Welcome to this special issue on the nursing faculty workforce. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown the world the importance of nurses, yet there continues to be a shortage of practicing nurses and faculty to educate nursing students. In 2019, 80,407 qualified students were turned away from baccalaureate and graduate nursing programs in the United States, and most schools attributed the reason to a lack of faculty (American Association of Colleges of Nursing, 2020).
Being a nurse faculty member is a critically important and rewarding job, yet not enough nurses are attracted to the academic nurse educator role. Several possible explanations exist for this shortfall. Compensation is one reason, because nurse faculty salaries are often lower than those of nurses in practice with advanced degrees (https://nursinglicensemap.com/resources/nurse-salary/). Salary is important; however, for schools of nursing to attract and retain academic nurse educators, faculty must feel supported in their jobs and be adequately prepared for their diverse roles. Certainly, the faculty workforce needs study. The articles in this issue cover a range of issues important to faculty work life.
In the lead article, Sebach highlights the roles of academic nurse educators as described by the National League for Nursing and how faculty members of diverse educational preparation differ in their readiness to assume these roles. Becoming an academic nurse educator requires a new and complex skill set. Therefore, to foster new faculty success, both continuing education and strong mentoring are essential.
Three additional articles in this issue focus on mentoring, diversity, and preparation for the nurse faculty role. Ortiz examines mentoring for male faculty members and how this mentoring may help diversify the faculty workforce. Those faculty members who are in the majority also need to learn to support minorities to increase diversity in the profession, and Shilo's article describes female faculty members supporting male nursing students in the clinical setting. Viveiros and colleagues describe peer mentoring for new faculty, and Clark and Stanfill illustrate intentional collaboration among faculty of different academic preparation to advance the faculty role of scholarship.
The roles of teaching and scholarship must be supported to retain faculty and facilitate their success. Moch and colleagues describe a mentoring program to assist faculty with publishing, an important and often intimidating process. The shortage of full-time nurse faculty brings with it an increase in part-time faculty, and Yoder and colleagues report the development and implementation of a model to assist and retain new part-time faculty. Hollinger-Smith and colleagues describe the importance of faculty recognition and how recognition might be incorporated into a workplace culture.
Recent events have highlighted the importance of online education in today's dynamic educational environment. All nurse faculty must rise to the challenges of meeting students' academic needs, including providing high-quality online education. Important issues related to online education are the focus of three articles in this issue. Matthias and colleagues discuss the importance of information literacy in the preparation of nurse educators; Nininger and Abbott describe ways to monitor online education quality; and Sacco and Kelly examine faculty stress as it relates to rapidly moving classes to an online format in response to the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions. The stresses of faculty life also affect academic leaders, and Aspen and colleagues discuss the current and continuing shortage of nurse faculty willing to venture into leadership roles.
Incivility is the focus of two articles in this issue from one study by Sherrod and Lewallen, but it is also mentioned in other articles. The problem of incivility has received widespread attention in the literature regarding students, faculty, clinical partners, and leaders. Incivility may also serve as the driving force behind many other faculty workplace issues. Although there is disagreement about the definitions of incivility, most agree that it involves violations of established norms (Kenski et al., 2019). The lack of congruence in understanding the concept of incivility provides fertile ground for future research.
Further exploration is needed to determine the preferred norms of the nursing faculty workforce. Research is also needed to determine best practices in establishing shared norms in academic settings and holding faculty accountable in their behavior in adhering to established norms. Academic leadership has an important role to play in this endeavor, but developing a culture of civility will be best embraced if everyone in the workplace is engaged in the process, including leaders, faculty, staff, and students.
The issues presented here and many others affecting nursing faculty are ripe for further study. Research is needed to answer important questions such as these:
* What types of workplace resources and support are most effective in acquiring and retaining diverse nurse faculty and facilitating their success in the workplace?
* How can the diversity of nursing faculty be expanded to include more faculty from underrepresented groups?
* What are optimal work assignments, and how should they be configured for tenure track and clinical track faculty?
* What are factors that influence success in achieving tenure?
* What are the essential components of a faculty practice plan, and what strategies and supports are needed to effectively manage the demands of practice and academia?
* What are best practice strategies for curtailing workplace incivility and promoting civility?
* How can faculty be best prepared to meet the needs of students representing diverse ethnicities, sexual orientations, gender identities, and cultures?
It is our intention that the scholarship provided in this issue will stimulate further thought and more research on these important topics that affect the nursing faculty workplace. We must investigate best practices for creating a hospitable workplace where faculty are prepared for and supported in meeting the challenges of the academic nurse faculty role.
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