Not Moving On Up

A new report from the Modern Language Association shows that English and foreign-language departments routinely promote male associate professors to full professors faster than they promote women. According to an article in The Chronicle:

The report shows that women at doctoral institutions take two and a half years longer than men to reach full professor. The gap shrinks to one and a half years at master’s institutions, and the smallest gap—a year—is at baccalaureate colleges. A closer look at private independent colleges by the association revealed that women there take three and a half years longer than their male counterparts to advance to associate professor.

Over all, the average time to promotion for female associate professors is 8.2 years, compared with 6.6 years for men.

Notably, the report shows that the disparity cannot be blamed on women’s traditional child-rearing responsibilities, as the women surveyed by the MLA were promoted more slowly than men, regardless of their marital or parental status. The dearth of female mentors is a more likely explanation. Lisa Maatz, director of publicly policy and government relations at the American Association of University Women, told The Chronicle that another factor was that women typically “end up doing more committee work and more advisory work” that isn’t counted toward advancement.

How do the MLA’s findings compare with your experiences in your own department?