DOC I-06-10
PROPOSAL TO THE ACADEMIC SENATE
Please see the minutes of the Faculty affairs committee for on-going changes to this document.
TITLE: UNIVERSITY
PROMOTION & TENURE COMMITTEE
.
SUBMITTED BY: Provost Committee
DATE: September 25, 2006
ACTION: To Be Determined: The document has been assigned to all
standing committees with the Faculty Affairs Committee taking primary
responsibility for finalizing the document.
Once this is completed, the action will be assigned.
REFERENCE:
Will require faculty vote
I. Background-Provost’s
Charge to P&T Committee (Lead: Tom Lasley)
In
recent years the Academic Affairs Committee (formerly Academic Policies and
Programs Committee) of the Board of Trustees has expressed concerned about its
role in promotion and tenure review. It
is the committee’s wish to contribute to this process not by ruling on
individual cases, but instead by focusing on matters of process and
oversight. Current trends reflect that
this is perhaps the most appropriate way for Boards to be engaged. The Board of Trustees has the right and
authority to remove itself from the promotion and tenure process, but to do so
in a manner consistent with the Constitution of the Academic Senate would
require approval of the Academic Senate and a vote by the full-time tenure and
tenure track faculty with at least 50% voting and 50% of those voting being in
favor. Before it removes itself from the
current practice of individual case review, the Board would like to see a
strengthening of the Tenure and Promotion processes at the university-wide
level, as well as consistency in practices across the Schools and the College. The Academic Affairs Committee believes that
one way to strengthen the Promotion and Tenure process would be to obtain wider
involvement of faculty at the final stages of the process. This subcommittee will suggest a policy for
university-wide review to be forwarded to the Provost. The Provost will forward the policy along
with his comments to the Academic Senate for its consideration. The subcommittee will also recommend what
common practices should be shared by all of the academic units.
II. Issue
Considerations Deliberated by the Committee and A
Rationale for Committee Recommendations
In the
process of developing the University Promotion & Tenure Committee document,
the working committee identified a number of issues that needed to be resolved
in order to make specific recommendations for University P&T procedures and
policies. Outlined below are some of the
issues that were discussed and the rationale for the approach taken by the
committee working on the document being presented to the Academic Senate. After
considerable discussion it became apparent that the committee believes in the
general value, both for faculty and for the University overall, of having
broader, more representative faculty involvement in the P&T process at the
University level. Such a change
increases the fairness of the promotion and tenure process. In
essence, the proposal submitted by the committee responsible for revising the
P&T procedures focuses on enhancing faculty responsibility and power.
Issue 1:
Ensuring consistency among units with regard to P&T
procedures. At the present time,
P&T unit documents are dissimilar with respect to review and approval
practices. Members of the working
committee believe that these differences make it difficult for University
officials to ensure that due process, promotion decisions, and tenure decisions
are made evenly and fairly across units. As an example, some units now permit
assistant professors to be granted tenure whereas other units require promotion
to associate professor as a condition for tenure. This practice and other policy disparities
need to be addressed to ensure equal treatment for all faculty members.
Issue 2:
Focusing on procedural appeals as opposed to substantive
appeals. Members of the
working committee believe that a University P&T Committee should ensure
procedural consistency across units for promotion and tenure. This
responsibility includes the University P&T Committee’s involvement in
procedural appeals. Members of the working committee also believe that a
University P&T Committee should not be involved in purely substantive
appeals related to promotion and tenure.
Purely substantive appeals (e.g., those involving disputes over the
quality of academic publications or the quality of teaching) should be
processed through the respective academic units and ultimately resolved by the
Provost and the President. The proposal
to the Academic Senate integrates the process of appealing a dean’s
recommendation to the provost fully into the process of reviewing and approving
unit documents and into the basic calendars for promotion and tenure. Currently, the University Committee on
Academic Freedom and Tenure has little to do with the overall P&T process and
has limited familiarity with the applicable academic unit documents.
Issue 3:
Providing a uniform P&T calendar applicable to all
faculty seeking promotion and tenure that must be followed uniformly in all
units and sub-units. Currently, some dissimilarities
exist in timelines across the academic units. As an example, in some academic
units timelines for seeking promotion to full professor differ from timelines
for seeking promotion to associate professor. These differences can be
confusing and result in errors that may negatively impact a candidate. The
committee discussed this issue at length and agrees that it may be
efficacious to have the former on a different time schedule from the latter but
it could not reconcile a calendaring process for making this possible. Given that circumstance, the committee
decided to require that all candidates submit applications at the same
time. The committee is open to the
possibility of putting those applying for professor on a different time
schedule to ensure that all candidate applications can receive proper reviews.
