From the initial job interview until the faculty portfolio is submitted, tenure-track professors shed the proverbial blood, sweat, and tears worrying they won’t make the grade.
A statement of intellectual development is a required part of tenure dossiers at most colleges and universities (Boyce & Aguilera, 2021; Vega & Hengartner, 2021).
Although they are a fairly recent innovation, most faculty are familiar with teaching philosophy statements. Many have prepared them for job interviews, for promotion and tenure dossiers, for teaching awards, or for personal benefit.
Hiring, promotion, and tenure activities are full of risk and potential landmines. Poor hiring decisions are not only costly, but the hiring process itself opens the institution up to litigation if everyone on the hiring committee is not trained properly.
Administrators can help inspire much-needed reform of the tenure and promotion processes at their institutions if they begin discussions of reducing the workload of both candidates and committees in the following three ways.
Despite the admirable goal of improving student learning by assessment, many faculty members are uneasy about participating in assessment-related activities. One way to overcome negative feelings about assessment while promoting improved student learning is to encourage faculty to engage in the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL).
A recent informal poll conducted by Magna Publications asked, “Would you like to see student affairs work more closely with academic affairs on your campus? What is preventing—or encouraging—collaboration on your campus?”
Most higher education institutions include language in their mission statements about the importance of diversity, but they often fall short when it comes to retaining faculty of color, says Christine A. Stanley, executive associate dean of faculty affairs at Texas A&M University, and editor of Faculty of Color: Teaching in Predominantly White Colleges and Universities (Anker Publishing, April 2006).
Incorporating material that addresses diversity issues in classes has positive effects on a number of learning outcomes. The success of efforts to make curricula more diverse depends to a large degree on faculty willingness to incorporate these materials because control of the curriculum remains in faculty hands—both collectively, in terms of course and program approval processes, and individually, in terms of daily decisions about what to teach.
Until recently, George Mason University’s tenure requirements were typical of most research institutions: research was the primary activity; teaching and service, though important, were secondary. During the past six years, GMU created new paths to tenure that recognize the different types of contributions that faculty can make to the university.