The provost provided an update to Senate at its April meeting about faculty hiring that's been occurring across the University so far this year. A total of 35 new tenure and teaching track faculty members have been hired and approximately another ten searches are still underway.

“Faculty renewal has been our priority for some time,” said provost Ilene Busch-Vishniac. “As we continue to struggle with the budget challenges we've made a clear commitment that our priority is ensuring that we are able to renew and strengthen full-time faculty positions. It doesn't mean that we're in better financial shape than other universities that have imposed hiring freezes but it does reflect our commitment to faculty renewal and the long-term benefits it brings to the entire university.”

The new faculty members will be joining areas across the University with the most significant hiring in Humanities and Business. Twenty-eight of the positions are tenure track and the rest are in the teaching track stream.

Busch-Vishniac says, “Faculty hiring is about continuously improving McMaster's strength as both a teaching and research university. It's the best way to ensure that we are able to integrate the research experience into the classroom and to support McMaster's ability to maintain and strengthen its role as one of only four Canadian universities listed in the Top 100 in the World.

“Full-time faculty appointments are where faculty and students tells us they want us to focus our resources and it is the best strategy to achieve our goals in both teaching and research. But there's only so much money and each department still needs to balance its budget and realign resources to support the new faculty hiring they've been able to do.”

The searches for new faculty have drawn outstanding candidates from around the world. The majority of the new faculty members will join the University this summer.