A small majority of provosts (52 percent) would favor a system of long-term contracts over the current tenure system, according to the 2023 Survey of College and University Chief Academic Officers, published today by Inside Higher Ed and Hanover Research. The survey was answered by 401 provosts (or the equivalent position if a college doesn’t have a provost). The respondents are nationally representative and produce a margin of error of 4.51 percent. Provosts are deeply committed to academic freedom, but they are open (or 52 percent are) to other ways of protecting it.
