By 1958, Gunn was managing editor of University of Kansas Alumni Publications. He became a faculty member of the university, where he served as the director of public relations and as a Professor of English, specializing in science fiction and fiction writing. He was a professor emeritus and director of the Center for the Study of Science Fiction, which awards the annual John W. Campbell Memorial Award for best novel and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award at the Campbell Conference in Lawrence, Kansas, every summer.