Activities	Demonstrate and teach patient care in classroom and clinical units to nursing students. Includes both teachers primarily engaged in teaching and those who do a combination of both teaching and research.
Outlook	Faster-than-average-job growth
Median Income	$59,200 per year in 2008
Work Context & Conditions	Nursing instructors usually have flexible schedules. They must be present for classes, usually 12 to 16 hours per week, and for faculty and committee meetings.
Minimum Education Requirements	Master's Degree
Skills	Persuasion, Social Perceptiveness, Learning Strategies, Monitoring, Critical Thinking, Instructing, Active Listening, Writing, Service Orientation, Time Management, Active Learning, Complex Problem Solving, Judgment and Decision Making, Coordination, Reading Comprehension, Speaking, Science
Abilities	Oral Expression, Deductive Reasoning, Written Comprehension, Speech Clarity, Inductive Reasoning, Written Expression, Oral Comprehension

Job Category		Education, Training, & Library
Job Description		Nursing instructors initiate, facilitate, and moderate classroom discussions. They prepare and deliver lectures to undergraduate and/or graduate students on topics such as pharmacology, mental health nursing, and community health care practices and keep abreast of developments in their field by reading current literature, talking with colleagues, and participating in professional conferences. Nursing instructors prepare course materials such as syllabi, homework assignments, and handouts; supervise students' laboratory and clinical work; and evaluate and grade students' class work, laboratory and clinic work, assignments, and papers. They also collaborate with colleagues to address teaching and research issues; plan, evaluate, and revise curricula, course content, and course materials and methods of instruction; and compile, administer, and grade examinations, or assign this work to others. In addition, nursing instructors advise students on academic and vocational curricula, and on career issues; maintain student attendance records, grades, and other required records; and maintain regularly scheduled office hours in order to advise and assist students. They also supervise undergraduate and/or graduate teaching, internship, and research work; conduct research in a particular field of knowledge, and publish findings in professional journals, books, and/or electronic media and participate in student recruitment, registration, and placement activities.
Working Conditions		Postsecondary teachers who work full time usually have flexible schedules. They must be present for classes, usually 12 to 16 hours per week, and for faculty and committee meetings. Most establish regular office hours for student consultations, usually 3 to 6 hours per week. Otherwise, teachers are free to decide when and where they will work, and how much time to devote to course preparation, grading, study, research, graduate student supervision, and other activities. Some teach night and weekend classes. This is particularly true for teachers at 2-year community colleges or institutions with large enrollments of older students who have full-time jobs or family responsibilities. Most colleges and universities require teachers to work 9 months of the year. About 29 percent of college and university faculty worked part time in 2008. Some part-timers, known as “adjunct faculty,” have primary jobs outside of academia—in government, private industry, or nonprofit research—and teach “on the side.” University faculty may experience a conflict between their responsibilities to teach students and the pressure to do research and publish their findings. This may be a particular problem for young faculty seeking advancement in 4-year research universities. Also, recent cutbacks in support workers and the hiring of more part-time faculty have put a greater administrative burden on full-time faculty. Requirements to teach online classes also have added greatly to the workloads of postsecondary teachers. Many find that developing the courses to put online, plus learning how to operate the technology and answering large amounts of e-mail, is very time-consuming.
Salary Range		The median annual earnings of nursing instructors and teachers in 2008 were $59,200. The middle 50 percent earned between $46,900 and $75,100. The lowest 10 percent earned less than $37,200; the highest 10 percent, more than $94,600. Earnings for college faculty vary according to rank and type of institution, geographic area, and field. According to a 2008-09 survey by the American Association of University Professors, salaries for full-time faculty averaged $79,439. By rank, the average was $108,749 for professors, $76,147 for associate professors, $63,827 for assistant professors, $45,977 for instructors, and $452,436 for lecturers. Faculty in 4-year institutions earn higher salaries, on average, than do those in 2-year schools. In 2008-09, faculty salaries averaged $92,257 in private independent institutions, $77,009 in public institutions, and $71,857 in religiously affiliated private colleges and universities. In fields with high-paying nonacademic alternatives—medicine, law, engineering, and business, among others—earnings exceed these averages. In others fields—such as the humanities and education—they are lower. Many faculty members have significant earnings in addition to their base salary, from consulting, teaching additional courses, research, writing for publication, or other employment. In addition, many college and university faculty enjoy some unique benefits, including access to campus facilities, tuition waivers for dependents, housing and travel allowances, and paid sabbatical leaves. Part-time faculty usually have fewer benefits than full-time faculty.

