How To Become A Speech Professor: What It Is and Career Path

What is a speech professor and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

2 min read

Quoted expert

Alex Holte PhD

There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a speech professor. For example, did you know that they make an average of $39.47 an hour? That's $82,102 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 12% and produce 159,400 job opportunities across the U.S.

What general advice would you give to a speech professor?

Alex Holte PhD

Assistant Professor of Psychology, Website

My advice for someone new to the field of academia is to learn time management skills early and learn what type of service work you find interesting and would like to contribute to. From there, learn how to say “no” to opportunities that may not align with your goals as well. I feel a lot of new professors tend to find the need to be involved in everything, which can result in burning out later in their career.

ScoreSpeech ProfessorUS Average

Salary

6.4

Avg. Salary $82,102

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

5.9

Growth rate 12%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

5.2

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.27%

Asian 12.18%

Black or African American 4.93%

Hispanic or Latino 7.22%

Unknown 4.56%

White 70.84%

Gender

female 63.16%

male 36.84%

Age - 46

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 46

Stress level

5.9

Stress level is manageable

7.1 - high

Complexity level

7.7

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

7.1

Work life balance is good

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a speech professor

Explore speech professor education requirements

Most common speech professor degrees

Master's

50.0 %

Bachelor's

46.9 %

Doctorate

3.1 %

Start to develop specific speech professor skills

Skills	Percentages
Syllabus	41.98%
Course Objectives	37.18%
Public Speaking	14.04%
Instructional Strategies	6.80%

Complete relevant speech professor training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 2-4 years on post-employment, on-the-job training. New speech professors learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a speech professor based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real speech professor resumes.

Research speech professor duties and responsibilities

Develop and manage syllabus materials.
Develop curriculum, create syllabus and course materials.
Facilitate instruction for developing the thesis topic statement, qualitative and quantitative research design, and conducting a review of literature.
Double tutoring windows to improve student participation.

Prepare your speech professor resume

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