Getting Tenure At Tulane:
Guidelines and Advice from the SLA
Dean’s Office
Carole Haber, Dean
Mary Clark, Assoc. Dean
Jeremy Jernegan, Assoc. Dean
102 Newcomb Hall
“Only 3 publications and he expects to
get tenure”
Review Processes
3rd-Year Review
Promotion to Associate Professor with
Tenure
Candidate submits review declaration form
late March (March 25, 2015)
Candidate submits review declaration form
late March (March 25, 2015)
Candidate submits materials late August of
3rd year (August 28, 2015)
Candidate submits first materials early April
of 5th year (April 9, 2015)
No outside letters
External evaluations required
Separate votes by department and SLA P&T
committee
Separate votes by department and SLA P&T
committee
These votes and dean’s recommendation sent These votes and dean’s recommendation sent
to the provost
to the provost
Get the Facts: Overview
 Study the SLA website concerning tenure and
promotion (under Faculty, Promotion & Tenure).
Understand the following:
 The role of the Promotion and Tenure (P&T)
Committee
 The role of departments
 SLA procedures, timetable, and criteria
Research and Publishing
 Understand what
“counts”
 Books? Articles?
Textbooks? Book
reviews?
Encyclopedia
entries? Singleauthored vs.
multiple-authored
publications?
Publications in
foreign presses or
other languages?
Just do it…
 Be prompt and
persistent in revising
and resubmitting
proposals and
manuscripts
 Be aware that for
your book to count
for tenure it must be
in production with all
revisions completed
Write Grants, Win Time & Money
 Why does Tulane want you to write grants?
 Overhead or indirect costs help balance the
university budget
 Contributes to visibility, prestige, and national
ranking of the university
 Why do you want to write grants?
 Submission of an ATLAS proposal now required for
successful 3rd-year review
 Summer salary, course release, funds for travel &
equipment, extend time in the field and for write-up
 This is a research activity – put it on your CV
Help in Finding and Preparing
External Grants
 Corporate, Foundation, and Research Relations
http://tulane.edu/giving/cfr/
 Sponsored Projects Administration
http://tulane.edu/asvpr/ora/
Teaching Expectations
 WHAT you teach:
 Make sure you are offering courses valued by your
department and students
 Ask department chair for clear guidelines regarding how
many advisees and thesis committees to take on
 HOW you teach:
 Well-organized syllabi that are SACS compliant
 Consider offering service-learning courses
 Shoot for very good but not all-consuming or obsessive
Center for Engaged
Learning and Teaching (CELT)
http://tulane.edu/celt/
 SEEK ASSISTANCE if needed:
Service
 Newly hired assistant professors are neither required
nor expected to serve on university or SLA
committees
 After you pass third-year review, it is assumed that
you will stand for election to at least one university
and/or SLA committee
Help Others to Help You
 Take advantage of on-campus opportunities for
mentorship and feedback on your work
 Take advantage of opportunities for mentorship and
feedback offered by your professional associations
 Set clear boundaries on your time, esp. vis-à-vis
interdisciplinary programs & centers. Enlist your
chair’s help with this.
