Surrendering the Dream

Abstract

This study describes the nature and experience of professional conflict in relation to faculty satisfaction. Part of a longitudinal investigation of faculty identity development in education, this analysis concentrates on nine participants who spontaneously expressed disillusionment with their academic career and considered leaving higher education. Conflict narratives from multiple interviews are analyzed using the constant comparative method. Findings indicate that personal experiences of professional conflict correspond to an individual’s motivating force (source of meaningfulness) and disrupting force (interruption to meaningfulness), thus the disillusioning process evolves along a continuum of expectation and disposition, resulting in differential thresholds of faculty dissatisfaction. Furthermore, conflict is explored as a source of professional transformation and development of faculty identity.