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[deadcatbounce]

I am a new department chair at an R1 university. The way that we have historically solicited feedback on candidates for tenure and/or promotion has been to ask for letters addressed to the chair. Now that I am that person, I've learned that that generates extremely low response rates, usually about 10 to 20% of the department, and the letters usually come from the candidate's friends and allies.

I am considering proposing that we change to a meeting of tenured people to discuss each applicant for tenure, and a meeting of those at the rank or above for those seeking promotion. About half our departments do this at my university, so it permissible.

I am hoping for any thoughts for or against this kind of change. The fear would be that this could increase disagreement in the department, or make people afraid to voice their opinions. I'll be talking to some other department chairs here, but I thought I'd throw the question out there.

[oatmeal]

OP--I suggest whatever you decide to do that you take it slowly, have lots of consultation with colleagues, other chairs and your dean and make sure it is in keeping with the university's faculty manual and tenure and promotion rules/guidelines. I would also suggest that this only take effect next academic year at the earliest, so that no one in "mid process" for tenure or promotion is impacted. I would also meet with every single untenured faculty member to assure them that you are not changing standards, only some procedures. As a chair, this is what I did when we changed some of the procedures. The whole department, including untenured colleagues should vote on any procedural changes and you will want a large majority if you chairship is not tainted or even ruined by it. If the vote is close, that will probably be difficult for you and for the department.

I do not think you should suggest changing the rules on soliciting written feedback. Some tenured faculty like this (many do not), and even if it is allies who write in support, that is normally obvious in what they write. No written comments would seem strange, especially to committees and administrators further up the food chain. I am surprised that not all the tenured faculty meet to discuss and vote on a colleague up for tenure. That is rather routine. Or, do you have a specific committee that does this and then reports the vote to the tenured members of the department? A meeting that discusses but does not vote (or write a recommendation for tenure and/or promotion) is probably not much use and would be a minefield for a law suit if someone is denied (who said what in a meeting, for example). All this might increase disagreement in a department, especially if there are "difficult" colleagues or those that grandstand. But that is inevitable if you have faculty like that and they will find other ways to be like that. It should only be tenured faculty for tenure cases and full professors for promotion to full; this is common. I would also suggest that you see if your discipline's association has suggestions for procedures.

Good luck. It will take a while and will involve a lot of conversations and some discussion (sometimes heated) but it will be worth it. So long as the process is fair and seen to be fair, it should work.

[snowbound]

So who currently makes the department-level decision on whether to recommend for tenure?  The Chair?  Sees like you are trying to broaden the decision-making base, which I think many will welcome.  Even if the present system has worked well in the past, it could easily be a problem in the future if there's a conflict between candidate and chair