Start Organizing Your Tenure File Now
 Start a “research file,” a “teaching file,” and a “service
file” in which you place anything that you may later
use to support your case for third-year review and
tenure and promotion
 Study SLA P&T guidelines:
 put together a five-year plan
 organize your teaching dossier
 format your CV in the required Tulane style
 Keep careful records of your activities and update
your CV as soon as something new occurs
Third-Year Review:
Guidelines for Faculty
 Purpose of third-year review is to obtain a “mid-course”
judgment on the candidate's progress toward tenure
 Candidates must demonstrate “a well-defined trajectory
indicative of promise of an upcoming successful evaluation
for promotion to associate professor with tenure"
 Rigorous review of scholarship and teaching:
 Published work and/or creative works performed or in
progress
 Five-Year Plan
 Teaching performance
 Only department service expected at this point
Third-Year Review: Expectations
 Candidates must show evidence that they have begun
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independent work that is not co-authored with dissertation
chair
Candidates must provide evidence that they have
produced scholarly and/or creative works since joining SLA
Candidates are expected to participate in scholarly
meetings and present papers at conferences
All candidates MUST apply for the ATLAS grant, letter of
intent due first week of October
Candidates should not overstate their accomplishments or
intentions; they will be compared to the tenure file
Scholarly Publication and Creative Work
Tenure Criteria: All SLA Disciplines
 High quality record of active, ongoing, continuous
scholarship or creative productivity
 Beware of multi-year gaps in productivity
 Beware of the “tenure spurt” (burst of publications the
year before coming up for tenure)*
*If writing a book, you can show on-going productivity by
presenting
chapters as conference papers.
 Beware of the “halo effect” (lots of publications in
obscure, low-quality, and insignificant outlets)
 Evidence of scholarly/creative work accomplished
since joining SLA must be clearly presented. Work
done prior to SLA should also be included
 CV must reflect clearly the categories and status of
written work and creative activities
Criteria: The Humanities
and Social Sciences
 Most highly valued are single-authored publications in
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peer-reviewed outlets
If dissertation is the basis of a book, candidate must
state how the book is different and submit a copy of
the dissertation to P&T
Books must be at least “in production;” “under
contract” will not count
Scholarship in addition to the book is expected in the
candidate’s record
Where appropriate, grants to support research are
encouraged – mention the application on your CV
even if you are rejected
Criteria: General Advice
for the Fine Arts
 Need documentation of faculty member’s artistic
creation including musical compositions and
arrangements, costume design, choreography, works
of art, technology and artistic production
 Documentation should establish productivity, visibility,
and reviews (if possible).
 Faculty should develop a national reputation to the
extent possible. Seek opportunities to exhibit or
perform in major cultural centers outside of the Gulf
South.
Fine Arts - Specifics
 Documentation includes photographs, playbills, published
reviews, exhibit announcements of performances and exhibitions
relying on faculty member’s artistic creation.
 Provide specifics in your dossier: solo vs. group exhibition,
theatrical / musical performance director vs. crew member, solo
vs. ensemble performance. Invitational exhibits or performances
speak to reputation, and juried exhibitions demonstrate
selectivity and “peer review”.
 Explain significance of the venue: whether commercial gallery in
urban / cultural center, non- profit gallery, museum or workshop
or music venue, symphony, alternative theatre, as well as the
documented reputation based on past shows and events. A
group show in a prestigious urban gallery may be more important
than a solo show in a rural art center.
 Web based exhibition and performance requires explanation of
the significance of the site, likely audience and status. Shouldn’t
be seen as self publishing.
Role of the Chair (before tenure year)
 Oversee all promotion and tenure cases in your
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department
Provide guidance to junior faculty in matters of teaching,
service, and research and their progress toward promotion
and tenure
Meet with the candidate and go over “the duties of the
candidate” that can be found on the SLA P&T webpage
Communicate deadlines and the review schedule to the
candidate
Make sure the candidate has a mentor
Consider appointing senior faculty to visit the candidate’s
class to provide evaluations of teaching effectiveness
Role of the Chair (during tenure year)
 Make sure the candidate’s dossier posted on Interfolio
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has the correct information and is complete
Make sure that no more than half of the reviewers
come from the candidate’s list
Use the template letter on the SLA P&T webpage for
drafting your letter to external evaluators
Do not pay referees for their reviews
Remember that the department makes a single vote
for promotion and tenure
Chair’s Letter to P&T
 The chair is responsible for providing a detailed and
conscientious letter to P&T explaining:
 Quality of the candidate’s publications
 Selection of referees
 Incomplete or negative external evaluations from
referees
 Choice of publisher for the book.
