Two Private Institutions Selected for Their Innovative Policies and Programs Supporting VITAL/Contingent Faculty

For their campus-wide system efforts to implement innovative programs for VITAL faculty, private institutions Arcadia University and Connecticut College have been selected as the two winners of the 2026 Delphi Award. The Award is presented annually by the Pullias Center for Higher Education at the University of Southern California’s Rossier School of Education, in partnership with the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U).

Each university will receive a $15,000 cash award to continue their work to support contingent, also called VITAL (Visiting, Instructors, Temporary, Adjuncts and Lecturers) faculty, in promoting student success. In addition to the award winners, the Delphi Award committee recognized two finalists this year, the Modern Language Association and the University of Texas Austin.

“We are so excited to share the model practices of these two institutions with the larger higher education community, noted Professor Adrianna Kezar, Director Emeritus of the Pullias Center and Director of the Delphi Project on the Changing Faculty and Student Success, an initiative of the Pullias Center. “Their examples profile colleges who have prioritized support of faculty as mission central.  We hope other campuses follow their excellent lead.”

The Delphi Award is generously supported by OneHE and Adjunctions, which together focus on supporting higher education and VITAL/contingent faculty in a global community for educators, breaking down barriers and fostering shared learning.

As in past years, the members of the Delphi Award committee identified winners that represent key, specific changes that they believe should be in place to support higher education VITAL faculty across the country.

Pennsylvania’s Arcadia University and its “Sustaining Inclusive Methods for People-focused Learning Experiences” (SIMPLE) was selected as a winner of this year’s Delphi Award. Their application focused on efforts to improve VITAL faculty working conditions throughout their institution, led by their Center for Teaching, Learning and Mentoring (CTLM). Since its inception in 2020, CTLM has focused on elevating the voices and experiences of VITAL educators by including them in establishing the center’s priorities and working structures, and as a result, they are currently the majority group in leadership and participation throughout all the center’s programming.  These investments have had an outsized impact on VITAL faculty, ensuring they are not simply asked to deliver curriculum but are fully supported as educators and partners in student success. 

“It often feels like we are fighting an uphill battle in trying to build structures to support contingent faculty and the myriad talents they bring to the classroom,” noted Daniel Pieczkolon, Adjunct Professor of English, CTLM Administrative Fellow at Arcadia. “This recognition—and the material support that it comes with—means the world to us as we continue to try to make Arcadia’s campus a genuinely inclusive place.” 

Connecticut College was selected as a 2026 Delphi Award winner for their systemic, decade-long integrated changes dedicated to enhancing both the stability and professional standing of their VITAL faculty. “A Decade of Deliberate Action Toward a Just and Equitable Institution” was championed by the college’s Faculty Steering and Conference Committee (FSCC), their local chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and the Dean of Faculty’s office. With a goal of expanding faculty rights, and with it, the feeling of security, stability, equity and respect for VITAL faculty, the FSCC and AAUP chapter instituted significant working condition improvements, including granting teaching professors and continuing part-time faculty the same dismissal and termination procedures as tenured faculty; expanding voting rights and inclusion in shared governance; granting sabbaticals or professional development leaves to teaching professors; reducing the teaching load of VITAL faculty to be commensurate with tenure-line faculty; extending emeritus status to teaching professors, and more—all with the efforts and support of VITAL faculty,  tenure-line faculty and the Dean of the Faculty.

“We are honored that Connecticut College has been named a recipient of the 2026 Delphi Award for supporting VITAL faculty.  We value this national recognition of a decade of collective action to advance the rights and professional standing of our VITAL faculty, said Afshan Jafar, Professor and Chair of the Sociology department at CC. “We look forward to continuing the effort to build a more equitable and inclusive future for all of our colleagues, especially as higher education confronts ongoing external threats to its mission.”

