Colleges accredited to award bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees are required to maintain the highest level of qualifications for instructor certification. Because these college and university teaching positions are so competitive, instructors usually have a doctoral degree in the subject that they teach as well as a significant record of scholarly publication. Certification for these college instructor positions requires instructors to provide original transcripts documenting all coursework leading to the awarding of a graduate degree.
If students are going to be able to transfer their class credit to another college, they will need to prove that their instructor is certified to teach that subject. Community colleges that offer two-year degrees usually require a master's degree for instructors who want to teach transferable academic classes. Instructors who want to teach in a subject outside of their master's degree may be certified if they complete an additional 18 graduate semester credits in the new subject.
Students who are taking classes for self-improvement or career development may not need to transfer those classes to another college. The certification standards for instructors who teach these classes are not as rigorous. Many two-year colleges do not require a graduate degree but rather use a combination of education and work experience for certification for instructors for these classes. Some colleges also recognize high school teacher certification in assessing certification for college instructors who teach nontransfer classes.
Community college instructors who wish to teach specialized or technical nontransfer classes may be certified without any college degree if they can prove professional or artistic skills. Certification for these college instructor positions varies a lot depending on the college and the discipline. For example, the North Orange County Community College will certify college instructors to teach applied apprenticeship classes if they have a high school diploma and six years of occupational experience with two years of journeyman-level experience.
All levels of college instructors must maintain their certification according to the standards of their regional accreditation agency. These standards vary but always require documentation of a certain number of hours of continuing education in the discipline taught. For example, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools requires that each certified college instructors attend at least eight hours of workshops, classes or conferences each year in the subject they teach.