Going up for Full

[poiuy]

Hi all:

There used to be a thread on the old CHE fora that shared experiences of people going up for Full.  I had looked for a similar thread on these new fora last year when I was putting in my application for promotion to full.
I had a few early bumps in the process, but after finding some good mentorship in my institution, I made it through the process relatively easily. I am in a social science field, in a state University non flagship campus, that wants to be everything to everyone: research, teaching, and service.

Anyone else going up for Full? Any experiences to share, advice to offer, or moral support to give? Wishing everyone in the process all the best!

If such a thread already exists on the fora and I missed it through the search engines, then can this thread be deleted or merged with that one?

[mamselle]

Congrats!

I think you're right, this layer has been missing as a general one--a few have asked specific questions but no overall thread developed.

I recall the old thread, too; I think it asked folks to recount:

What can you share/ what did you learn/ what do you wish you'd known/ what did you see others have trouble with?

M.

[poiuy]

Congrats!

I think you're right, this layer has been missing as a general one--a few have asked specific questions but no overall thread developed.

I recall the old thread, too; I think it asked folks to recount:

What can you share/ what did you learn/ what do you wish you'd known/ what did you see others have trouble with?

M.

Thanks Mamselle,

To answer the questions you listed:

1.  What can I share:
- Know your institutional culture and requirements. Closely read the T&P documents and tailor your statement to their requirements.
- Have a series of preliminary conversations with the Chair in the year leading up to the application. We had a new-ish Dean and I didn't feel comfortable having similar conversations there. Instead, I developed a network of allies in the School who were familiar with my niche work and could advocate for me if needed (this wasn't needed, but still reassuring to have).
- Develop a mentor network and get their input at various stages.
If you have a requirement to write and submit annual reports of activities, this is really helpful to write your portfolio narratives from. So, make your annual reports very detailed.
- Serve on Tenure and Promotion Committees at every level (Department, School, Univ) if you can.
- Take opportunities to show your national / international impact.


2.  What did I learn:

- In the U.S. institutional culture you can never toot your own horn too much when writing up your portfolio. Based on my own personality and birth culture (I am an immigrant to the U.S.), I tend to be reticent, and had to really get past that. I am glad that's over.
- Also, the importance of the mentor network. Mentors tend to be emphasized for early career academics (e.g. the transition to / through tenure) but they are almost as important during the transition to Full.
- Also see #4 below.


3.  What did I wish I'd known:

- Actually I think I was well prepared because of the mentorship I got. I activated my networks a little late, I should have done this earlier. I went up after many years as Associate, and I could have gone up sooner. But on the other hand I was busy putting my head down and completing the work so that I could feel confident in compiling a portfolio strong enough to get past any sceptical external reviewers, internal committee members, and (as important) a stringent inner critic.


4.  What did I see others have trouble with:  This is big.

- A few years ago I had a great opportunity to serve on a Univ level T&P committee that reviewed only cases with mixed decisions at various levels and made a recommendation to the Provost. I got a great education in potential pitfalls.
- Strong candidates who did not write about their accomplishments clearly and with meticulous reference to their Department and School T&P documents. I made sure to cite chapter and verse when I wrote mine.
- Some candidates did not clarify their unique role when they had worked on joint projects and publications. I made sure to have a line item for each joint project that specified my contribution.


I hope this is helpful to anyone thinking of going up.

Looking forward to cheering others on.

[waterboy]

I made it last year at my R1, but I think I was a bit of a unicorn as I had decent research but really strong service. And my department head stood strongly behind that approach.  I wish more P/T decisions were less based on research and more on all three-teaching, service, and research.

Just my 0.02.

[traductio]

I don't have anything to add, but I want to follow this discussion. I plan to go up for full next fall. I teach at an R1-equivalent in Canada, and I think I'm relatively well positioned (I publish a lot, my teaching is what it needs to be [that, in itself, takes an explanation, but about our union contract rather than my teaching as such], and I've taken on important service and administrative roles), but I'm still early in the process of putting together my application.

[little bongo]

Thanks for getting this thread re-started. I made full as of this fall, and I would second the importance of clarity. Show exactly how and why your research, service, and teaching meet and/or exceed your school's criteria. Remember that a few of your readers will be in and have knowledge of your field, but many won't. Try not to "dumb down," but make your data and evidence accessible to an outsider.

I don't know about other schools, but we have a somewhat competitive element to the promotion process--a committee (that I served on for a couple of years) decides who's ready for promotion, and then takes those candidates and ranks them. Some are "highly recommended" and some are "recommended." I would advise profs at my school not to worry about that element so much (but some do) and more about stating their own case and telling their story clearly and convincingly.

A final recommendation based on the above: if you get a chance, serve on the promotion committee. Great place to learn what's expected.

[poiuy]

I would second the importance of clarity. Show exactly how and why your research, service, and teaching meet and/or exceed your school's criteria. Remember that a few of your readers will be in and have knowledge of your field, but many won't. Try not to "dumb down," but make your data and evidence accessible to an outsider.

