SLA Third Year Review Procedures
All non-tenured, tenure-track faculty members in SLA (with the exceptions noted below) are required to undergo a school-level review in their third year. The term "third year" normally refers to the faculty member's third year of employment. However, people who enter with one year of credit toward tenure are in their "third year" in their second year of employment, and people who enter with two years of credit toward tenure are in their "third year" in their first year of employment. Those who enter either with tenure or with more than two years of credit toward tenure are exempt from the third year review.
Procedures:
In the spring of each year (usually in early March), the notice of reappointment for non-tenured faculty is due in the Dean's Office. On that due date chairs will also submit, separately from the reappointment materials, the following items to the Dean*:
- The candidate's statement (the "candidate" being the faculty member undergoing the third year review). This document must not exceed five pages and ideally should not exceed two pages. It should be similar in organization to the statement the candidate will prepare when coming up for tenure and promotion. (See the Dean of the Faculties Guidelines for Promotion and Tenure, specifically the section on the "personal statement.") One thing it must state is the candidate's anticipated area of excellence for promotion or the candidate's intention to come up on the balanced case.
- The chair's statement about the candidate's progress. This statement should conform with Section V ("Responsibilities of the Department Chair"), item C, in the SLA Promotion and Tenure Guidelines.
- The department primary committee's statement about the candidate's progress. This statement should not be an evaluation of the candidate's "case." It should be an evaluation of the candidate's progress--specifically the candidate's progress toward tenure and promotion. (This is a point about the thrust of the evaluation. The aim of the evaluation should be to assess progress, not to pronounce the candidate "excellent," "satisfactory," etc.)
- The candidate's vita, prepared in accordance with the Dean of the Faculties Guidelines (i.e., the P&T format).
Four copies and the original will be submitted to the Dean. (A copy should be given to the candidate as well.) The original will remain with the Dean; the four copies will be passed on (by the Dean's Office) to the SLA Promotion & Tenure Committee.
The P&T Committee will provide an assessment of progress toward tenure and promotion, taking into account the candidate's intended area of excellence or the candidate's intention to come up on the balanced case. It will not provide a tenure decision, a pre-tenure decision, or anything of that kind. If the committee detects any problems its assessment should aim at helping the candidate and the candidate's department in their efforts to rectify the problems.
The assessment from the P&T Committee will be addressed to the candidate. The P&T committee will send it to the candidate and send a copy of it to the Dean and to the candidate's chair.
The assessment is to be finished and in the hands of the candidate, the candidate's chair, and the Dean no later than two weeks before the due date of the Faculty Review Checklist. (That checklist is usually due in the Dean's Office at the end of April.) That way, any candidate who wants to react to the assessment will have time to do so before the term ends and the P&T Committee dissolves.
Any response from the candidate should go to the candidate's chair or to the Dean, not directly to the P&T Committee. If necessary the Dean, though not the candidate or the candidate's chair, will consult with the P&T Committee about the candidate's response.
6 November 2000
* The third year review is separate from any other review of the candidate, including the reappointment review. It's due on the same date as that review, but it's not part of that review. This does not mean that the key documents in the third year review, e.g., the primary committee's statement, cannot be substantially the same in content as the corresponding documents in the reappointment review. It's just that the two reviews are separate. One of them, the third year review, ends up in the hands of the P&T committee; the other does not. So it's best to submit the documents for the two reviews in two separate packets.