Academic Affairs Manual (ACD)
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| Effective: 2/21/1990 |
Revised: 6/8/2007 |
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ACD 507–06: Review for Continuing Appointment |
Purpose
To describe review procedures for continuing appointment
Sources
Arizona Board of Regents Policy Manual - 6–301
Office of the Executive Vice President and Provost of the University
Applicability
Academic professionals with probationary appointments
Policy
Probationary academic professionals are subject to peer and administrative review of their qualifications for continuing appointment.
Continuing Appointment
Continuing appointment creates the expectation of reappointment for successive appointment periods and is authorized by the Arizona Board of Regents.
Continuing appointment provides job security through annual reappointment until retirement, resignation, dismissal for cause, release for budgetary reasons, or release for reasons of educational policy change.
Attainment of continuing appointment occurs only through specific notification from the president and may not result from inaction or inadvertence.
Continuing appointment is campus-based and is not transferable among campuses, except as provided through university policy and procedure.
Eligibility for Continuing Appointment
Continuing appointment can be granted only to individuals who are on state-funded salary lines.
Only academic professionals on probationary appointments are eligible to apply for continuing appointment.
Probationary academic professionals:
- appointed at assistant rank must apply for continuing
appointment no later than their sixth year
and
- appointed at the associate rank must apply for continuing appointment no later than their fourth year.
The award of promotion does not constitute an award of continuing appointment. A probationary academic professional may apply for promotion and continuing appointment in the same or different years, unless unit criteria dictate that they must be applied for concurrently. See ACD 507–07, “Review for Promotion.”
Once an academic professional receives continuing appointment, all appointments for subsequent years will expressly state “with continuing appointment.”
Denial of Continuing Appointment
Academic professionals who are not granted continuing appointment upon application in their final probationary year will receive a terminal contract for the following academic or fiscal year.
With an early application (prior to the final probationary year), a denial of continuing appointment will not necessarily result in a terminal contract, although a recommendation for a terminal contract can be made at any time during the probationary period, based on probationary review or performance evaluations. (See ACD 507–05, “Probationary Appointments and Reviews” and ACD 507–08, “Annual Performance Evaluation.”)
A person who is not reappointed shall not be employed subsequently under a year-to-year appointment except on a part-time (less than 50 percent FTE) basis.
Considerations such as the need for a different area of specialization or for a new emphasis within the unit, the lack of a continuing position, or the need to shift a position or resources to another department may dictate that the individual not be retained or awarded continuing appointment, despite performance worthy of retention
Review Criteria
A person is granted continuing appointment on the basis of excellent performance and the promise of continued excellence. Review includes assessment of the individual’s position effectiveness, professional contributions, and institutional, professional, and community service.
Unit procedures must define the expectations of the unit and illustrate how the academic professional can successfully earn continuing appointment.
Each probationary academic professional will have a job description that delineates standards for each of the criteria for continuing appointment. Individual academic professionals will have different percentages of effort in each criterion, depending on the job description.
Unit guidelines outline the elements contained within each of these three criteria (in units with only one or a few academic professionals, these guidelines may be incorporated into the position description). Guidelines include indicators for evaluating performance.
Position Effectiveness
Each academic professional shall have a position description. This description depends upon the unit’s mission and goals. Excellence is achieved in the context of the unit in which the academic professional works. Standards for performance include:
- effective and continuous accomplishments that relate to the missions of the unit and university
- effective accommodation of change in the position or environment in which the individual has worked during the time period under review
- contributions to organizational goals and objectives
- innovation and creativity in professional practices
- professional development, that is, continuing growth in
one’s position and professional expertise
and
- knowledge and application of professional standards, practices, guidelines, and protocols.
Professional Contributions
Professional contributions comprise a wide range of endeavors that draw upon the academic professional’s expertise, talents, and interests and represent a commitment to the profession or to the discipline that extends beyond the scope of assigned responsibilities.
Each position affords different opportunities, and each academic professional has different talents and means of contributing to the profession and enhancing his or her effectiveness in supporting the needs of the unit and the mission of the university.
Examples of professional contributions include, but are not limited to:
- active participation in appropriate professional or scholarly organizations
- publication and dissemination
- efforts to transfer techniques and practices resulting from creative activity at the university to other institutions
- consultations and evaluations drawing on the academic professional’s expertise
- fellowships or scholarly awards
- grant proposals written or grants received
and
- research, teaching, leadership, management, or administrative roles within the academic professional’s specialization beyond those stated in the position description for the individual.
The academic professional’s role in these activities is important in evaluating these contributions. The contributions should reflect an active, directed pursuit of goals that impact and advance the practice and/or scholarship within the academic professional’s field. Because many kinds of participation and contribution are possible, the academic professional should describe the nature and extent of the activities so that the level of significance is clear to reviewers.
Institutional, Professional, and Community Service
Academic professionals with continuing or probationary appointments are to actively serve the institution, the profession, and the community. Service of academic professionals is characterized by the application of subject knowledge and professional expertise beyond the scope of assigned responsibilities.
Service may include such activities as membership on unit search committees, roles in shared governance, contributions to campus committees, and/or similar activities within professional organizations. Service may also include community activities that draw upon professional expertise or subject knowledge and/or advance the university by meeting the needs of the greater public.