... stating their own case and telling their story clearly and convincingly.

A final recommendation based on the above: if you get a chance, serve on the promotion committee. Great place to learn what's expected.

Emphases mine and these points are really important.

Congratulations waterboy and little bongo! 
All the best for your application traductio!

[mythbuster]

Great thread. I am starting a 2 year stint on the University P+T committee with the plan to go up for full once I step off. In particular I'm curious to see how my departments expectations mesh with the rest of Uni's. My gut right now says my department is the tougher hurdle, but we will see.

[Ruralguy]

Obviously precise requirements and suggestions will depend on institution, department and field, but I'll also agree that *clarity* above all else (especially regarding role on papers, or even on committees, etc.) is quite important. I've served on our T&P committee, and I'd agree that serving on that could help (although honestly, when there are more people up for full prof, full profs should be making the judgments). I actually get annoyed with the portfolios that have too much "horn tooting." Such portfolios read like "I taught my classes and no one died, yay for me!"  Its fine to mention successes, and back by data, but going over every class since your last review with precise evaluation data is probably too much, especially if you are asked to lead your materials with a concise narrative. Similar with papers and committees. Especially i details are on an included CV anyway, I don't feel that its necessary to re-tread everything in a narrative.

[Hibush]

I'll chime in on clarity also, particularly on meeting expectations.

A lot of the time, even the candidate is a little unclear on the expectations. So many readers are likely to be even less clear. Don't assume that they have the secret grading rubric in hand. Say clearly what the expectations are. Quote if possible, but use data where there is uncertainty.

The tough ones are qualitative things like "National Impact". To be more explicit about the expectation, I used some defensible metrics for my field and then gave the number for the current Full professors. That established a clear benchmark for expectations.

My numbers were near the middle, which made it easy to say that my performance was comparable to those who had been promoted. Even if you quibble about the validity of the metric, the discussion starts with being in the ballpark. The current fulls are the ones making the first judgement, so saying I was normal in their context was an easy argument to accept. The annual review letters from the chair had been complementary, but without specifics ,on how I was doing on that element, so I got to chose how to quantify it.

On trumpeting your successes, it is absolutely true that modesty has no place in the package. If you did good things, say so. On the other hand, academic Twitter is is full of gushing over grad students' routine accomplishments. That's too much. So don't get too proud over a low mortality rate, where the benchmark really is zero.

[Morden]

I went up for full (successsfully) a number of years ago because my dean encouraged me to do so. I would have waited longer, and taken a financial hit for doing so, so I am grateful for his encouragement. I have tried to pay that encouragement forward with colleagues who are accomplished but perhaps intimidated by the process.
In our process, we are allowed to put together our documents and add some contextual information for reviewers (for example, documents about our tenure and promotion expectations, our past and current teaching loads, etc.) I think that's very important for external reviewers. 

[Wahoo Redux]

No advice, just W00T!  Congrats!  Good news is always greatly appreciated.

[little bongo]

Thanks! And congratulations also to waterboy and poiuy. Indeed we could all use some good news.

Quick note to clarify my role on the promotion committee--I actually didn't decide on full profs, but only on those going up for associate. But I still got a good sense of the overall way the committee worked and looked at things.

[Ruralguy]

Thanks for the clarification. At my SLAC, any tenured professor can serve on the college wide T&P Committee. There are no formal dept. committees of this sort, but departments do weigh in on the promotion decision. An Associate Prof on T&P can make decisions for full prof in general, though we split up committee duties by candidate, and a sensible chair would probably not put an Associate Prof on the case of a full prof.

[glowdart]

Advice first and foremost: know your campus culture and know the process.

Here, we have a hellacious process where upwards of 25 people will read your materials before it goes to a subcommittee of the Board and then the full Board of Trustees. This, we have to explain everything without being defensive and that takes some practice. We also have to document everything, so the files are massive and must be clearly organized. Little annoys committees more than having to work to find information when reviewing promotion cases (or job applications) — I've seen people be turned down because the applicant didn't bother to explain or provide documentation to support points. And unlike at tenure, when a uni committee might try to give a candidate the benefit of the doubt and assume poor mentorship in the department or from the Dean, for Full the committee here expects you to be competent at making an argument to people outside your discipline and supporting it.

I have heard other colleagues on the uni promotion review committee say things like "if this is how I seriously this person takes this process and how poorly they support their claims, can you imagine being in a classroom with them?"

Do not assume everyone has a priori knowledge of your awesomeness and why what you do matters. We don't. It's your job & your Dean, chair, and department's job to make that case.

This is not the time or place to wage your personal war against labels and subheadings and following picayune directions. Is the process onerous? Yes. But take issue with that through channels and not in your application for promotion.

So, clarity, yes, but also support and explication.

Also, find samples or models. We also encourage people who go up from the same areas/schools to talk about and share materials. Know what these documents might look like and what typical evidence looks like. Your individual case will be different, but you go up in the context of other applicants from that year and years past.