According to the American Association of Community Colleges (AACC), about 45 percent of all first-time freshman are enrolled at one of the US's 1,166 community colleges. Teaching chemistry and many other subjects employs many scientists and engineers. According to the American Chemical Society's Salaries 2001, approximately eight percent of respondents are teaching at community colleges. But one attribute they all agree on is that to work successfully in a community college setting you must love to teach.

"If you don't want to teach, it's not the place for you," says Elizabeth Smith, professor of chemistry at Northampton Community College in Bethlehem, PA. "If you want to teach, it's a great place."

But be forewarned the teaching loads are large. Cinzia Muzzi, a professor of chemistry, Truckee Meadows Community College in Reno, Nevada, teaches three classes. Each class has two one-and-half-hour lectures each week and a three-hour lab once a week, with about 28 students per class. "I teach all of it; I don't have any teaching assistants," she says. "I do all the grading and write all the exams." Muzzi received her Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of California, Davis three years ago. She was a teaching assistant while a graduate student and enjoyed the personal interaction with her students. She also participated in Davis's Program in College Teaching, which allows graduate students to work with a mentor, in her case a chemistry professor, to team teach classes. At Davis the classes she taught typically had 80 to 100 students, with five teaching assistants. "I saw the TAs, but rarely did I see the students."

But the increase in teaching is OK with Muzzi, who set out to teach in a community college setting. "I get to concentrate solely on teaching, which is one thing that's very important to me."

This was her primary reason for her coming to a community college. "While I was an undergraduate I had taken one course at a community college and that had a huge impact on me," she remembers. "I always thought why aren't all my other courses this small, with this interaction with the instructor."

The best place to start learning about community colleges is to visit the AACC Web site and visit a college in your area. In addition to broad information about community colleges, it has a college locator and a career center with a searchable job bank, a resume posting service, and information about professional development and internships.

A Ph.D. or not?

To land a position at a community college, you might need a Ph.D. now, says Smith, who as an MS in chemistry. Mickey Sarquis, director of the Center for Chemistry Education, at Miami University in Middletown, Ohio, agrees, saying that a Ph.D. is not an absolute, but a minimum of a master's is needed.

Counters John Clevenger, also a professor of chemistry at Truckee Meadows Community College, the necessary qualifications really depend on the community college administration, setting, and location. "It partly depends on the market and the nature of the college itself. For instance when we advertised [for a position] although we advertised for a minimum of an MS degree, no one with a masters was even competitive in the process." He says they didn't have the experience, depth, and background.

On the other hand, there are other community colleges, depending on the applicant pool, location, and how a college views itself, where a Ph.D. might be viewed as a negative, seeing the Ph.D. recipient as being ultimately more interested in research than teaching. "Someone setting out to apply would really need to find out as much about the institution and then target their application towards what the institution is looking for," advises Clevenger.

Davis's Program in College Teaching gave her an edge, says Muzzi, because participants discussed everything from how to hold office hours to diversity in the classroom, which helped her better answer questions about pedagogical issues on the community college job applications. "I also knew that community colleges are very sensitive to the fact that their standards are just as rigorous for parallel university courses," she adds. "I was able to address all of those issues."

Nevertheless, community college educators stress that you need to demonstrate teaching experience before applying for any of these types of positions. "Almost no one is competitive in a community college job search without having some kind of teaching and this is more than just being a teaching assistant in grad school," says Clevenger. Community colleges hire part-time, contractual adjunct instructors, so this is one way to get the appropriate experience.

Muzzi says that community colleges ideally like to get to know potential full-time instructors first before hiring because of the small department size, so try to part-time teach for the community college in which you're interested. She also suggests students look into programs like Preparing Future Faculty (PFF) that help students learn to teach. PFF is a collaborative effort of the Association of American Colleges and Universities and the Council of Graduate Schools that works with colleges and universities to coordinate professional development activities for students who aspire to academic careers. (ACS is a participant in this effort.) ACS's Division of Chemistry Education also holds seminars in teaching practices.

Pluses and Minuses

For Sarquis one of the personal advantages to working at a community college is that she likes the array of students that these colleges attract, from advanced-placement high school students to traditional freshman just out of high school to returning adult learners who postponed their education to those who are there for their own edification. "I like the heterogeneity," she says. "And the students also benefit from this."

Another plus, agree many community college professors, is that the students value their education more than most since many pay for it themselves through part-time work and loans, and because many are older students who have been out in the "real world" for a while. "It's rewarding in the sense that the students truly value their education," says Clevenger. "It's more of the non-traditional students. Lots of my students are single working mothers."

For some the disadvantage includes the small-sized departments. Smith's department employs three full time chemists and some part-time," from all walks of life that bring a practical flavor." So colleague interaction could be low at times.

But for Clevenger, these small departments foment interaction with people outside the instructor's main discipline. "To me the advantages are you get to work with creative people. I find that really stimulating."

Karen Young Kreeger is a freelance science writer based in Ridley Park, PA.