 If books or articles are published outside of the United
States or in a language other than English, please
explain the publisher’s review process, the
press’/journal’s impact on the field, and anything else
that would justify the choice.
Early Tenure Request
 An assistant professor may be considered for promotion and
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tenure in any year before the sixth year of the probationary
period
Early consideration requires evidence of truly outstanding
accomplishments and extraordinary potential
Individuals are advised to consult with senior faculty and take
their advice seriously
Candidates who receive a negative tenure decision can ask for
reconsideration the next year following the SLA process
A reconsideration may be considered on the basis of significant
new evidence of excellence
The tenure clock, however, does not revert to its original
timetable
Can You Appeal a Negative
Recommendation?
 At Tulane, appealing a negative tenure decision means that you are filing a
grievance because you believe that correct procedure was not followed in
your case or that the decision was negative because of bias.
 If you wish to file a grievance (appeal) over your tenure decision, that must
be done with the Faculty Tenure, Freedom, and Responsibility committee of
the University Senate. This is not an SLA body. Here is information about
the FTFR: http://tulane.edu/senate/ftfr.cfm?RenderForPrint=1
 If, on the other hand, you believe that your case should be reconsidered
because of significant new publication(s), or teaching or service
improvement that occurred after the tenure decision, please read the next
two slides:
Reconsideration
 Reconsideration only occurs on the basis of significant new
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evidence of scholarly, teaching, or service excellence
The new material and a letter from the candidate requesting the
reconsideration must be submitted no later than the last day of
the penultimate semester in the candidate’s final probationary
year
Letter should only address new material, it should not rehearse
the old case. This is not the place to discuss why the negative
decision was wrong.
If the P&T Committee decides not to accept the case, then it
goes no further in a review process
If, however, a majority of the P&T Committee decides to accept
the case for consideration, the case begins anew. The candidate
creates a new dossier (including the previous file and new
material) to be forwarded to the home department for evaluation,
then P&T, and so on
 In instances of new evidence for scholarship, both the
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department and P&T will obtain new letters from external
reviewers
All pieces of scholarship in the newly presented dossier must be
accompanied by a letter provided by the editor of the press or
journal by which it has been accepted for publication and
establishing the date of acceptance of the piece in question
In cases of an unsatisfactory teaching record, new evidence of
significant improvement in that record must be submitted
In cases of a scant record of service, evidence must be
presented that the record has measurably improved
The departmental report and vote will be submitted to the P&T
committee as usual, and the P&T committee’s report and vote
along with the dean’s recommendation will be submitted in
normal fashion to the provost
Preparing your Dossier
 Prepare to spend much time and effort getting your dossier
ready for Third-Year Review and Promotion and Tenure
Review
 You are responsible for putting together your own dossier
(do not ask your department secretary), including making
an additional hard copy and uploading materials to
Interfolio
 The following tasks will take time:
 Organizing your CV according to Tulane format and
guidelines
 Photocopying and labeling your publications
 Writing your five-year plan
 Organizing your Teaching Dossier
We’re going paperless…pretty much
Interfolio
 Starting with those going up for tenure and 3rd year review in
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2015-16, we will be using an on-line system called Interfolio.
If this applies to you, you will receive an email from Tara via
Interfolio with instructions to begin uploading material. Most
immediately, this will affect candidates who must submit materials
by April 9, 2015.
You still must prepare a master file (a full copy) because evaluators
may still request a hardcopy, so you may have to make copies.
Candidates for P&T are required to submit one copy of their
dissertations (electronic or paper).
Any materials that candidates cannot easily digitize (e.g. large
books) can be submitted in hardcopy format.
Key Links
 Third-Year Review and Promotion and Tenure
Guidelines for the School of Liberal Arts (SLA)
http://www.liberalarts.tulane.edu/PandTContents.
cfm
 General guidelines on promotion and tenure
policies for all schools at Tulane from the
Provost's website
http://tulane.edu/provost/upload/Guidelines-forPT-Review-UPT.pdf