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[crjuprofsteve]

I'm a tenured associate professor at a master's comprehensive university.  This year, I'm chairing my department's promotion committee.  It hasn't been too long since I was up for tenure and promotion, myself. 

At my institution, the Faculty Handbook gives scant guidance on tenure and promotion criteria, beyond indicating that a terminal degree is required, as is satisfactory performance in teaching, research, and service.  Departments then set more specific internal criteria pertinent to their disciplines and departmental expectations.

The Faculty Handbook is likewise vague about preparation of the tenure and promotion application.  The Handbook indicates that the application should a statement justifying tenure/promotion, copies of yearly evaluations from the chair, a summary of student evaluatins, a CV, and whatever other supporting material the candidate chooses to include.  Department guidelines provide no further guidance.

Needless to say, tenure and promotion applications here are quite hefty, containing a lot of materials.  But, there is no uniform standard for what to be included, what order to put it in, how long it should be, etc.  This results in packages that can differ dramatically from one another.

Having said that...here's my question.  Does your university, college, or department have a set format for tenure and promotion applications?  Either way, do you think it's better to allow the candidate to develop their own package, or to have more firm guidelines?  I'm thinking I'm going to raise this same discussion in my personnel committee.

[espagnole]

Sounds like we work at the same school. At my university, there is no set way to prepare or submit promotion and tenure materials, and different people do it very differently. Some use binders, others (myself included) use file boxes etc. The main thing is that each of the main categories (T,R,S) are addressed. When I was preparing my tenure file, I asked some senior colleagues I trusted for copies of their narratives and for advice on how they put the file together. But then I followed much of their advice but ultimately did what worked best for me. I would be reluctant to support a "one size fits all" format for the applications, although I fully support giving junior colleagues access to mentors and sample files that have been successful. The big issue, at least at my school, is that so much of the process is veiled in secrecy.

[rjenny]

I'm all for clarity in establishing guidelines--as long as such guidelines work across disciplines. At my university our contract mandates we submit an updated CV, sample publications or evidence of research (if in visual arts, for instance...), sample course syllabi, and teaching evaluations. In addition, I was advised to submit a teaching dossier, complete with a statement re: my pedagogy. Luckily I had one, but some didn't, and were stuck running around at the last minute putting one together. Had this been clear in the contract....

Having a set of criteria lets us untenured know what to expect, and what we will be judged on. It also provides clarity in advance about how we will be evaluated so we can prepare. The more vague the guidelines, in my opinon, the more an opportunity exists for personal biases to enter the picture, or even the appearence thereof. And even the specter of personal bias can be a disaster if someone is turned back (or down).