KC Culver, Associate Director of the Delphi Project on the Changing Faculty and Student Success, noted “By structuring leadership opportunities for VITAL faculty, both of the 2026 Delphi Award winners demonstrate how recognizing the institutional and pedagogical expertise of VITAL faculty can benefit institutions.”

This year, two finalists for the Delphi Award were selected from a competitive applicant pool of more than 17 public and private organizations and two- and four-year campuses to recognize their work to support VITAL faculty.

University of Texas Austin (UT) reimagined how their ‘professional-track’ VITAL faculty is integrated, acknowledged and celebrated with their Community, Careers and Culture framework. Over the past decade, UT has invested in staffing, funding and policy reforms to integrate pro-track faculty—who comprise 53% of UT Austin’s faculty—more fully into the academic community and to support them at every career stage. This includes shifts in titles and structural changes that enable VITAL faculty to serve in university leadership roles, access to specific professional development, promotion and recognition opportunities, and increasing VITAL faculty’s involvement in shared governance.

The Modern Language Association (MLA), a leading advocacy organization for the humanities, incorporated its support of VITAL faculty in its 2023 revised strategic mission, values and strategic priorities. With a goal of expanding services and initiatives that foster the improvement of working conditions, especially for VITAL faculty, MLA has issued working and policy papers that explore compensation and collective action, and created professional development grants and awards to help VITAL faculty feel supported by and connected to the larger academic community. In addition, MLA collaborates with institutional partners by fostering and replicating good practices for VITAL faculty at campuses nationwide.

The winners of the Delphi Award will be honored for their work at AAC&U’s annual meeting on January 20-22, 2027 in Seattle. “The Delphi Award recognizes that student success depends on the contributions and engagement of all faculty, and it highlights the important role colleges and universities can play in ensuring that faculty are valued and supported across all types of appointments,” said AAC&U President Lynn Pasquerella. “AAC&U congratulates this year’s winners and finalists and celebrates their outstanding work.”

"We're thrilled to congratulate this year's winners, whose work shows what's possible when institutions invest in all of their educators. We look forward to helping share their practice with educators around the world,” noted Olivia Fleming, co-founder of OneHE. Kathleen Mandziuk and Ian Doyle, Co-founders of Adjunctions added “The Delphi Award winners exemplify the commitment to creating meaningful opportunities for adjunct and contingent faculty to grow, contribute, and thrive. We are proud to support institutions that recognize and invest in the important role these faculty play in higher education.”

This is the ninth year for The Delphi Award, an initiative of the Delphi Project on the Changing Faculty and Student Success at the Pullias Center. The Award is an extension of the Delphi Project’s mission to better support faculty off the tenure track (also known as VITAL faculty) while helping create new faculty models for postsecondary institutions to adopt. The USC Pullias Center for Higher Education has worked in partnership with AAC&U on the Delphi Project since the Project’s inception in 2012, developing reports and resources, collecting models and conducting research and advocacy on this issue.

Instructional faculty in American higher education is mostly comprised of VITAL professionals responsible for teaching the vast majority of college and university classes. These instructors are typically hired on short notice, on short-term or no contracts, and paid less than tenured or tenure-track faculty, while offering little or no orientation or mentoring, professional development, or voice in governance. As a result, VITAL faculty are often tasked with balancing heavy teaching loads at multiple institutions despite limited time to prepare courses and limited support for their curriculum design or pedagogy—factors shown by Delphi Project research to correlate with lower student success rates.

Additional tools and resources from the Pullias Center and the Delphi Project to assist campuses in supporting non-tenure-track faculty include Departmental Cultures and Non-Tenure-Track Faculty: A Self-Assessment Tool for Departments and Non-Tenure-Track Faculty on our Campus: A Guide for Campus Task Forces to Better Understand Faculty Working Conditions and the Necessity of Change. Case Studies of all Delphi Award winners, including 2025 winners Florida Gulf Coast University and Montclair State University, and finalists Community College of Baltimore County and Mid-Atlantic Teaching Faculty Alliance, are also available on the Pullias Center website.