Members of the Faculty Senate,
The UM2020 Strategic Plan calls for charging a task force to review issues surrounding faculty
excellence. The Strategic Planning Council is attempting to work with existing committees rather
than charge and assign new task forces, unless necessary. As I mentioned at the end of our last
meeting, the Strategic Planning Council has reviewed this charge and believes that it, or elements
of this charge, would be best handled by the Faculty Senate or one or more of its standing
committees.
With this in mind, the Executive Committee of the Faculty Senate asked that each standing
committee of the Senate, Academic Affairs, Academic Support, Finance, Governance and
University Services, meet during the months of February and March to identify concrete
measures to help promote faculty success and achievement or to remove obstacles to faculty
success and achievement. These reports were submitted to the Executive Committee Monday
April 1 and will be discussed at the Faculty Senate meeting on Tuesday April 9.
Areas of discussion from the UM2020 Strategic Plan follow:
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Develop a university-wide policy on the status and employment of non-tenure-track
faculty
Develop incentive programs to encourage faculty productivity and reward success
Develop plans to define and adopt post-professorial titles
Develop a proactive policy on counteroffers and dual career hiring
Develop proposals to enhance diversity and the intellectual environment for faculty (e.g.,
identify benchmarks or successful practices at peer institutions)
Develop proposals to enhance the intellectual environment for faculty (e.g., reward
collaborative work; develop a faculty dining facility, etc.)
Develop proposals to meet the nonprofessional needs of employees related to work/life
balance (e.g., areas including child care and elder care, dual career support programs,
newcomer transitions, and employee benefits)
Over the next eight pages you will find the initial feedback from the committees. Please review
this information prior to our meeting next week and come to the meeting with further ideas to
help promote faculty success and achievement or to remove obstacles to faculty success and
achievement. It is my hope that reading through the ideas presented by our peers will help
generate further thoughts on faculty excellence.
Thank you,
Michael Barnett
Chair of the Faculty Senate
Faculty Excellence Task Force Initial Feedback
DEVELOP A UNIVERSITY-WIDE POLICY ON THE STATUS AND EMPLOYMENT
OF NON-TENURE-TRACK FACULTY
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While support faculty, as defined in the 2006 Definition of Faculty Ranks Policy (e.g.,
instructors, clinical professors, instructional assistant professors, lecturers, etc.) play an
important role in the University’s teaching mission, they also provide a protective buffer
for tenure-track faculty against the teaching demands associated with increasing
enrollments and lower budgets. Support faculty typically teach four sections each
semester, and these sections are often introductory or lower-level classes with large
enrollment numbers. In 2012, only 36% of the undergraduate credit hours were taught by
tenure-track faculty, while 52% of undergraduate credit hours were taught by support
faculty (including 22% by permanent support faculty lines and 30% by temporary support
faculty). It is important that we recognize the value of the support faculty and their
contribution to teaching, course development, and curriculum development by providing
them with a clear and defined promotion ladder and a voice within the faculty senate, as
they currently have no recognized representation at the University.
o All permanent support faculty should have a clear promotion ladder
available within their support faculty category, as defined in the 2006
Definition of Faculty Ranks Policy.
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Permanent support faculty should be proportionally represented on the
faculty senate.
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Providing support faculty with a consistent promotion ladder increases the
likelihood of the University attracting and retaining excellent teachers. Today,
there is no single university policy governing promotion of support faculty.
Promotion guidelines are ad hoc, and vary between Departments and Schools. In
some cases, no promotion ladder exists. The university should provide clear
promotion guidelines, similar to those for promotion of tenure-track faculty and
support funding for these promotion lines.
In 2012, there were 158 permanent support faculty and 508 tenure track faculty.
Support faculty representatives would be distributed to each School within the
University proportional to the number of permanent support faculty in that
school. Support faculty representatives would be elected by all support faculty
(permanent and temporary) working in their School during that school year.
Their voting rights would be limited to issues related to general university
Incentive programs and rewards for success for those of us who cannot obtain tenure
would be nice so that we would feel valued.
In my department the tenure track and non-tenure track faculty have very similar
responsibilities and roles. From our perspective, non-tenure track faculty should not be
treated differently than the tenure track faculty
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DEVELOP INCENTIVE PROGRAMS TO ENCOURAGE FACULTY PRODUCTIVITY
AND REWARD SUCCESS
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To increase productivity of research/creative activity by creating teaching-free semesters
for faculty.
o Matching Grants
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Leave
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System of internally funded, competitive sabbatical leave (for research or
creative activity) in addition to the current system of every 7th year.
