The Promotion Portfolio:  Selected Faculty Personnel Rules

[from the UW-Whitewater Faculty Personnel Rules (Revised August 18, 2006)]

C.  Reappointment, Tenure, and Promotion

3.  Faculty Member's Responsibilities

a.  Assemble the portfolio organized according to the university format (III, F and III, G of these Rules).  The portfolio is a cumulative record of the faculty member's performance at UW-Whitewater.

b.  Write a Document of Intent so that its fulfillment would represent significant progress toward satisfying the department, constituency, and university standards for tenure and/or promotion.  Probationary faculty members shall submit an annual Document of Intent to the department standards committee for review.  Generally the probationary faculty member will write the Document of Intent in consultation with the supervisor, i.e., department chair, department standards committee, or other appropriate person(s) specified by the department

• by the third Friday in September for new faculty members, or

• within ten calendar days of the department consultation during non-review years, or

• within ten calendar days of the department consultation following the review and decision by the department.

c.  The faculty member places a copy of the approved and signed Document of Intent in the portfolio and submits a copy to the supervisor.  Subsequent performance consultations and reviews assess progress in fulfilling the indicators of quality identified in the Document of Intent.

d.  Satisfy the department requirements.

The promotion portfolio shall be made available to the tenured faculty for review during an interval of at least two weeks prior to the time at which the department decision is made.

The Portfolio

1. Disposition of the Portfolio:   In so far as the portfolio is a synthesis of a faculty member's professional performance, it belongs to the faculty member.  Once the faculty member has submitted the portfolio to the department for review, the only materials that shall be added to the portfolio are those specified in these rules (II, C, f, d; III, C, 6, f; III, D; and III, F, 4).  Documents shall not be removed from the portfolio without the consent of the faculty member.  Likewise, the faculty member may not add or remove documents specified in these rules without the explicit consent of the Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs.  In case of negative decisions for reappointment or tenure, the Chancellor shall secure copies of all relevant documents including the portfolio, reports of decision, requests for a reconsideration and/or an appeal, reports of recommended actions, and rebuttals produced during the review sequence for possible use as required by law. 
2. General Guidelines for Preparation of the Portfolio:

             a.  Use Times, 12 point typeface for body of text

             b.  Develop a Table of Contents for each year under consideration and label each item for easy location and identification.

             c.  Include a written narrative for each year.  Use a maximum of three pages for this narrative.  The narrative should consider the faculty member's:

                     (1)  critical evaluation of his/her performance in teaching, research and creative activity, and professional and public service,

                     (2)  description of his/her performance as it relates to the university principles in teaching, research and creative activity, and professional and public service, 

                     (3)  description of his/here performance as it relates to his/her departmental and constituency standards in teaching, research and creative activity, and professional and public service,  

                     (4)  description of his/her performance as it relates to the Document of Intent or annual face-to-face goals.

3.  Include only accomplishments during the time period covered by the Document of Intent.

4.  For each year period presented in the portfolio, the following basic documentation should be included:

          a.  Updated table of contents with blanks for signatures from the faculty member and all reviewing bodies attesting to the integrity of the portfolio's contents as listed in the table of contents.

          b.  Updated vita

          c.  Document of Intent

          d.  Faculty member's narrative

          e.  Performance Evaluation Form (Annual List of Performance Data)   prepared by candidate, using standard classification of performance data 

          f.  Department evaluation

         g.  Reports of Decision(s)

         h.  Reports of Recommended Action

         i.  Representative evidence of teaching/job performance, research/creative activities, and professional and public service activities.  The evidence included in the portfolio shall be representative, and thus, limited to one or two examples in each category for each year of review.  However, the faculty member should have complete documentation available upon request.

         j.  Any documents produced through an appeal process or other reviews should be included in the portfolio. 

G.  Standard Classification of Performance Data

1. Guidelines for using the standard classification of performance data

a.  When preparing the portfolio, the faculty member is expected to use the standard classification scheme to determine where various activities should be listed.  The extent of the list is not intended to suggest that any one faculty member should have an example of each type of listed activity; the intent is to indicate where to place the wide variety of teaching, scholarly, and professional and public service enterprises in which the faculty engage.

b.  Changes in the standard classification

(1)  Departments and units responsible for performance evaluations may add items of performance to a category, but may not remove an item from the standard classification.

(2)  Departments and units responsible for performance evaluations may not move items among categories for the standard classification.

(3)  The Faculty Senate is responsible for revisions of the standard classification.  At the time the Faculty Senate approves revisions of the standard classification, it also shall define the effective date of the revisions to insure reasonable and just lead time.

(4)  In the narrative statement, the faculty member should discuss the activities included in an order that suits the coherence and enhances the meaning of the narrative, not the order in which the activities are listed in this classification scheme. This narrative should establish the context of the faculty member's position and the relevance and importance of the activities in fulfilling the responsibilities associated with the position.

c.  Since the major purpose of the portfolio is to chronicle the development of a faculty member throughout his or her professional career, the relative emphasis given to the different categories may change over time which would be reflected in the order in which the activities are considered in the narrative statement.

d.  The standard classification is used for all performance reviews, i.e., for reappointment, tenure and/or promotion decisions.

Standard Classification of Performance Data: Teaching, Research/Creative Activities, Professional & Public Service