IU Kokomo School of Humanities and Social Sciences Guidelines for Preparing Your Promotion

IU Kokomo School of Humanities and Social Sciences Guidelines for Preparing Your Promotion Dossier

Throughout this document “Research” is generally assumed to also refer to other forms of scholarship, such as creative works. If your position does not require research or other scholarship, ignore statements concerning research in this document. General Advice What follows is general advice for presenting your case for promotion in your dossier.

Choose an Area of Excellence Tenured/tenure track faculty are rated in three areas: Teaching, Research, and Service. Other faculty (lecturers and clinical faculty) are rated in two areas: Teaching and Service. You must choose one (and only one) area you wish to be judged as excellent in, and you must be judged as at least satisfactory in the other area(s). (In very rare and exceptional cases, a candidate may go up with a “balanced case” and no area of excellence. Arguing for a balanced case is not recommended. If you wish to, it should only be attempted for promotion to Full Professor).

Your dossier is to make an argument that you are excellent in the area you chose and at least satisfactory in the other areas. Thus, it is useful to keep in mind that the dossier is not simply a collection of materials; it is an argument making a case. You are also making a case that you are at least satisfactory in the other areas, so be sure to provide evidence not only for your area of excellence, but also to support your case in these other area(s). Even though you are only allowed to argue for excellence in one area, present strong evidence in every area.

Use PDF documents You can upload your materials in a variety of formats. However, we strongly advise putting all documents in PDF format before uploading them; this preserves their format for all people viewing your dossier and makes them easier to view within a browser. Sometimes it is useful to not overwhelm a committee with too many files. Thus, where applicable, it is advisable to combine PDF files in Acrobat Pro. Whenever possible, you should use bookmarks in Adobe Acrobat to make areas within a PDF easy to locate (i.e., table of contents). However, bookmarks currently do not currently work within most browsers, and generally only work if the user downloads the file and opens it with Acrobat Reader. So do not count on the reader having access to bookmarks—if downloading the file and using bookmarks would greatly aid the reader, include a note to that effect.

Include Links to Documents The eDossier system allows you to create hypertext links from one document to another within your dossier. This can make it much easier for your reader to navigate. This is especially useful in your Executive Summary document, as you can link to specific resources within your dossier. It can also be 2 useful in your Teaching Statement, Research Statement (if applicable), and Service Statement, as you can link directly to specific supporting files. Instructions for creating links are included in the Help tab in the upper right of your screen.

No “Double Dipping” No activity can be used as evidence in more than one area of the dossier. For example, a peer-reviewed article on teaching methods (also called a SoTL article) can be counted as evidence in Teaching or Research but not both. The candidate chooses. Once you choose in which area to use the evidence, refrain from including this evidence in any other sections.

Not All Dossier Sections are Applicable to Everyone It is important to remember this was created to work for all IU campuses for all faculty. Some areas of the dossier may not apply to you, so it is expected that candidates may leave some sections of the eDossier empty. For example, you could state that HSS does not have an expectation for candidates to include this information.

Be Prepared for the External Review Deadline In order for the dean to send out and receive back the necessary number of external reviews, you will need to provide copies of publications, your case summary, CV, research/creative agenda (if applicable), and your teaching philosophy in the late spring or early summer between your fifth and sixth years. Make sure to provide reviewers with appropriate detail so that they can write an informed review, particularly in your area of excellence. The external review letters are particularly important to your committees, because the majority of your committee members will be outside of your discipline, so having thorough reviews helps them understand the importance of your work.

The Dossier Locks Note, once you formally submit it (or once the deadline occurs), the dossier locks. You can no longer make changes to anything in it. You can still upload new material into the Supplemental section, but it will be flagged as being turned in post submission. Section by Section Advice This part of the document gives advice for each section of the eDossier. The eDossier is organized by a variety of sections and subsections. In each subsection, you may upload files.

General Summary School and Campus Criteria Include the School and Campus Promotion and Tenure Criteria. You can copy and paste the campus criteria into Word, clean up the formatting, and create a PDF of them.

Candidate’s Curriculum Vitae 3

This is your standard CV. Note, your CV should be easy to read, and it should be easy to locate information within it. Marking achievements, such as publications and awards, accomplished in rank is helpful to reviewers and committee members, and can be done by using a symbol such as an asterisk. Be sure to include information such as:

 Specific courses taught  Specific publications, creative works, grants, and presentations. Note whether items are peer reviewed, juried, etc. Provide citation information for publications and presentations, and provide similar information for creative works  Specific service items and accomplishments, within the University, profession, and community

Candidate’s Statements These provide your case. Along with the CV, these are likely the most often and closely read part of the dossier.