Funding: The University itself, independent of IHL and state government
priorities and politics, would need to make a serious commitment to crafting a
stronger identity as a research institution. The Development Office should
cultivate (wealthy) alumni support for giving to faculty research and the
intellectual mission of the University in the form of "named" grants and "named"
research leave.
Flexible Teaching Arrangements
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Commitment to matching substantial outside grants to generate extended time (at
least a full semester) for research and publication or creative activity.
Benefit: Encourages application for outside grants, which raises the university's
profile. Helps junior faculty, in particular, to get a pre-tenure leave to generate
sufficient time to meet tenure requirements.
Professors should have the opportunity to arrange teaching loads flexibly in order
to meet research and writings goals that lead directly to meeting promotion
requirements. In consultation with department chairs, professors with a regular 22 load (as example) should be able to arrange a 3-1 load, or even a 3-3-0.
Creating financial incentives with clear and transparent rules to encourage faculty
productivity.
o Merit-based Salary Increases (clear criteria, transparent allocation, and
communication)
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Benefit: Takes the mystery out of administrator-allocated raises. It does not
encourage faculty productivity if department chairs or school deans have the sole
power to decide whether individual faculty members receives a 1%, 2%, 3%, or
x% raise, especially if the criteria are not clear and published. Standards should
exist (at least at the departmental level) and they should be published.
Note: The history department has a policy of a three-person faculty committee,
drawn by lot every year, allocating the salary increases by merit. The department
has a salary policy that defines 'merit', with an overwhelming emphasis on
publications.
Related question: Should the university reward departments that demonstrate
higher productivity and accomplishments than others? If yes, how would that
work?
Greater Promotion Raises
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Currently, promotion raises are modest and do not create an incentive for a
commitment to a highly productive career in research or creative activity at the
University of Mississippi.
Benefit: Creates an incentive to invest in research or creative activity as a longterm strategy with financial rewards.
Currently, we often see professors respond to short-term financial incentives to
the detriment of productivity in research or creative activity:
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Rather than work on ambitious, long-term projects with potentially great
recognition in the community of scholars, professors work on
publications/projects with comparatively small impact to take advantage
of annual 'merit' raises, which tend to value quantity more than quality.
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Professors who may have a productive career in research/creative
activity switch to an administrative career as avenue towards financial
advancement. This is especially true for Associate Professors.
The university should create special positions such as College Professor or
University Professor to recognize academic excellence. These positions would
include a salary supplement and carry a special research fund. These may be
temporary (three- or five-year appointments).
While having a sabbatical provides time for research and creative activity, it does
not carry automatic travel support, even though faculty often need to travel (some
even to other continents) to be able to engage in their research or creative
activity.
To create programs to bring collaborators to campus for a short period of time.
o Other universities have Scholar in Residence Programs that allocate money to
cover the expenses of bringing a collaborator for a week. For example, part of the
College of Liberal Arts Summer Research Grants could be used for bringing in or
visiting a collaborator.
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Travel Support
o When the University grants sabbatical leave they also consider awarding a travel
stipend, perhaps $2,000 - $3,000.
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Professors teach summer or intersession classes, or overloads, because
that in the end pays more than productivity in research or creative
activity.
Special Professorships based on Productivity
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The idea is that sometimes little money can accomplish a lot. For instance, it
should be possible to bring a collaborator for one week for about $1000-1500. In
one week, a faculty member with a guest collaborator can round up and finish
writing up a paper, or concentrate on and solve a specific problem delaying
progress in a research project. There are very successful international institutes
already devoted to this approach, such as the Banff International Research
Station, and the Mathematisches Forschungsinstitut Oberwolfach.
To provide incentives, they need to have competitive grants that encourage the
kinds of "excellence" they want to foster.
o For example, if they want more community outreach and public private
partnerships, or interdisciplinary clusters at the university, there need to be grants
to support that activity--in summer research money, travel grants, and maybe
course releases. And they need to value that activity in promotion and merit pay
increases.
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All of this depends, of course, on defining "excellence." If they want more
scholarly output, that's a different grant program. I want to discourage looking at
MOOCs and online education as teaching excellence, by the way.
