 15 different departments, including English. "We assumed it would be very unlikely to find full-time teachers of journalism and mass communication in such departments," the authors wrote.(2)However, the 1993 survey of more than 200 mostly full-time journalism educators at small schools(3) found that many work in departments not surveyed by Weaver and Wilhoit.(4) This was particularly true for English departments, where 41.1 percent of the respondents are housed. Indeed, the author of the 1993 survey has been a full-time journalism educator for nine years--all as a member of English departments at small liberal arts colleges in Vermont and Maryland, neither of which offers a major in journalism. It should be noted, however, that not all of the journalism educators working in English departments (or other departments, for that matter) who responded to the 1993 survey teach journalism courses exclusively.The purpose of the 1993 survey was primarily to isolate journalism educators at small liberal arts schools and examine their common needs, concerns, purposes, satisfactions, and priorities. It should be noted that many of those responding to the survey, through hand-written comments in the margins or attached notes and letters, expressed surprise and gratitude that they were being surveyed. "Great survey!" wrote one Oklahoma educator, "Please send results." Similar sentiments were expressed by small-college journalism faculty attending the 1993 AEJMC meeting in Kansas City, where the final panel presentation was entitled "Voices in the Wilderness: Teaching Journalism at Small Liberal Arts Colleges." Several faculty members noted that small-college units had never before been the topic of a panel presentation at the association's annual convention.(5)MethodThe survey population was drawn from a list of more than 500 colleges and universities offering courses in journalism, but no journalism major. The list was provided by Garland C. Elmore, associate vice chancellor and executive director of the Office of Integrated Technologies at Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis, and author of The Communication Disciplines in Higher Education.(6) Telephone calls to approximately one-half of the schools on the Elmore list (the rest were eliminated primarily because of their size) produced a list of 202 journalism educators, the vast majority of whom teach at small liberal arts colleges lacking a department or major in journalism.In early 1993, the 202 survey subjects were mailed a five-page, 37-item questionnaire and a postage-paid, self-addressed envelope. Most of the subjects who did not return the survey within three to four weeks were sent a second copy, plus another postage-paid envelope. Ultimately, 129 questionnaires were returned, or 64 percent of the total.The questionnaire, consisting of 35 close-ended and two open-ended questions, attempted to obtain both a profile of the respondents and their schools and the subjects' views on teaching objectives, obstacles, and satisfaction as well as internal and external academic and professional activities and obligations. The two open-ended questions asked the respondents to identify the greatest advantage and disadvantage to teaching journalism at a small liberal arts school. …