AT the end of the school year through summer, besides preparing final marks, academics give time to compiling evidences of their growth and development for purposes of academic ranking. The most common labels of academic ranks in higher education are instructor, assistant professor, associate professor, full professor and university professor.

In many campuses, “professor” is most often used to refer to or address an academic especially one with no doctorate degree. Otherwise, if the academic has a doctorate degree, he/she would be addressed as “doctor.” With globalization in our midst, it is much more likely that there would be visiting professors from cross border HEI’s spending their sabbatical leave in Philippine HEI’s. The commonly used title of “professor” to address non-doctorates could mislead visiting academics to thinking that Philippine HEI’s are not wanting of academics with doctorates since everyone has achieved “professorship” – a much coveted level of academic ranking.