An Investigation of the First Day's Teaching Experioences of Faculty Members: A Qualitative Study

The present study aimed to investigate the faculty members’ experiences of the first days of teaching at public Universities in Western Iran.
The present study employed qualitative research method based on Grounded theory. Theoretical saturation index was employed to select the participants who were 54 university professors in four different universities¡ including University of Kurdistan¡ Lurestan University¡ Ilam University¡ Razi University and Bu-Ali Sina University. Data were collected through semi-structured audiovisual recording interviews and their content was transcribed. The interview data were analyzed in three stages¡ including open¡ axial and selective coding steps¡ and categorized as concepts and themes.
Findings: The analeses of the present study indicate that the main themes grounded from interviews are: (1) the development of endogenous factors (including concepts like: individual psychological characteristics of novice faculty members¡ and the exchange of professional experiences among colleagues); and (2) the development of exogenous factors (including concepts like: a revision of the implementation of training courses; and modification of obstacles and supporting the training courses). Based on these factors¡ given from the experiences of faculty members from the first days of teaching¡ the Grounded conceptual model has been presented.