Education Required		Four-year colleges and universities usually consider doctoral degree holders for full-time, tenure-track positions, but may hire master’s degree holders or doctoral candidates for certain disciplines, such as the arts, or for part-time and temporary jobs. Most college and university faculty are in four academic ranks—professor, associate professor, assistant professor, and instructor. These positions usually are considered to be tenure-track positions. Most faculty members are hired as instructors or assistant professors. A smaller number of additional faculty members, called lecturers, are usually employed on contracts for a single academic term and are not on the tenure track. In 2-year colleges, master’s degree holders fill most full-time positions. However, in certain fields where there may be more applicants than available jobs, institutions can be more selective in their hiring practices. In these fields, Master’s degree holders may be passed over in favor of candidates holding Ph.Ds. Many 2-year institutions increasingly prefer job applicants to have some teaching experience or experience with distance learning. Preference also may be given to those holding dual master’s degrees, especially at smaller institutions, because they can teach more subjects. Doctoral programs take an average of 6 years of full-time study beyond the bachelor’s degree, including time spent completing a master’s degree and a dissertation. Some programs, such as those in the humanities, may take longer to complete; others, such as those in engineering, usually are shorter. Candidates specialize in a subfield of a discipline—for example, organic chemistry, counseling psychology, or European history—but also take courses covering the entire discipline. Programs typically include 20 or more increasingly specialized courses and seminars plus comprehensive examinations on all major areas of the field. Candidates also must complete a dissertation—a written report on original research in the candidate’s major field of study. The dissertation sets forth an original hypothesis or proposes a model and tests it. Students in the natural sciences and engineering usually do laboratory work; in the humanities, they study original documents and other published material. The dissertation is done under the guidance of one or more faculty advisors and usually takes 1 or 2 years of full-time work.
Recommended High School Courses		Biology, English, Chemistry
Postsecondary Instructional Programs		Law, Government and Jurisprudence, Education and Training, English Language, Psychology, Sociology and Anthropology, Personnel and Human Resources, Administration and Management, Public Safety and Security, Mathematics, Therapy and Counseling, Communications and Media, Chemistry, Philosophy and Theology, Biology, Customer and Personal Service, Clerical
Certification and Licensing		None

Interest Area		Social Involves working and communicating with, helping, and teaching people.
Work Values		Social Status Looked up to by others in their company and their community. Achievement Get a feeling of accomplishment. Social Service Do things for other people. Ability Utilization Make use of individual abilities. Working Conditions Good working conditions. Co-workers Have co-workers who are easy to get along with. Autonomy Plan work with little supervision. Authority Give directions and instructions to others. Responsibility Make decisions on your own.
Skills		Persuasion Persuade others to approach things differently. Social Perceptiveness Be aware of others' reactions and understand why they react the way they do. Learning Strategies Use multiple approaches when learning or teaching new things. Monitoring Assess how well someone is doing when learning or doing something. Critical Thinking Use logic and analysis to identify the strengths and weaknesses of different approaches. Instructing Teach others how to do something. Active Listening Listen to what other people are saying and ask questions as appropriate. Writing Communicate effectively with others in writing as indicated by the needs of the audience. Service Orientation Actively look for ways to help people. Time Management Manage one's own time and the time of others. Active Learning Work with new material or information to grasp its implications. Complex Problem Solving Solving novel, ill-defined problems in complex, real-world settings. Judgment and Decision Making Be able to weigh the relative costs and benefits of a potential action. Coordination Adjust actions in relation to others' actions. Reading Comprehension Understand written sentences and paragraphs in work-related documents. Speaking Talk to others to effectively convey information. Science Use scientific methods to solve problems.
Abilities		Oral Expression Able to convey information and ideas through speech in ways that others will understand. Deductive Reasoning Able to apply general rules to specific problems to come up with logical answers, including deciding whether an answer makes sense. Written Comprehension Able to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing. Speech Clarity Able to speak clearly so listeners understand. Inductive Reasoning Able to combine separate pieces of information, or specific answers to problems, to form general rules or conclusions. This includes coming up with a logical explanation for why seemingly unrelated events occur together. Written Expression Able to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand. Oral Comprehension Able to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.

Related Jobs		Technologist, Medical and Clinical Laboratory, Technician, Biological, Teacher, Postsecondary, Health Specialties, Nurse, Registered, Therapist, Occupational, Physician, Psychiatrist
Job Outlook		Postsecondary teachers held nearly 1.7 million jobs in 2008. Most were employed in public and private 4-year colleges and universities and in 2-year community colleges. Of these, 55,100 were nursing instructors and teachers. Overall, employment of postsecondary teachers is expected to grow much faster than the average for all occupations through 2018. A significant proportion of these new jobs will be part-time positions. Job opportunities are generally expected to be very good—although they will vary somewhat from field to field—as numerous openings for all types of postsecondary teachers result from retirements of current postsecondary teachers and continued increases in student enrollments. Projected growth in college and university enrollment over the next decade stems mainly from the expected increase in the population of 18- to 24-year-olds, who constitute the majority of students at postsecondary institutions, and from the increasing number of high school graduates who choose to attend these institutions. Adults returning to college to enhance their career prospects or to update their skills also will continue to create new opportunities for postsecondary teachers, particularly at community colleges and for-profit institutions that cater to working adults. However, many postsecondary educational institutions receive a significant portion of their funding from State and local governments, so expansion of public higher education will be limited by State and local budgets. Nevertheless, in addition to growth in enrollments, the need to replace the large numbers of postsecondary teachers who are likely to retire over the next decade will also create a significant number of openings. Many postsecondary teachers were hired in the late 1960s and the 1970s to teach members of the baby boom generation, and they are expected to retire in growing numbers in the years ahead. Ph.D. recipients seeking jobs as postsecondary teachers will experience favorable job prospects over the next decade. While competition will remain tight for tenure-track positions at 4-year colleges and universities, there will be a considerable number of part-time or renewable, term appointments at these institutions and positions at community colleges available to them. Opportunities for master’s degree holders are also expected to be favorable, as community colleges and other institutions that employ them, such as professional career education programs, are expected to experience considerable growth.
More Information		American Association of Colleges of Nursing, National League for Nursing, American Nurses Association
References		Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2010-11 Edition, Teachers—Postsecondary, on the Internet at http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos066.htm O*NET OnLine, on the Internet at http://online.onetcenter.org/link/summary/25-1072.00