Professors and associate professors
A faculty member's title reflects his or her status in the process of seeking tenure—a six-year probationary period in which the candidate's skills as a scholar, instructor, and researcher are evaluated by colleagues and department administrators.

Instructors who have been granted tenure include some 1,300 professors and associate professors at Iowa. Because the tenure process is so demanding, we count these individuals among our most distinguished instructors. They lead courses at the undergraduate and graduate level and allow students to help with research projects. Typically, these individuals are nationally or internationally recognized in their area of expertise.

Meet our Top Professors
Watch Faculty Video: Another Look at Iowa

Assistant professors
Assistant professors are instructors in the process of seeking tenure. To become an assistant professor, an individual must show promising ability as a teacher and hold a doctoral degree or its equivalent in his or her chosen field. There are approximately 400 assistant professors on Iowa's faculty, teaching in virtually every academic area.

UI faculty achievements
Iowa's faculty includes three Pulitzer Prize winners (journalism professor Steve Berry and Writers' Workshop faculty members Marilynne Robinson and James Alan McPherson), two Medal of Science winners, and is well represented in the nation's most prestigious scholarly academies.

• 17 American Institute of Medicine members
• 16 American Academy of Nursing fellows
• 9 American Academy of Arts and Sciences inductees
• 4 Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigators
• 4 National Academy of Sciences members
• 1 National Academy of Engineering member