I am writing to call your attention to the 2022 – 2023 deadlines for various TPAC (Tenure, Promotions, and Appointments Committee) actions related to promotions, reappointments, and senior level appointments. It is essential that we schedule TPAC business so that these cases can be considered in a timely manner.
You will receive an invitation to the annual TPAC workshop under separate cover. This will be an in-person meeting on September 22nd, 12-1:30pm and I encourage you to attend.
Reappointment of Lecturers and Assistant Professors: Faculty eligible for reappointment and with contracts of four years or less are entitled to eight months’ notification of the disposition of their case: for contracts ending on June 30, 2023, notification must be made by November 1, 2022. In order to complete review by this date, we request that reappointment dossiers be submitted by September 15. Note that faculty with contracts ending December 31, 2023 require notice by May 1, 2023; such dossiers should be submitted by March 1, 2023. If you have other off-cycle appointments, please be in contact with Anne Windham (anne_windham@brown.edu) about the deadlines for submission.
Promotion and Tenure Reviews of Assistant Professors: Assistant Professors being considered for tenure and promotion to Associate Professor are to be informed of the outcome of their review one year in advance of the contract end date: for appointments ending June 30, 2024, notification must be made by June 30, 2023. As you can appreciate, it is crucial that TPAC have adequate time to consider these cases carefully. Tenure dossiers for assistant professors with contract end dates of June 30, 2024 are to be submitted by January 7, 2023, unless another submission date has been arranged with my office.
Please keep the following in mind for tenure cases as well as other types of promotions:
· the candidate does not have the right to see the department’s list of proposed evaluators, but does have the ability to suggest evaluators as well as to provide a list of any individuals whom the candidate does not want solicited for an evaluation.[1] We advise the candidate to supply no more than 3-4 names in order to preserve the balance of candidate-to-committee-recommended evaluators.
· the department will submit the final list of proposed evaluators to the appropriate divisional dean for review and comment before soliciting letters;
· in the event that a candidate elects an early tenure review (i.e. before the 7th year), the candidate’s contract will be adjusted to provide for one terminal year should promotion not be granted; and
· the candidate should be informed in writing of the department’s recommendation within one week of the department’s meeting. This written communication should briefly summarize the points of discussion at the meeting and convey the department’s recommendation without sharing the exact vote. This notification will be included in the dossier.
Reappointment of Senior Lecturers: Senior lecturers with six-year contracts also require a year’s notification regarding renewal and non-renewal, and TPAC needs adequate time for full consideration of these cases in the spring. Materials should be submitted by March 1, 2023.
Promotion from Associate Professor to Professor, from Lecturer to Senior Lecturer, or from Senior Lecturer to Distinguished Senior Lecturer: For promotions that do not involve an impending contract end date, we recommend submission of dossiers by December 1 in order to allow time for review in the spring semester. Because of the heavy load of cases in the spring, any dossiers arriving after February 15, 2023 cannot be guaranteed a spot on the spring docket for TPAC.
New appointments to Associate Professor and Professor: Although many searches don’t culminate until relatively late in the academic year, we are bound by the AAUP Guidelines that state that May 1 is the deadline by which offers of appointment for the next academic year must be made. In order to make an offer after that date, the permission of the other institution must be sought. Late submission of dossiers can therefore jeopardize our ability to make these appointments, therefore we request that all dossiers for external candidates be submitted no later than April 1, 2023.
A detailed description of review procedures is available in Chapter 10 and Appendix C of the Handbook of Academic Administration, which is posted on the DOF website:
http://www.brown.edu/about/administration/dean-of-faculty/handbook-academic-administration
The Tenure and Promotion page, on the Dean of the Faculty’s website, has recently been updated and is another important source of information.
https://www.brown.edu/about/administration/dean-of-faculty/faculty-review-and-promotion
Departmental Standards and Criteria Documents
Department chairs and managers have access to the Standards and Criteria page on the DoF website: https://dof.brown.edu/tenure-promotion/standards-criteria-and-reviews
Please review to ensure your department’s most recent document is there. If not, submit it to our office.
Special guidance for sharing Spring 2020 course feedback forms
Spring 2020 course feedback results are excluded from course feedback reports by default due to the interruptions and consequent modifications to instruction caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Tenure, Promotion, and Appointments Committee (TPAC) will not require that these course feedback results be included in any dossier material, and it is not required that they be included in annual or mid-contract review material. TPAC has been instructed not to disadvantage candidates for the absence of course feedback results from this period. If candidates wish to include spring 2020 course feedback results as part of a TPAC dossier, annual or mid-contract review, the department should obtain the candidate’s consent in writing (email is acceptable) before including the feedback in the report.
You have already been notified about reviews that must be completed this year in order to provide the requisite notice to the candidate. If you have not already done so, I would be grateful if you would also inform us of any other reviews (e.g. early tenure reviews, promotions from Associate to Full Professor, or Lecturer to Senior Lecturer) you anticipate conducting, so that we can plan the committee’s workload.
Please note that all dossiers must be submitted to my office using the Interfolio system.
Special guidance regarding documenting the impact of Covid-19 on research, teaching, and service
We invite faculty members who are being reviewed for reappointment or promotion to document in their candidate statements any continuing setbacks to their research, teaching, and service related to the coronavirus pandemic for the time period under review. We consider this information as important context for evaluating the work of these faculty members and encourage the departments to take it into account in assessing the professional accomplishments of the faculty under review.
If you have any questions regarding the policies or procedures for preparing TPAC cases, please contact Senior Associate Dean of the Faculty Anne Windham (Anne_Windham@brown.edu).
[1] The candidate's objections to particular external evaluators must be considered by the tenure committee but do not constitute a binding veto on the composition of the final list of evaluators.