OM 5.9.0 Non-Tenure Teaching Faculty Track - Appointment, Reappointment, and Promotion of Teaching Faculty

About This Policy

Effective Date: May 2017
Last Updated: March 2022
Responsible University Office: President's Office
Responsible University Administrator: President

Policy Contact:

Office of the Provost
provost@clarkson.edu

A teaching track appointment shall be restricted to faculty whose primary duties involve teaching, including advising of students, and University service, although additional duties drawn from those listed above in OM Sections 5.2.B through 5.2.D may be assigned. These are non-tenure track faculty members. The prefix “Teaching” to the faculty rank shall only be used in the faculty member’s contract. It shall not be used as a designator for a faculty member in any public database. The duties for each Teaching track faculty member shall be specified in their contract.

A. Teaching Faculty Standards by Academic Rank

An Instructor on the teaching track shall have
1. Education and/or experience that is appropriate for their assigned duties.
2. Demonstrated ability to perform their assigned duties.

An Assistant Professor on the teaching track shall have
1. Appropriate terminal degree in the teaching content area.
2. Evident ability as a teacher.
3. An active commitment to teaching and teaching pedagogy.
4. Interest in University and/or professional service.

An Associate Professor on the teaching track shall have
1. Appropriate terminal degree in the teaching content area.
2. Demonstrated consistent and substantial accomplishment as a teacher.
3. Contributed to the improvement of scholarship, or the improvement of pedagogy and teaching practice at or beyond Clarkson University.
4. Involvement in University and professional service.

A Professor on the teaching track shall have
1. Appropriate terminal degree in the teaching content area.
2. Demonstrated high accomplishment as a teacher at Clarkson University.
3. Made significant contributions to the scholarship, or the improvement of pedagogy and teaching practice at or beyond Clarkson University.
4. Contributed substantially, through service, to the University and the profession.
5. Demonstrated an on-going commitment to excellence in teaching.

B. Definitions

Evidence of effective teaching should follow the department guidelines for effective teaching and also may include (but is not limited to):
1. positive student evaluations
2. demonstration of student accomplishment
3. development of course and curricular materials, including multimedia, online education, and educational software products.
4. positive peer evaluations of classroom teaching, teaching materials and evidence of student learning, which may include:
  1. syllabi
  2. examinations
  3. student research projects or papers
  4. grading practices
5. development of creating and effective teaching modalities and techniques
6. faculty development in support of instruction (ie. advanced coursework)
7. availability to students
8. successful advisement of students

Scholarship may include (but is not limited to):
1. refereed or peer-reviewed public dissemination of
  1. creative and effective teaching modalities and techniques
  2. developed multimedia, online education, and education software products
  3. developed instructional and curricular materials
2. presentation of continuing education
3. participation in educational conferences
4. grant funding for educational programs
5. disciplinary research published in peer reviewed journals or books
6. improving the practice of teaching at Clarkson University (beyond the faculty member's own classroom).

C. Term of Appointment

Full-Time Teaching Appointments
1. Appointments at the rank of the Teaching Instructor are appointed for up to a two year term and may be renewed annually.
2. Faculty initially appointed at the rank of Teaching Assistant Professor or Teaching Associate Professor and faculty promoted to these same ranks are appointed for up to a three year term and may be renewed annually.
3. Faculty initially appointed to the rank of Teaching Professor may be appointed for a term of four years or less and may be renewed annually. Faculty promoted from Teaching Associate Professor to Teaching Professor and faculty reappointed to the rank of Teaching Professor are appointed for the four year terms which may be renewed annually.

D. Procedures for Evaluation and Reappointment of Teaching Faculty

The procedures for the continuing evaluation (that is, the annual evaluation) of Teaching Faculty shall be substantially similar to those specified for tenure-track faculty in Section 5.4 of the Operations Manual.

Faculty evaluation is an on-going process. At least once a year each faculty member shall have an evaluation conference with the department chair or the person designated by the dean to perform this function. At this conference, the faculty member's professional progress for the year in terms of teaching, scholarship and service, and cumulative progress to date shall be reviewed. The evaluative standards employed will be those described in 5.3. Immediately following this review, the person who conducted it shall prepare a record of this discussion in memorandum form. This "annual evaluation memorandum" shall be initialed by the faculty member before being placed in the appropriate personnel file of the faculty member. The faculty member's initials merely indicate that the faculty member has seen the memorandum. If the faculty member refuses to initial the evaluation memorandum, the person conducting the annual evaluation conference must note that fact at the bottom of the memorandum before placing it in the faculty member's personnel file. Each faculty member may submit for inclusion in the personnel file a written response to the annual evaluation memorandum. This response shall be appended to the evaluation memorandum, and shall be treated as part of the latter.

One important datum for evaluation purposes is information about how students view the teaching of a faculty member. Every semester each student should be given the opportunity to make an anonymous rating of every class in which the student is enrolled. This rating should be collected in a systematic, quantitative and, as far as possible, uniform way, and a report of the results included in the faculty member's personnel file.

Another important evaluative measure is the assessment of teaching by a faculty member's colleagues. Classroom visits should be carried out on a regular basis for all faculty. For those teaching online, evaluation may take place through observation of their online course. Departments should develop individual criteria for conducting and recording these principles, while being guided by principles jointly developed by faculty governance and administration. Such visits should be mandatory for the first five years of an instructor's appointment at Clarkson; evaluations of other teaching-track faculty should take place once per contract cycle. Arrangements for classroom visits will be coordinated by the chair, dean, or a delegated individual. Faculty members of Associate rank or higher, regardless of track, will be appointed as visitors in consultation with the faculty member. Visitors shall submit a written report to the chair, dean, or person responsible for conducting the annual evaluations. Before a written report of a classroom visit is included in a faculty member’s personnel file, the faculty member should initial the report as evidence of having read it. If the faculty member refuses to initial the report of a classroom visit, the person conducting the annual evaluation should note that fact at the bottom of the report before placing it in the personnel file.

Parenthetically, it should be noted that while the results of the annual conferences, classroom visits, and student evaluations of instruction are crucial, they may not be decisive in such matters as promotion. For example, the faculty member being considered for reappointment is not guaranteed reappointment even with entirely favorable annual reviews. Although the annual reviews play an important part in the decision, they do not have a preemptive role.

The decision whether to reappoint a Teaching Faculty member to another term shall be at the discretion of the Dean of the Teaching Faculty’s School or Director of the Teaching Faculty’s Institute. In cases where the decision is not to reappoint, an appeals process may begin at the request of the Teaching Faculty member. As a minimum for the appeals process, faculty peers in the teaching area shall be polled re the suitability of reappointment, and the results of this poll shall be included in the documentation that accompanies the recommendation about reappointment as it is forwarded to the Provost for further evaluation to determine whether to reappoint. When there are department and/or school-level committees that address tenure and promotion cases, these committees shall also make a recommendation about proposed reappointments.

E. Procedures For Promoting Teaching Faculty

The procedures for promoting full-time Teaching Faculty shall be substantially similar to those specified for tenure-track faculty in Section 5.6.C of the Operations Manual, except that the standards shall be those listed above in Section A and the promotion process explicitly shall be the charge of the Promotions Committee.

Part-time faculty on the teaching track who move from part-time status to full-time status will not automatically carry forward their part-time rank; the appropriate full-time rank will be part of the appointment decision.