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More yearly departmental conference travel money
Seed grants for research
Teaching load reductions (competitively awarded), summer salaries, policy on
salary raises.
o Provost: credit hours reduction available, University policy on salary raises
o Dean/chair: agree on a benchmark for research productivity and teaching loads for
the department
o Department chair: distributes teaching load reductions and salary increases among
the faculty according to merit
DEVELOP PLANS TO DEFINE AND ADOPT POST-PROFESSORIAL TITLES
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In favor of post-professorial titles as strong encouragement to maintain research
productivity
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The UC system had a model of ranks within ranks, with multiple ways to be an
"associate" professor as well as a full professor. The latter included the rank of "research
professor" for those with significant research accomplishment after promotion to full with
associated financial rewards – which may be competitive and rotating. One could
imagine five year stint as "distinguished research professor", accompanied by yearly
research funds for travel, etc. to encourage and reward faculty research.
DEVELOP A PROACTIVE POLICY ON COUNTEROFFERS AND DUAL CAREER
HIRING
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Matching counteroffers and spousal hires
o Dean/chair: Investigates the possibility of counteroffer and available jobs for the
spouse
o Department chair: makes the offer
o CONSIDERATION: These policies are very important, but high cost. Suggestion
to prioritize spousal hires over counter-offers (as a happy family is a more
powerful motivator than some extras in the paycheck)
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Be mindful of what you offer (i.e. spousal hires bargaining too hard)
Spouse hiring plans with clarity of purpose
DEVELOP PROPOSALS TO ENHANCE DIVERSITY AND THE INTELLECTUAL
ENVIRONMENT FOR FACULTY (E.G., IDENTIFY BENCHMARKS OR
SUCCESSFUL PRACTICES AT PEER INSTITUTIONS)
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Collaboration and workshops to develop small competitive funding for research.
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DEVELOP PROPOSALS TO ENHANCE THE INTELLECTUAL ENVIRONMENT FOR
FACULTY (E.G., REWARD COLLABORATIVE WORK; DEVELOP A FACULTY
DINING FACILITY, ETC.)
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Place greater emphasis on senior faculty mentoring junior faculty
o This may require creating incentives for senior faculty to take on this extra
burden, maybe in the form of counting it formally as departmental service.
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A structured mentor program in the area of research and grant writing.
Having an assigned mentor and given time to pursue improvements would be great
too.
Formal mentoring program
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Create a centrally-located faculty-only space on campus
O A faculty lounge of some sort, where free coffee and tea are served and where
faculty from all disciplines are encouraged to come, hang out, chat, meet, and
exchange ideas. I've read recently in the Chronicle of Higher Ed of research
which suggests that informal but structurally-encouraged (i.e., through lounges,
office space configurations, etc.) interactions among professional cohorts are
breeding grounds for innovation. Excellence, in another word.
Encourage interdisciplinary programs that have not just core faculty but affiliate
faculty, such as Southern Studies and Af-Am Studies (those are merely two
examples) to have AT LEAST one get-together a year where all affiliate faculty are
invited.
O I've been pleading with Southern Studies to do this for the past decade. It still
hasn't happened. Make it a "strongly recommended" recommendation directly
from the Provost.
Encourage every single department AND interdisciplinary program to find the time,
at least every two years, for a one- or two-day faculty retreat.
O Perhaps departments and programs can alternate years. Find university and/or
private funding for this. Figure out low-cost options. Lowest cost would
probably be a one-day retreat at the Oxford Conference Center with catered
breakfast goodies, catered lunch, and a concluding cocktail hour. The Provost's
office should take the lead in offering departments/programs pre-planned options
in several different price ranges, to eliminate the inertial tendency to
simply......avoid doing this.
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The African Studies program at Vassar did this; I went on two retreats, which
involved a Friday afternoon meeting at a remote location, drinks and dinner, and
a whole day of meetings the following day. It was an amazing, excellenceencouraging time.
The Provost or, as a last resort, his designated representative, should make a point
of paying a visit to a faculty meeting in every single department and program at
least every second year, just to say hello and to solicit....well, the sort of suggestions
I'm sending you here.
O He's our boss, in a sense; our line supervisor, near the top of the line. It's in his
interest to keep lines of communication open. We on the shop floor are actually
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building the widgets--i.e., educating the students--and we may have ideas,
questions, and concerns that he will want to know about.
Greater faculty participation in decisions about the relationship between technology
and instruction
O I was very disturbed by the recent announcement of a competitive grant to
encourage incorporating MOOCs (Massive Open Online Course) from other
institutions into our courses. I have no objection to MOOCs in general, but I'm
disturbed at what this says concerning how our administration is positioning our
"brand"--and, for that matter, how they conceptualize our pedagogy. I am
sometimes tempted to request greater faculty supervision over decision-making at
IT, but perhaps that is taking place at some level.
