Abstract The academic training of professionals influences the evolution and future direction of scientific disciplines. However, the training background and demographic composition of weed science faculty have not been systematically characterized. To address this, we conducted an Internet-based survey of weed science faculty at universities in the United States of America (USA). This included the academic fields of the degrees these faculty had received, the institutions that granted these degrees, which USA state or country (if outside the USA) the degrees came from, the current academic rank of each faculty member, whether the faculty held leadership positions at their university, and the gender of each faculty member. We identified 223 faculty at 50 universities. They received their degrees from institutions in 24 countries and 39 USA states. Most of their BS degrees were in agronomy and crop science or plant science, physiology, and genetics, with few weed science and ecology degrees. Weed science and ecology representation increased at the MS level and became the most common doctoral training area. A plurality of the faculty were professors (48.9%), followed by assistant professors (28.7%), associate professors (19.7%), lecturers (0.9%) and unidentified rank (1.8%). Men made up 82.5% of the faculty with women at 17.5%. Men also held more of the leadership positions (84.4%) than women (15.6%). These findings provide the first comprehensive overview of the weed science academic workforce of the USA and establish a baseline for evaluating future trends in training pathways, disciplinary identity, workforce diversity, and potential continental or international comparisons.
Babaei et al. (Thu,) studied this question.