Research
Interview Protocol - Flying Solo Study
Demographic Questions
Professional Role Questions
Isolation Questions
Recommendations
- With what gender do you identify?
- What is your age? / Age (now and during the time of the solo faculty experience)
- With what race or ethnicity do you identify?
- What is your country of origin?
- Where do you work now?
Professional Role Questions
- What is your Program/Department/Division/College?
- What is your title (or “ was” if the person is describing a past job).
- Please describe primary, key, and/or regular duties.
- How long have you been a faculty member in general? How long have you been in your current position? (If the solo faculty experience occurred in a past job, how long WERE you in that position?)
- How long have you worked for your institution (or, if the solo faculty experienced occurred in a past job, how long had the person been in that position before becoming a solo faculty member).
- How many courses do you teach a year? (did you teach if a past job)
- Do you teach graduate, undergraduate, or a combination of graduate and undergraduate courses? (did you teach if a past job).
- Was this your first (as a solo faculty member / contingent faculty / expatriate faculty) experience? How many other such experiences? When? Where?
- How many other people with similar experiences to yours are there at this institution? In your program/ department/division? (if the person knew of others, we asked for a referral).
- Do you have a formal or informal leadership function in your program? (or did you have a formal or informal leadership function if the interview is about a past job).
Isolation Questions
- For the questions that follow, we will focus on your professional role as [role(s) connected to each researcher’s study]. For this study, we define “professional isolation as undesired feelings of psychological and/or emotional distance from key contributors to our professional role(s).” How would you define professional isolation?
- Considering your definition, do you ever feel / have you ever felt isolated in your role?
- If yes, the person has felt isolated
- What are the sources/causes of the isolation?
- How does/did isolation impact you personally?
- How does/did isolation impact your professional role?
- Did you act to overcome the isolation?
- If the person did act to overcome the isolation:
- What specific action(s) did you take?
- When did you take this action / these actions?
- Why did you take this/these action(s)? (probe deeper, as needed).
- Was/were the action(s) successful?
- If yes:
- What was the impact of the action(s)
- What is the evidence of success of the action(s)?
- If no:
- Why do you feel the action was unsuccessful?
- What is the impact of the action?
- If yes:
- If the person did not act to overcome the isolation:
- What prevented you from taking action?
- If yes, the person has felt isolated
- If no, the person has not felt isolated:
- What helps or helped you feel included? (think of specific actions you or others may take)
- How does/did feeling included impact you personally?
- How does/did feeling included impact your professional role?
Recommendations
- Regardless of whether you personally feel/felt isolated, what recommendations would you offer individuals to mitigate isolation?
- Regardless of whether you personally feel/felt isolation, what recommendations would you offer to institutions to mitigate isolation?