Promotion Case Executive Summary This is a fairly lengthy (roughly 8-12 single-spaced pages) document that makes an argument for your promotion. It presents your case. This is likely the most important part of the dossier.

Throughout this document, you will summarize your arguments. You can use the eDossier linking feature to link to evidence elsewhere in your dossier. For example, when you discuss an article, link to it. When you discuss a class, link to your longer description of it. In this way, the executive summary also serves as a gateway/table of content to the rest of your dossier.

List your area of excellence first. For each area, quote the relevant criteria. Then show how you meet them, providing reflective, clear commentary focused on the criteria. Once done, move to the next area. For each area, make sure to provide plans for continued development.

Example: Excellence in Teaching lists course development, course Improvement, and course innovation among its criteria. You could include a section (or sections) on these areas, summarizing your accomplishments.

You should also make sure that you include arguments for the areas in which you are arguing for satisfactory ratings.

Sometimes, candidates struggle with describing their accomplishments due to being accustomed to modest self-presentation. In the dossier, however, the candidate needs to thoroughly explain their strengths and contributions as part of the arguments for excellence as well as for satisfactory ratings. Avoid downplaying your achievements in the dossier.

Teaching Statement This document allows you to make an argument about the quality of your teaching. You can detail your philosophy of teaching while giving tangible examples of how you enact your 4

philosophy that also demonstrate your accomplishments as a teacher. Describe your use of assessment to evaluate and improve student learning and engagement. Include descriptions of efforts to improve teaching, particularly use of feedback (peer, student, and self) or use of scholarship to enhance teaching. This might run from 4-12 single-spaced pages.

Research Statement This statement allows you to guide readers through your research (or creative) works. It should provide readers with an explanation of your research approach and provide a narrative showing a clear and coherent path for your research. It should describe your research accomplishments in your current rank, your current research activities, and your plans for future research. Include grant applications, even if unsuccessful. When discussing works, be sure to explain them and provide context. Because most readers of your dossier will be outside of your discipline, explain in laymen’s terms, avoiding or thoroughly explaining abbreviations, jargon, and acronyms. When describing collaborative projects, describe your role and give an estimate of what percentage of the credit you should receive (such as 50%). This document might run from 3-8 single-spaced pages.

Service Statement This statement explains your philosophy for service and then illustrates your enactment of this philosophy, describing significant accomplishments, leadership roles, and activities. As much as possible, explain the significance and impact of your service.

School List of Prospective Referees This list is created and uploaded by the dean. It is a list of external reviewers the dean contacted for your promotion case. The dean will consult with you when generating this list.

Candidate’s List of Prospective Referees This list is also created and uploaded by the dean. It is a list of external reviewers that you generated. The dean will explain to you the required qualifications for external reviewers.

Research/Creative Activity Summary Faculty who are not judged on research (Lecturers and Clinical faculty) do not include any material in this section. However, if they have research activities, those works might be able to be positioned as Teaching or Service and included in those areas.

Copies of Publications and/or Evidence of Creative Work In this section provide copies of your works in PDF format. Note, for some sorts of work (such as video), this is not possible. Perhaps you can provide links to online versions of the video.

Reviews of Candidate’s Books, Creative Performances and Exhibitions If your work has been reviewed, please include that. If not, include nothing. Note, faculty at IU Kokomo typically do not include this. 5

List of Grants Applied for/Received If have had applied for or received grants, list them in a document located here. Note, this includes internal grants. You could also consider including copies of grant applications and acceptance letters. If so, use the link feature to link from items in the list to the grants. Grants applied for but not received still demonstrate scholarly activity, so include them as well.

Copies of Manuscripts or Creative Works in Progress Include PDFs of projects that are far enough along to share.

Evidence for the Impact/Influence of Publications or Creative Works We have not traditionally included this in HSS. However, it can be included. If you wish to include something, feel free to consult with librarians, your chair, and your dean on what to include. Typically, this takes the form of citation counts using Scopus (a library database) and Google Scholar. If you pull up the pages on your browser, you can save them as a PDF. If you choose not to include this, upload a note saying our school does not require it.

Evidence for the Stature/Visibility of Journals, Presses or Artistic Venues We have not traditionally included this in HSS. However, it can be included. Feel free to consult with librarians, your chair, and your dean on what to include. Typically, for peer reviewed journals this would involve using online library databases such as Scopus or Cabell’s. For other sorts of works, document as appropriate. If you choose not to include this, upload a note saying our school does not require it.

