Good Practices
Good Practices
(April 21, 1999)
Drafted by Faculty Senate P&T Transition Committee, 4/21/1999
Members: Mike Duffy, LuAnn Gaskill, David Hopper, Jerry Thomas, Dean Ulrichson(chair), Faye Whitaker.The Promotion and Tenure Policy document dated 12/3/1998 describes the process to be used in review, evaluation and promotion and tenure of faculty members. The document is quite specific in some statements on process and content but it does not provide a sense of what is deemed to be good practice. This document is advisory only and was prepared to provide what the committee thought represented good practices for preparation and documentation of a case for promotion and tenure. Colleges and departments are free to modify and use the suggestions at their discretion.
This document deals with "Good Practices" in four areas: A. the candidate; B. the DEO and departmental committee; C. the external review letters; and, D. the timeline.
A. The Candidate
1. Keep excellent records of all your activities. Undocumented effort will not help achieve promotion and/or tenure. Consult your mentor, your senior colleagues, and your DEO when preparing for review.
2. Create files or folders in which you record your accomplishments related to annual review, promotion and tenure.
3. Get copies of the university, your college, and departmental P&T documents and read and understand them.
4. Prepare a short personal checklist of the items needed and the tasks to be completed as part of the P&T process.
5. Keep a dated record of your professional responsibility statement and show any changes as they occur. A historical record will document changes in focus, in time allocation, and in productivity. If the PRS does not reflect the work you are actually doing, discuss this with your DEO and work together to have it reflect actual activity.
6. Prepare your promotion and tenure vita and make it a routine practice to make entries (such as recent publications, grants and awards) - at least once a month. Keep your vita on your computer and update it electronically. This will help keep your records up-to-date and also help monitor your progress.
7. Determine the format your college or department is using for the teaching, research, and outreach/professional practice portfolios and maintain the appropriate portfolios just as you do your vita.
8. If you are on a joint appointment, document which department is your primary department and which is your secondary. Investigate and understand the promotion and tenure processes in both departments.
9. Work with your mentor to learn the culture of your department, to understand the performance standards of the department, and to understand the support available for your professional activities.
10. Cultivate relationships in professional organizations and societies to develop a group of professionals outside the institution that know you and your work.
11. If non-tenured, carefully select and focus your opportunities for institutional service. Do not become over committed to committee work.
12. As your career develops, consider how you will describe your scholarly activities in the teaching, research/creative activities and extension/professional practice areas. Does the balance among these activities conform to your Position Responsibility Statement? Do your annual reviews support this balance?
13. When in doubt, don't wait, ask questions.
B. The DEO and the Departmental Committee.
The faculty in a department and the Chair (DEO) have major responsibilities in the faculty promotion and tenure process. Every department should mentor junior faculty toward successful movement through the academic ranks since the investment of faculty resources is the largest component of a department's (and the university's) budget. While senior faculty and the DEO have the responsibility to evaluate junior faculty, they also have the responsibility to mentor them. These dual responsibilities may lead to conflicts among faculty and/or the DEO about promotion and tenure issues. This brief document may assist in preparing successful applications for promotion or tenure.
Assisting Candidates in Preparation
The departmental governance document should address the issue of who is to be of assistance to a candidate for promotion or tenure. The passive voice is used here to avoid suggestions of how that is done.
1. Faculty should be assisted in preparing their vita and other materials for the most effective presentation. A good set of promotion and tenure materials should have the following characteristics:
a. They are carefully and thoroughly prepared
b. Repetition is avoided
c. Everything cited is correct (e.g., papers published, grants, books)
d. The candidate's strengths are highlighted (e.g., place important items early in the document)
e. The material is organized to present professional performance clearly
f. The readability is high and the proper audience is identified.
