Policy & Committee

Tenure and Promotion Committee

Auspices

The Tenure/Promotion Committee is a standing committee of the College of Design, Art & Performance and receives authority for its actions through the Dean and the Directors' Council.

Charge

The Tenure/Promotion Committee is responsible for reviewing applications for tenure, promotion, and/or midpoint reviews, and advises the Dean and Directors of the College of Design, Art & Performance of its recommendations. The committee reports to the Dean on matters pertaining to the qualifications of each candidate for tenure, promotion, and/or midpoint review. Responsibilities include the review and evaluation of the candidate's application materials and supporting documentation. The committee will also advise the Dean, Directors, and faculty of the College on the format of the application materials, the criteria for its evaluation, and shall aid them in developing, reviewing and updating the format and criteria in accordance with the University Guidelines for Tenure and Promotion. Additionally, the Committee will consult the Tenure and Promotion Guidelines developed by each individual School when evaluating applicants in that unit.

Operating Procedure

The committee will develop its own operating procedures in accordance with the College Bylaws and University Guidelines for Tenure and Promotion. Functions of the committee include:

  1. Provision for the review of applications for tenure, promotion, and/or midpoint reviews within the College and University schedules. Duties include reviewing the complete tenure and promotion application and supporting documentation held by the Associate Dean, voting on tenure and promotion decisions, and making written recommendations for tenure, promotion and/or midpoint reviews to the Dean.
  2. A committee member from a given academic unit may not vote on a recommendation concerning a member of his/her unit and may not volunteer opinions about the fitness of the candidate for tenure, promotion, and/or midpoint review. However, s/he may give the committee specific information about matters unique to the discipline and respond to direct questions to assist the committee in assessing the fitness of the candidate for tenure, promotion, and/or midpoint review.
  3. The committee reserves the right to invite other members of the faculty unit of the candidate for consultation on matters that will assist the committee in assessing the fitness of the candidate for tenure, promotion, and/or midpoint review.
  4. The Associate Dean will convene the initial committee meeting, charge the committee, call for the election of the committee chairperson, and facilitate the committee's activities in order to assure completion of the process in accordance with the College and University guidelines. The chairperson will thereafter convene the T&P committee and Promotion to Full Professor subcommittee as needed, assuring completion of the committee's duties within the College and University schedules.
  5. Voting will be by secret ballot and the recommendation of the committee will be forwarded to the Dean with a written rationale for the recommendation. The Dean is not obliged to accept the recommendation, but will inform the committee of the reason for not accepting a recommendation. Deliberations, findings, and data of this committee will be treated with the same degree of confidentiality as the balance of the tenure/promotion/midpoint review file.
  6. The final written evaluation for each candidate will be written by a designated member of the committee that is not from the candidate's unit. This written evaluation will be submitted to and approved by the evaluating committee.

Membership

  • Faculty members will be elected for one-year terms by the faculty from their academic unit. The membership will consist of three elected representatives from each academic unit plus one elected alternate. The four representatives from each unit will include:
    • a minimum of one tenured Full Professor
    • two other tenured Associate or Full Professors
    • an alternate tenured Full Professor
  • The alternate tenured Full Professor will serve in instances of committee member 'conflict of interest' as the substitute from the academic unit, and/or will serve, when named by the unit, on the Promotion to Full Professor sub-committee.
  • The Promotion to Full Professor subcommittee will consist of two Full Professors from each academic unit. The units will be responsible for identifying the two Full Professors from those elected as alternate and the elected college committee. Terms run for one-year from September 1 to August 31. An academic unit chair or director is not eligible to serve on this committee unless s/he is the only tenured member of that academic unit.
  • In the event an academic unit has no faculty of Full Professor rank, then the committee members and the alternate from the unit will be tenured Associate Professors. In this case, that unit will be represented on the Full Professor subcommittee at the Associate Professor rank.
  • The chairperson of the committee must be elected from and by the committee membership with voting privileges in accordance with the committees operating procedures.