Addressing Gender Inequalities in Faculty Workloads

Faculty workload inequities are common, with women faculty reporting high levels of service, mentoring, and teaching-related activities, even though this work is often devalued in faculty evaluations. We describe insights developed through a National Science Foundation ADVANCE-funded project, “Faculty Workload & Rewards,” aimed at ensuring equity in how teaching and service are taken up, assigned, and rewarded. We identify concrete strategies that improve transparency, enhance perceived fairness, allow for crediting, address accountability, and attend to context to strengthen workload equity. We also identify key challenges to revising workload, including denial, fear, the need for control, and lack of creativity, as well as approaches to addressing these forms of resistance.