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Harrison Spenser's Case |
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Introduction Chair, Personnel Committee #1
CCCC Promotion and Tenure Guidelines for Work with Technology CCCC Statement of Professional Guidance CCCC Statement on Scholarship in Composition MLA Guidelines for Evaluating Work with Digital Media in the Modern Languages MLA
Guidelines for the Institutional Support of and Access to IT for Faculty
Members and Students
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Characterization of Institution Research I University
Ph.D. granted in Composition/Rhetoric
If Spencer were to come up for tenure here with one book (accepted for publication prior to his hire), a couple of articles, a software package, and several reviews, he would have trouble at tenure time. Our current T&P document specifies that while research published prior to one's hire is "commendable," it will not count toward tenure. The document also specifies that for tenure, a candidate is expected to produce "a published or accepted book, or articles that are equivalent to a book." The problem for Spencer would be that faculty couldn't count his book; without that book, his research profile wouldn't be equivalent to a book. Faculty here would have no problems with the fact that much of Spencer's work is on-line; that's accepted. They would have trouble, however, with the fact that most of his work is in the form of book reviews. He needs more articles.
1st: Who assigned administrative duties to Spencer (there's a passive verb in the description above that hides responsibility; I'm assuming the chair made this assignment)? As chair, I make every attempt possible to protect untenured faculty from administrative service. As far as I know, most departments will NOT count administrative work toward tenure. The candidate assigned such duties is caught in a terrible bind; as an untenured person, s/he has little power to enforce administrative decisions AND s/he is not getting credit for all this administrative work. It's simply not fair to put an untenured person in this bind. The chair should have found someone else to assume primary responsibility for the lab, perhaps with Spencer as an associate to this person. 5th: During Spencer's second year, the chair asks for volunteers to serve on Spencer's committee, rather than appointing members. While the call for volunteers may entice interested parties, it does not lend administrative strength to Spencer or to his committee. Spencer has little public clout.
The Personnel Committee Chair should take a more active role in clarifying, for Spencer, what the department's expectations are. The committee chair and the department chair can work together to inform the candidate about the specifics of his candidacy.
Here, the Dean of the College reads the Chair's Annual Assessment of each faculty member and meets with the Chair to discuss each faculty person (the assessment are in January; the Dean and Chair meet in February). Assuming that the Chair reported Spencer's slow progress toward publication to the Dean, she most likely would have urged the Chair to carry back her concerns to Spencer. The Chair then would meet with Spencer and convey to him what the Dean had said. The Dean might query the Chair about the department's willingness to accept on-line and software publication and probably would encourage the chair to include guidelines about such publication in the department's T& P policy statement.
Spencer takes on too much--but can't be expected to know that he is taking on too much. Spencer should have clarified the status of his book before accepting the position; he should have clarified administrative duties; he should have gotten, in writing, some statement about how his admin. work would count toward tenure. He should have focused more on developing his conference presentations into articles. He should have left the book reviews until after tenure (at least here, book reviews count for next to nothing).What went wrong? What went right? What went right: Spencer tries to figure out the situation, tries to adjust demands on his time (that is, he suggests a committee to help him in his work; publishes in the area of his teaching; completes his grant work). Unfortunately, every time he tries to make adjustments, the system undermines him (the committee is volunteer rather than appointed; to publish in his teaching area requires development of new courses; to complete the grant he alienates the faculty member who becomes chair). This case COULD have come out differently if Spencer had more support and attention from his chair and from members of the T&P committee. |