Associate to full

[Sun_Worshiper]

For those of you who have gone from associate to full professor, what was your approach? On the research side, how much did you produce as an associate? Did you do different/riskier research projects or just keep plugging away like an assistant? On the service side, did you seek service opportunities (internal or external) or just let them come to you? And how long did you wait before going up for full? Any other comments are welcome as well.

[arcturus]

Your department/institution should be providing you with information regarding the expectations for promotion. At an R1 institution, the productivity expected is probably similar or more than that required for your promotion from assistant to associate. At my school, the phraseology is something along the lines that promotion (and tenure) is based on demonstration of promise/potential and promotion to full is based on demonstration of accomplishment. At my school, you are expected to have an international reputation for research for promotion to full. In my department, it is expected that you have at least national-level service, with most people doing some service at the international level prior to promotion to full. Personally, I have never had to seek out service opportunities, they come flooding to me.

I went up for promotion approximately "on schedule". I have a colleague who waited (for no good reason) and it weakened his promotion case. You should submit your materials when you are ready to do so.

[sinenomine]

I went up on schedule, with more research and service than I had under my belt when I went from assistant to associate. I wanted to get to full professor so I could get on the promotion review committee, which I've been on ever since.

[mleok]

I was at the associate professor rank for 4 years before being promoted to full professor. We have a rank and step system, so that early promotion was due to a 2 year acceleration I received 2 years into being associate professor. Generally, you want some evidence of a national reputation, which may be evidenced by editorships, plenary talk invitations, invitations to serve on grant panels, prize committees, conference organization, etc. You'll want to make sure you have a strong reputation in your field, and that people are aware of your work, since the promotion to full typically involves external research letters, and people are less likely to pull their punches if your research is lacking, since you'll not lose your job if you're denied promotion to full professor.

[glowdart]

We have incredibly vague guidelines, so I went up when I felt my case was unimpeachable. My research diversified quite a bit, and while I wasn't working on riskier things, I wasn't just churning things out to get them out. I also started being picky about conferences. And service quadrupled from an already excessive load.

As one of our deans likes to say, the way you get tenure is pretty standard, but every full case is different from the next.

[poiuy]

You may find some useful information in a prior thread on going up for full:
https://thefora.org/index.php?topic=3043.msg110045#msg110045

In my University there is variability across disciplines, departments and schools.  You need to be very attuned to the guidelines for your Dept and School: there must be Tenure and Promotion documents available to you - follow them as closely as you can.

For research, I produced as much as I could, both conventional articles and public scholarship / community education products (with documentation of impact).  This was a riskier approach that worked at my University for my case. 

I had regular discussions with my Chair, and networked with people in the tenure and promotion committees at various levels, getting general input and guidance.  I also served on the T&P committee as Associate that gave me a good idea of what cases were problematic and which were smooth, and I shaped my application materials accordingly.

I echo what the others have said about building evidence of a national / international reputation, extra service (internal and external), and increased research expectations.

I waited longer than many people just to build a watertight case, but your situation may differ.

[Ruralguy]

Honestly, our guidelines are worthless. I say that as someone on the T&P committee at my college. But maybe they don't need to be very detailed. We expect someone to definitely have a continued record of peer reviewed scholarship for full. If you only have one thing, it will be held suspect, so there's a chance it won't be seen as enough. Most folks who have had 2 or 3 more published works (or equivalent in other field) won't have trouble on the grounds of their scholarship. Teaching may not need to be excellent, but it can't be problematic. We are a small school that cares about faculty governance, so, yes, someone going up for full (at my place) would have a better chance of getting if they had been on a substantive committee (say, curriculum or policy  vs.   parking ticket appeals or whatever).

I made sure I got some "real" publications under my belt, then I got more experimental. That was all before full. I've seen a couple of people kind of "wing it" a bit too early and then not get full.

[jimbogumbo]

sinenomine is absolutely correct re on schedule. waiting means committee's routinely expect more. I would strongly encourage two things (if possible): look at successful cases in your department and school if colleagues will provide them, and serve on the school P&T committee if that is allowed. those two Things really helped me.

My campus also expects significantly more service for the second promotion, and at higher levels of internal committees.

[pgher]

I just want to say that I hate the concept of "on time" and "early." Assistant -> associate has a clock. It's written into the rules; you must go up for tenure in a certain year, and it explicitly says that early is for "exceptional" performers. By contrast, there IS no rule for associate -> full. There is just a general requirement of national reputation and "sustained" excellence. Well, how long does it take to say that your excellence is "sustained"? The default here is to assume the clock is the same for both promotions, so if you apply before that time, some people will vote against your promotion on principle. It's stupid. I went "early" by that logic, but my record clearly demonstrated sustained excellence over more than a decade, due to a previous non-academic career. I was ultimately successful, but I'm still angry about the split vote at one level of the process.

[jerseyjay]

At my university, tenure and promotion are not officially connected, so it is theoretically possible to become a full before getting tenure, and get tenure and never be promoted to associated. Both are very rare, but have happened. More common is to fall victim of changing requirements, so that somebody who is an associate based on old criteria (when teaching and service were more important than research) cannot get promoted to full based on current criteria that value research more.

That said, the requirements are extremely vague and also each cohort is judged against each other. That is, if I apply for promotion, it is not just a question of how strong my case is, but how does it compare to everybody else who is applying for promotion at the same time. Which I find frustrating, but it leads to a certain unofficial "pecking order" of people applying for promotion when they "are ready", i.e., when it is their turn.