Issue 4:
Creating a form for tracking promotion and tenure
applications. The committee believes that some type of tracking mechanism
should accompany all candidate applications.
A paper tracking form would require applicants and designated officials
to document by virtue of their signature that procedures designated in the unit
documents and University policy have been implemented correctly at each stage
of the decision-making process. A
University P&T Committee would include the tracking form to the Provost and
President as evidence in procedural appeals.
Issue 5:
Revising, where appropriate, extant University policies. The
committee believes that the adoption of new promotion and tenure procedures
necessitates a review of all current policies to ensure consistency between new
measures to be adopted and existing policies.
Issue 6:
Creating a committee composition that is appropriately
reflective of the faculty. The committee debated issues around representation and
specifically whether the University P&T Committee should consist only of
those at the rank of professor. It was
finally agreed that faculty at both the associate and professor ranks be
represented, but that they must be tenured.
III. The Proposal – A University Promotion &
Tenure Committee
A.
Committee Purposes
The University Promotion & Tenure Committee is created for the following purposes.
(i) The Committee has responsibility for reviewing and approving the guidelines for promotion and tenure (P&T) for all academic units (schools, libraries and college). It approves those guidelines that define clear, substantive and procedural criteria and are consistent with other University policies on P&T. Academic unit P&T documents must be reviewed and approved by the University P&T Committee whenever any changes occur in P&T guidelines.
(ii) The Committee has responsibility for hearing all procedural appeals. Appeals are considered solely on the grounds that: (a) approved academic unit and/or University P&T procedures or policies were not followed; or (b) impermissible criteria were used in making a P&T decision about a candidate’s application.
B.
Application and Review Process
(i) Candidates must submit their application and supporting documentation for promotion and/or tenure no later than September 1.
(ii)
The specific administrative process for submitting
material, including to whom to submit documentation, must be specified in each
academic unit’s P&T guidelines.
(iii)
Each academic unit P&T committee must make P&T
recommendations in writing to the appropriate academic Dean by November 15th
of each calendar year.
(iv)
Each academic unit Dean must inform candidates in
writing regarding his or her recommendation by November 30th.
(v)
Candidates receiving a negative recommendation who wish
to submit a rebuttal have until December 15th to do so.
(vi)
The respective Dean must send a recommendation in
writing to the Provost and inform the candidate of his or her decisions no later
than the first business day following January 1st.
C. Appeals to the Provost
(i) Materials submitted for promotion and/or tenure will contain a form on which the candidate, appropriate unit review committees, and academic unit Dean stipulate whether the established P&T review procedures of the academic unit have been followed.
(ii) This form must be completed prior to submitting materials to the Provost.
(iii) Candidates receiving a negative recommendation who believe that inappropriate procedures were followed, or who believe impermissible criteria were used in the P&T decision making process have until January 30th to file an appeal in writing to the Provost.
D. Provost Review Process
(i) The Provost will forward all procedural appeals to the University P&T Committee, which will review the appeals and make recommendations to the Provost by March 1st.
(ii) Once the appeals process is completed, the Provost, using the information received from both the academic dean and the University P&T Committee, will make a recommendation for all eligible candidates to the President, no later than March 10th.
(iii) Final administrative authority rests with the President. The Board of Trustees will receive a report of the P&T actions at its spring meeting.*
E. Committee Composition
(i)
The University P&T Committee shall consist of
eleven members, with three from the College (with one each from the Humanities
and Arts, the Social Sciences, and the Natural Sciences), two respectively from
Education, Engineering, and Business, and one each from the
(ii) All members are to be elected by their respective academic unit faculties.
(iii) The Committee shall elect a chair from those duly elected.
(iv) Members shall serve three-year terms (maximum of two consecutive terms, with staggered terms within and across units); all members must be tenured with rank of associate professor or professor and cannot hold an administrative appointment (including Department Chairs, Assistant and Associate Deans, Deans, and other full or part-time administrators with line authority).
*Note: The Provost, as a point of information, shares with the Board of Trustees through its Academic Affairs Committee, the disposition of each candidate’s application as well as overall trends (e.g., percentage of faculty at each rank, percentage of faculty hired who receive tenure, overall percentage of tenured faculty, etc.), reviews policies and practices, and answers any questions proffered by the Board of Trustees. 9/21/06