Levels of Review
Review for continuing appointment involves multiple levels within the university and includes consideration of review letters, some of which are external to the university. This broad base provides a mechanism for ensuring quality control and provides checks and balances for perceived biases at one or more levels. The academic professional’s request for continuing appointment moves through these levels unless, after consultation with the unit director or dean, the academic professional requests that the application be withdrawn.
The order of the continuing appointment application is as follows. The review moves:
- from the academic professional and his or her supervisor (in consultation with the primary evaluator, if different) to a unit personnel review committee
- from the unit personnel review committee to the unit administrator (usually a department chair or center director)
- from the unit administrator to the college peer review committee
- from the college peer review committee to the dean of the college
- from the dean of the college to the University Promotion and Continuing Appointment Committee
- from the University Promotion and Continuing Appointment Committee to the campus provost
- from the campus provost to the executive vice president and
provost of the university
and
- from the executive vice president and provost of the university to the president.
No person should participate in more than one level of review.
- Peer Review Committees
- At each level of the administrative structure—unit;
college, school, or library; and university—a minimum of two
independent reviews will be conducted: the first by a peer
committee and the second by an administrator.
Each unit will establish committees for promotion and continuing appointment of academic professionals in accordance with unit by-laws. Guidelines at each administrative level must articulate the procedures for establishing peer review committees, which must be developed and approved through appropriate governance processes.
Where possible, peer review committees will consist of academic professionals on continuing appointment from within the same administrative unit. In those units with few academic professionals, unit guidelines may allow for greater flexibility in the configuration of peer review committees. Such units may allow peer review committees to include individuals from other units, or from other employment categories.
- University Promotion and Continuing Appointment Review Committee
- The University Promotion and Continuing Appointment Review Committee will conduct a review and will consider the reviews from prior levels. Individuals appointed to this committee will serve as voting members on all cases from all the university campuses for the duration of their appointment. The Office of the Executive Vice President and Provost of the University, upon recommendation by deans/university administrators will appoint members for staggered three-year terms of appointment. The committee shall consist of an odd number of members, including at least one member from each of the university campuses.
Review Letters
The purpose of letters of review is to contextualize the academic professional’s record, both within the university and within the professional discipline. Letters both internal and external to the university should be solicited. The percentage of external letters is proportionate to the professional contributions area of the academic professional’s position description. Unit guidelines determine this proportionality.
Academic units, in consultation with the college, have primary responsibility to procure review letters from experts who are qualified to evaluate the candidate’s accomplishments. The unit head is responsible for procuring review letters, in compliance with procedures outlined by the university provost. The unit should carefully explain and document each reviewer’s expertise and relevance to the review. Candidates will be asked to suggest reviewers, but the administration of the unit has the ultimate responsibility for identifying a selection of well-qualified reviewers.
In consultation with the unit, the dean of the candidate’s college approves the choice of reviewers. In instances when a candidate believes that there may be a conflict of interest or an unreasonable bias by persons who could be selected as reviewers, the candidate may provide a written list of such persons and request that they be excluded from consideration for review letters.
Only deans, department chairs, and school or center directors may request external review letters on behalf of the university. Relevant information about the candidate, the unit, the criteria for continuing appointment, and the continuing appointment review procedures should be sent to external experts for use in preparing their reviews. All reviewers shall be given at least 30 days to provide the review.
Confidentiality
The review process is confidential. The only people authorized to discuss results with the academic professional are department chairs, center directors, and deans.
If an academic professional withdraws the application for continuing appointment review, the nonconfidential portions of the request package shall be returned to the academic professional.
Confidential materials will be placed in the personnel file of the academic professional in the supervising dean’s office. In these instances, nothing will be forwarded to the Office of the Executive Vice President and Provost of the University except in the final year of a probationary appointment, when the request package must go forward unless the candidate submits a resignation.
Grievance
Decisions of the president on the granting or denying of promotion or continuing appointment are final unless an academic professional alleges that the review or decision was not made in accordance with regular university procedures or that the results were based on discriminatory or other unconstitutional grounds, as outlined in ACD 509–03, “Grievance Policies and Procedures for Academic Professionals.”
Grievances based on discrimination are to be referred to the Office of Diversity, Human Resources.
Procedure
Units are responsible for providing academic professionals applying for continuing appointment with guidelines for preparing their review file.
Academic professionals undergoing review are responsible for assembling materials to support their case, per unit guidelines.
If a nonprobationary academic professional is hired on a probationary appointment, then in future years when applying for continuing appointment, he or she can ask that reviewing committees also consider previous experience.
The dean is responsible for ensuring that the file is complete before forwarding it to the campus provosts.
The president makes the final decision whether to grant or deny continuing appointment.
Notification
When the recommendations are finalized at each level, the administrator at that level should inform the academic professional orally of the recommendations of the review.
Academic professionals being considered for continuing appointment will be informed in writing of the final decision by the president of the university.
Probationary academic professionals who are reviewed before their final probationary year will be informed in writing by their deans or unit heads after the deans have received written notification of retention decisions from the president of the university.
All academic professionals on probationary appointments who will not be retained will be notified by the president of the university.
Cross-References
For information on promotion, see ACD 507–07, “Review for Promotion.”
For information on unit policies for annual review, see ACD 507–08, “Annual Performance Evaluation.”
For information on grievance policies, see ACD 509–03, “Grievance Policies and Procedures for Academic Professionals.”
For information on unlawful discrimination, see ACD 403, “Procedures for Resolving Complaints of Unlawful Discrimination.”
For information on nonreappointment, see ACD 508–01, “Nonreappointment.”
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