Robert Baukus, associate professor of advertising, and Maria Cabrera-Baukus, associate broadcast/cable professor, came to the University from the Boston area. The fourth married addition to the school is Ronald Bettig and Angela Valdivia, both mass communications instructors.

Dean Brian Winston characterized 1988 as an "unusual hiring year," but said he does not consider it strange to have so many married couples in the school. Other colleges in the University also have professors who are married to each other, he said.

The school hired a total of 14 new instructors last year in response to expanding student enrollment, Winston said. Each of these people had an individual claim on the jobs available in terms of the natural recruitment search, he said, noting that the choices were not difficult.

"The main criterion is, would we still hire these people if they were not married. These people were all at the top of the selection pile, so that wasn't a problem." he said.

The school has not had to contend with communications couples in which one spouse is qualified but the other is lower in the selection scale, Winston said, commenting that he would not allow himself to get into a position where he was forced to hire an unqualified person to keep a couple together.

"You can't distort the search procedure for the sake of hiring spouses. The students would not be well-served," he said.

Knowlton said he believes his marriage-work arrangement holds some distinct advantages.

"We take home more of our jobs than would other faculty," he said. Because Knowlton and Freeman work in the same department, their ideas get a more sympathetic ear at home, he added.

Freeman noted that she would not have taken the job if her husband had not also been offered a position. "We need two incomes and we were looking for a place where we could both find a job," she added.

Bettig pinpointed another benefit of merging workplaces with your marriage partner. "The difference is our being able to share the day's events, issues, and problems and being able to relate instantly to them," he said. Because they have the same work it is easier to consider their roles and use that as another basis of "commonality," he added.

Parsons, who came to the University with his wife three years ago, pointed to the potential difficulties of sharing a workplace with your spouse. It may pose a problem professionally as people see the two as a couple instead of individuals with their own ideas and ideologies, he said. Given the choice, both he and his wife would adamantly refuse to be put in the same office because of this danger, he said.

Of the married professors, the Keefers are the only couple who share an office. Though other married professors in the school may prefer sharing an office, this decision is not up to them because space in Carnegie Building is limited, Winston said. Office space is allocated according to what Winston calls the "shoehorn principle," which places them wherever space exists.

Winston said he does not expect 1989 to bring as many married couples to the school's faculty. Of eight prospective communications teachers, he is already aware of six whose who either have no spouse or whose spouses are seeking a position elsewhere.

Attracting able professors --particularly those with spouses -- to the University is sometimes difficult, Winston said, because of State College's relatively isolated position in the center of Pennsylvania.

A job opportunity for one spouse must be complemented by a position for the other, in most cases, said Jan Davidson, coordinator of the Dual Career Employment Assistance Program in Rider Building.

This University program was created to ensure that spouses get a fair chance at possible job openings, she said, explaining that she and her coworkers provide information and guidance to spouses of recruited faculty or staff. DCEA attempts to explain the University's hiring procedure to these couples so they have a better chance at securing employment here, she said.