2. The candidate should be assisted in preparing an effective letter of application or personal narrative. Characteristics often include:
a. An overview and analysis of the candidate's scholarly efforts
b. An analysis of the candidate's research/creative activity record; if competitive grants are identified, how do they relate to the candidate's research record,if multiple-author papers are included, what is the candidate's role in the work
c. An indication of teaching strengths including how the candidate views his/her pedagogical approach
d. An analysis of student perceptions of the candidate as a teacher, mentor, and advisor
e. How the candidate's professional service relates to his/her record
f. How the candidate's extension/professional practice efforts are related to his/her research/creative activities and teaching
g. The candidate's role as an academic citizen
Evaluating Candidates
1. Evaluations should be based on objective data concerning the candidate's record as well as on external and internal evaluations. However, a candidate's contributions to departmental goals and his/her affect on departmental rapport are valid issues to consider.
2. The Promotion and Tenure Committee is closest to the candidate's work. The committee must evaluate both the quality and quantity of that work. Committees and administrators at higher levels are in a weaker position to evaluate the quality and contributions of a candidate's work and they may not see all of the materials.
3. The Promotion and Tenure Committee and the DEO should write independent, objective evaluations of the candidate that carefully analyze the material. All candidates have strengths and weaknesses and these should be carefully assessed and commented on by evaluators at the departmental level.
4. Department governance documents should specify how the Promotion and Tenure Committee and the DEO evaluate and prepare materials for promotion and tenure.
Departmental procedures may well differ but the goal should be to obtain two relatively independent assessments. The Promotion and Tenure Committee and the DEO should stay in close communication throughout the process. In some departments this may include the DEO sitting with the Promotion and Tenure Committee as they deliberate. Certainly the DEO can better understand the decision-making process if present during that process. However, this may compromise the independence of the two decisions.
5. The DEO's evaluation should focus on analysis of the candidate's record; not the reiteration of data in the candidate's vita or the external letters. This includes issues like
a. How the candidate's record compares to other successful candidates
b. Special features of the candidate's materials (e.g., outstanding publications, special recognition)
c. Points that may need clarification or contextual explanation relative to statements made by the Promotion and Tenure Committee
d. An analysis of the quality of the external reviewers, their relationship to the candidate and perhaps a contextual discussion of their reviews and disagreements
e. An analysis of the candidate's effectiveness in teaching/learning, mentoring and advising
Materials to be forwarded from the department
When materials go forward from the Department to the next level, the following should be included (College governance documents may specify additional materials.):
1. The candidate's letter of application or personal narrative as described previously;
2. The candidate's vita documenting contributions to scholarship in teaching, research/creative activities, and extension/professional practice;
3. At least 4 external letters of evaluation with a short vitae for each evaluator;
4. Documentation of the candidates effectiveness with students;
5. A memo from the Promotion and Tenure Committee analyzing the candidates strengths and weaknesses;
6. A memo from the DEO analyzing: a) the candidate's strengths and weaknesses, b) the evaluation by the Promotion and Tenure Committee, and c) in some cases, a contextual discussion of the external letters of evaluation;
7. A university cover page that has been completed with appropriate departmental information;
8. Other information only if deemed critical to the evaluation of the candidate.
The Promotion and Tenure Committee and the DEO are responsible for documenting that materials are correct and statements are accurate. Committees and administrators beyond the departmental level must be able to assume the documentation and evaluations sent forward are accurate and complete.
C. External Evaluations
1. Departmental governance documents should specify the procedure for selecting external reviewers. Characteristics of "good" external reviewers typically include:
a. their focus in scholarship is similar to the candidates
b. they are well-known for their work
c. the majority are at institutions similar to ISU (e.g., Research I, similar levels of programs, peer institutions)
d. they may know the candidate, but they should not be closely tied (e.g., former advisor)
2. Letters to evaluators must be carefully written to elicit the evaluator's comments with regard to any specific claims that will be made in the promotion or tenure recommendation letters written by the departmental committee and DEO. Example letters for each of the two most common cases (promotion and tenure, and promotion to professor) are attached and will be available on the Provost's web page in the near future.
D. Timeline
Working back from the Regent's due-date sets the department's submission date for promotion and tenure materials. The departmental evaluation process needs to begin early enough to provide time for external evaluators to respond and for other materials to be collected.
