Procedures for Faculty Tenure and Promotion (adopted May 17, 1997; revised October 3, 1997)

1.  Guiding Presumptions for the Tenure And Promotion Process

The Departmental Personnel Committee (DPC) will undertake a fair assessment of the candidate's strengths and weaknesses in relation to the criteria established by the University and the College. The Department encourages the maximum participation of all members of its community in decision-making, consistent with the norms of fairness, maintaining community, and adherence to external requirements.

2.  Categories for Evaluation

The current Agreement between the faculty union (University of Hawai'i Professional Assembly--"UHPA") and the Board of Regents of the University of Hawai'i (a document which is variously called "The Agreement" or "The Contract") describes the tenure process in Article XI and the promotion process in Article XIII.  The current "College Focus" document elaborates on it somewhat on page 13.  The Vice President for Academic Affairs (VPAA) annually submits to the Deans and Directors, and they to the Department Chairs for their use and for submission independently by the DPC's, "Criteria and Guidelines for Faculty Tenure/Promotion Application" and other information which is used to determine the timing of the Department's tenure and promotion procedures.

The Chair shall give a copy of each of these documents, and this statement of "Procedures for Tenure and Promotion" of the Department of Political Science to each newly-hired faculty member and discuss them with the new faculty member as soon as possible after s/he is hired.  The Chair shall also give in a timely manner to and discuss with each candidate any new or amended documents which probationary faculty need in order to prepare themselves for the tenure and promotion process.

"Article XI, "Tenure and Service,"  paragraph K "Tenure Evaluation Procedures," subparagraph 2 "Procedures for Evaluating Tenure Applications," of the 1995-1999 Agreement states in part:

On the VPAA forms, the DPC shall indicate whether it supports or opposes tenure and/or promotion, and shall record its vote.

Each candidate is to be evaluated only on the professionally-relevant categories mentioned in the criteria. When more than one faculty member is being assessed by the DPC, the candidates shall not be compared to one another.

3.  Information Used by The DPC in the Assessment

The Chair of the Department, though informed by the DPC report, is not a member of the DPC and engages in, and reports to the Dean, an assessment of probationary faculty independently of the DPC.

Each candidate shall assemble and give to the DPC a file of appropriate information, which includes a narrative addressing teaching, research, and service goals,

Full and complete teaching evaluations from all classes taught, based on a common departmentally-approved instrument, administered independently of the candidate by the Department, shall also be placed in the member's DPC file.

The DPC independently of the candidate shall elicit supplemental information by requesting written submittals only on teaching, scholarship, and professional, university, departmental and community service from faculty and students. Only signed letters will be accepted, with the confidentiality of the author being assured throughout the review process. These letters are in addition to those of outside reviewers, which shall be solicited in accordance with established university procedures.

The DPC should make an effort to elicit responses from all Department faculty members, especially those who are within the candidate's field of specialization. Letters from other UH faculty may be solicited, when appropriate.

Requests for student comments will be distributed by the DPC to all graduate and undergraduate student mailboxes or through email, when appropriate.

When requesting letters, the DPC should make it clear that it is asking letter writers to assess the strengths and weaknesses of, and continuing need for, the candidate in terms of her/his teaching, scholarship, Department participation, professional and community service, meeting the curricular needs of the Department and University, and other elements included in the relevant criteria.

The DPC is not a venue for the filing of formal complaints.  If the DPC were to receive something which seems to be a formal complaint, the chair of the DPC will immediately contact the appropriate administrator or counselor (Department Chair, Dean, Student Advocate, and the like) for evaluation and resolution of the matter.

In order to assess the candidate's strengths and areas that need improving, the DPC does not need exhaustively to search for every bit of information available, but merely try to obtain a fair sampling of relevant information. Whenever the committee receives negative information about the candidate, the committee should evaluate the information as to its accuracy.

4.  Composition of the DPC

The DPC will be composed of five tenured faculty members randomly selected from all Department tenured faculty members above the rank of the candidate being reviewed.  Prior to the actual selection, each of the candidates being reviewed may ask the Department Chair to remove one name from the pool of potential DPC members. This request will be kept confidential. ]The five tenured faculty members shall be chosen from a box containing the names of all departmental tenured faculty members above the rank of the candidate being reviewed, excepting any otherwise eligible tenured faculty members who have been excluded by the candidate(s) under review. The names of all eligible tenured faculty members who have previously served on a DPC shall also be included. The names shall be pulled blindly from the box by the Department Chair during a Department Meeting. No active member of the tenured faculty above the rank of the candidate being evaluated has the right to refuse to participate in the selection process or to refuse to serve on the DPC, if selected.

5.  Procedures of the DPC

The Chair of the DPC is a tenured faculty member elected by DPC members.  Each member of the DPC shall receive a copy of this document, and all of the other documents mentioned above. The meetings of the DPC shall be closed and all information and discussions kept in confidence. 

In the process of its deliberations, the DPC shall make the candidate's file available to all Department tenured faculty members above the rank of the candidate being considered so that the faculty may perform its proper role in evaluating the candidate. The DPC shall make a draft of its report available to all tenured faculty members above the rank of the candidate, then hold a meeting with those faculty in order to solicit information about the candidate and obtain a sense of an interactive faculty evaluation. The DPC may ask for a vote from the eligible tenured faculty at this meeting. This vote is advisory to the DPC.

The DPC will strive to arrive at a consensual appraisal of the candidate's professional progress. In the absence of consensus, the decision will be determined by a majority vote by secret ballot.

6.  The Norm of Confidentiality

All DPC members will adhere to strict confidence of information sources.  Unsigned letters and "secondhand" information are not legitimate inputs into the DPC assessment process and will not be accepted or considered.

The candidate's file shall be available only to the candidate and tenured faculty members above the rank of the candidate being considered.

If a DPC participant feels the process of the Committee has been seriously breached or the norm of confidentiality violated, and cannot resolve the matter in the Committee, he or she has the right to take his or her case to the Department Chair for resolution. In the absence of a satisfactory resolution of the issue, he or she may then bring the matter to the attention of a meeting of all tenured faculty above the rank of the candidate. Maintaining the confidentiality of sources, however, will remain the prime consideration at all times.

7.  The Right of Candidates to Respond to the Committee's Assessment

During the initial deliberation stage, candidates shall have an opportunity to respond to any especially critical information which the Committee might receive (with the author's anonymity insured if the author wishes to remain unidentified to the candidate).

The candidate shall have a chance to review and comment on the DPC's draft report.

The candidate may, at his or her discretion, choose to bring the report before a meeting of the tenured faculty members (including the Chair) above the rank of the candidate for further discussion.

8.  Reporting the Committee's Assessment

The Committee's final report will be submitted to the Chair, who will show both the Chair's and the DPC's assessment to the candidate before transmitting all of this to the Dean for the Dean's subsequent assessment and decision. 

The Committee shall inform the Department that the procedures have been completed and that the report is available in the Departmental Office for inspection by all tenured faculty members above the rank of the candidate being considered.