Improved institutional technology (faculty committee to give suggestions and
oversight)
O Our technology doesn’t begin to keep up with what is needed to teach and do
research, compared to other campuses.
Supporting on-campus research as much as possible
O Continuing or strengthening the library's commitments to database and journal
acquisition
Dining facility, grants for collaborative work
o CONSIDERATION: the dining facility looks very expensive and the reward for
collaborative work may be subsumed under faculty productivity
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Faculty dining may also be counterproductive
ALTERNATIVE SUGGESTION: emphasis on childcare, elderly care and dual
career support – areas that would improve faculty quality of life
DEVELOP PROPOSALS TO MEET THE NONPROFESSIONAL NEEDS OF
EMPLOYEES RELATED TO WORK/LIFE BALANCE (E.G., AREAS INCLUDING
CHILD CARE AND ELDER CARE, DUAL CAREER SUPPORT PROGRAMS,
NEWCOMER TRANSITIONS, AND EMPLOYEE BENEFITS)
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Willie-Price needs to grow
Child Care hours at the Turner Center to be able to use the facility.
Expanded childcare/elderlycare seems more important/should replace faculty
dining
Turner Center needs to be redone and is starting to cost more
O I really considered just going somewhere else that would be pretty equal (price
went up again this year) in price and open all the time.
What I would really like to see in services is a partnership with UMMC, dental
school to develop University Hospital where services could be provided to employees
and their families here in Oxford.
O Emergency room, acute care, physical therapy, occupational therapy, dentist,
women's clinic, speech, social work, audiology, psychology.
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Supporting faculty health and wellness
O Bring the gym membership price back down, offer more healthy eating options on
campus / making them available to faculty in some more enticing form (like the
existing meal plans but with better food options and lower pricing, maybe?)
Well-developed recreational and well-health programs for faculty
It seems like insurance is not very good right now
O That should be much better.
O I do like the vision insurance with Davis, that has been a life saver with two kids
with glasses.
Be positively encouraged
Allow flex time, even if it's a workout allowed during lunch.
I feel my intellectual life is best enhanced when we work together collaboratively to
balance work and home life. I feel I am given ample opportunity for continuing
education. I do not care about, nor need a faculty dining facility. I dearly enjoy my
colleagues, but during a hectic day on the rare occasion I have an hour for lunch, I
typically need to run errands for my family off campus. I would rather that money be
spent giving raises than building a dining hall.
More and improved green space and trails for walking, biking, hiking
UNCATEGORIZED
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Provide a clearer definition of the meaning of "service", not least in the context of
the service-learning initiative.
Improve the conditions for staff retention at the departmental level
o Good staff at the departmental level will make sure that faculty does not spend
unnecessary time dealing with basic administrative tasks.
To make visiting assistant professorships more attractive by assigning them the
same teaching load as those of regular faculty members. These positions could be
renamed to postdoc positions.
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The typical teaching load for visiting assistant professors is at least 3 and 3. This leaves
the visitors with very little time to do any research on their own or to collaborate with
regular faculty members. Often, these visitors are recent graduates whose research
experience is still at a basic stage. The idea is to make these positions more beneficial to
the research output of the university.
A better balance of responsibilities
o Maybe that is just how I am feeling right now, but still for clinical people it seems
like there is not a balance in place that fosters success and development.
Continuing education money
o We should get more money to specialize. Maybe if we get an SLPD program
here, our SLPs can be first to complete. Also, an incentive based program for
research may be good. For grad faculty there is promotion, for clinical faculty
there is just extra work.
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I have always wanted to investigate and consider clinical tenure track, as I would love to
rearrange our positions to be able to individualize our strengths – teaching, clinic and
research.
I feel there is poor planning in class schedules, and because we don't have enough
faculty. Summer poses a problem as several of us working mothers would like to have
more time to be with our children when they are not in school in the summer. Another
non-tenured faculty member and I have taught clinically and taught summer school
classes every summer, bringing in money to the department. We think this should be
rewarded with job sharing during the summer, so we could be with our children.
Higher grad student stipends.
Fix the my.olemiss interface. That's maybe something that can never happen, but if they
haven't received a complaint a day about it, maybe they just assume that it's awesome.
Some kind of increased institutional support for TA training? This is something that I
normally think of in departmental terms, but if there is any will to help fund or enable it
outside the department, we should tap it.
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