Awards and Honors for Research/Creative Activity This is typically not included by our faculty, but if you have awards, do list them and explain their significance.

Candidate's Contributions to Collaborative Projects For collaborative projects, you can include letters from collaborators where they explain your contribution to the project. HSS has not typically included these. If you do not do so, please upload a note to that effect.

Teaching List of Courses Taught This section asks you to list for each course the number of students enrolled and grade distribution. Consider arranging this chronologically by semester and using a large, multi-page table, set up in landscape mode. The table could use the following headings: Semester, Course Prefix, Course Number, # of Students, and then a heading for each possible grade. If you need to find this information, it is all available in SIS. 6

Sample of Course Materials This is the heart of the teaching section. Include samples of materials for each course you teach. We suggest having one file for each course. The file might contain an overview, discussion of how the course has evolved, summary of teaching evaluations, syllabuses, and samples of assignments, tests, and other materials.

Graduate Training If you served on Masters Thesis committees, in one file list each thesis and your role on the committee. If not, leave this empty.

Student Awards, Honors, Collaborative Publications, Achievements If your students have achievements you are connected to, place them here. Generally, these can be listed in a file. Include in separate files any publications.

Undergraduate Research Experiences and Mentoring Include these if you have them. Generally, these can be listed in a single file. Include co-authored papers or conference presentations, which can also be listed on the CV.

Student Course Evaluations The instructions for this read “Include a summary of quantitative data and all qualitative responses gathered from student evaluation forms. Do not scan nor upload individual student evaluation forms.”

There are many ways to present this information. One method for presenting quantitative data is to include a summary of the average scores for all questions for every course you have taught in your current rank. Then include one or more tables summarizing your numbers for each section of the course. One method is to include a separate table for each course you have frequently taught, allowing reviewers to examine how your evaluations have changed over time in a particular course. Courses you have taught infrequently can be combined in one table. Generally, documents in this section work better if formatted in landscape mode.

Qualitative comments can simply be listed in a single document, prepared in Word and saved as a PDF. Listing them in reverse chronological order, arranged within each semester by course, allows the reader to effectively review these comments.

Unsolicited Letters from Former Students Include copies of letters, cards, notes, and emails from students concerning your teaching, if you have them. Handwritten notes can be scanned in and included. Note, these should be unsolicited.

Evidence of Learning Outcomes The instructions on the screen read “Document assessment strategies, supporting data, and any pedagogical adjustments made.”

This has not been formally required in all areas of HSS as a separate section. Learning outcomes are not always formally assessed for every course. Generally, discussion of course revisions is often 7

included when discussing courses under course materials. You can include content here or include a note of why you are not including much content here and refer people to where you discuss course revisions. If they are supportive, the results of the assessment of your major or general education assessment could be included here.

Peer Evaluations The instructions on the screen read “Solicited by the chair or dean, these include letters from peer observers and or teaching mentors.”

Typically, we include all peer evaluations or reviews in this section regardless of whether the chair, dean, or candidate solicited them. Peer review is important to committee members. If you are providing evidence for excellence in teaching, include at least one peer review every year. Just as journal publications are peer reviewed, teaching is equally important to be peer reviewed to document teaching quality.

Curricular Development The instructions on the screen read “Includes new courses and/or programs, and evidence of impact.” Discuss any curriculum development you have performed and give evidence of impact if you have any.

Professional Pedagogical Development The instructions on the screen read “Workshops, learning communities, master classes, etc.” List (and where possible document) any training you have undergone to improve your teaching. This can include CTLA training, FACET workshops, and professional conferences that cover pedagogy.

Teaching Publications Put copies of any scholarship of teaching and learning publications here. In the case of a textbook, you may want to include only sections of it. You may wish to include an introductory document that provides an overview and contextualizes each publication. If you have no teaching publications, then this can be blank. If you include a publication here, do not include it in your research section.

Teaching Awards, Honors, Grants, Fellowships Include a document listing any of these. If you have notification letters, feel free to include these.

Service/Engagement There are three subsections here:

 Evidence of Service to the University, School and Department

 Evidence of Service to the Profession

 Evidence of Engagement with Non-Academic Communities and Agencies

In each subsection, upload the appropriate evidence. You also might want to provide an overview for each section. How much you have here is going to vary a lot from person to person, depending on your position and what areas of service you have focused on. Some areas may be blank.