Fellowship as resistance: How women educators in higher education benefit from international professional recognition

Abstract

Teaching is a crucial role of universities. Yet the academic elite know that—in terms of both prestige and relative salaries—research is the more highly valued component of the teaching-research nexus. Paralleling this functional divide is a gender divide, with women academics more likely than their male counterparts to take on heavy teaching loads and the associated administration. Resisting the gender bias evident in research-focused tenure or promotion requires women to proclaim their specific successes as educators. By engaging the voices of Australasian women academics who have earned professional recognition for their university teaching, this chapter explores the potentialities of professional recognition as an unheralded gender equity initiative in the academy.