Monday, December 1, 2014

Exceptional Circumstances?

How I stumbled across this isn't important, but one UGA department's promotion and tenure requirements includes a clause that's kinda interesting. To save time and trouble I copied the text below from #3 under Exceptional Circumstances:
Ability to work well with others is an important consideration in the promotion and tenure process. Professional and collegial interaction with colleagues and others will be considered as one of the criteria for the promotion and tenure unit, college, university, or profession may merit a negative vote during the evaluation process.
Read that last bit again.  Fascinating, this inclusion of likeability or collegiality in a P&T decision, especially as I don't immediately see the same language in other departments in the same college or elsewhere in the university.  Let's be honest. Likeability and collegiality do matter. They hang in the background of all promotion and tenure decisions, but if they come into play at all, it's usually in very close cases where they might tip a vote or two.

I get the point of this language, and I can see how in some departments this may be a thing, but I have no idea how you measure and apply this in a defensible manner. Research, yeah, that's measurable. Teaching, sure. Even service, I get that too.

Hell, my own department would be a lot smaller if we followed these criteria. And I'd be out of a job.




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