Procedures for Appointment, Promotion, and Tenure

Promotion

General Considerations
The following guidelines for promotion are formulated to acknowledge the desirability of diversity in the faculty as well as the need for excellence and scholarly activity to maintain the academic standards and status of the institution. As part of an academic medical center, the College of Medicine fulfills missions in education, research, and service, with patient care as a unique and significant service role. The College requires committed and excellent faculty members in a broad range of disciplines. Faculty appointments in the College of Medicine are based on potential for and evidence of academic accomplishment. Over the course of their careers, faculty members may become eligible for promotion to higher rank on the basis of distinctive contributions, as determined by guidelines appropriate to their background and training and their academic and professional responsibilities. However, faculty members may be crucially important and valued contributors to the institution without necessarily aspiring to, or attaining, a tenured position or the rank of full professor in either a tenure track or contractual track position.

Academic Tenure
Tenure is traditionally given to academic faculty members achieving senior faculty status after a successful probationary period that includes demonstration by the faculty members that they are likely to succeed and contribute to the institution on a long-term basis. The tenure policy exists primarily to ensure the continuation of an atmosphere of academic freedom. The University of Kentucky is committed to a tenure system, and this document is consistent with that commitment.

Academic tenure will be associated with promotion to the rank of Associate Professor in any of the tenure-eligible faculty designations (Academic Basic Scientist, Academic Clinician/Scientist, and Academic Medical Educator). The awarding of tenure is a serious step for the College and the faculty member, and is not based merely on time in service. In addition to the requirements noted above for promotion, tenure is awarded to individual faculty members upon evidence of the capacity and likelihood of continued intellectual, scholarly, and professional vitality; upon evidence of the ability and willingness to perform assigned duties; upon demonstration of a strong commitment to the College and the University; and upon evidence of a sense of responsibility and dedication to make the continuing exemplary performance of duties a reasonable expectation.  The Departmental Statement of Evidences provides information regarding the expectations in each Department for achievement of intellectual, scholarly, and professional vitality.

A faculty member may change from a tenure-eligible faculty designation to a contractual faculty designation at any time, with the concurrence of his or her Chair. A faculty member who has not previously been in a tenure-eligible designation may change from a contractual designation to a tenure-eligible designation, with the concurrence of his or her Chair and the Dean or Dean's designate. Because of University restrictions on movement between title series, great thought should be given to this process at the time of appointment.

Promotion Guidelines
For promotion, all faculty members are expected to meet the terms outlined in their letter of appointment (or reappointment). These terms should be consistent with the faculty designation and university title series to which they are assigned, and with the Departmental Statement of Evidences as detailed for each title series.

For promotion, Academic Basic Scientist, Academic Clinician/Scientist, and Academic Medical Educator faculty members in the University Regular Title Series must demonstrate scholarly activity in research; excellence in research, teaching, and service; and an enlarging national presence related to their academic activities. For promotion, Academic Basic Scientist, Academic Clinician/Scientist, and Academic Medical Educator faculty members in the University Special Title Series must meet the terms of their letters of appointment and demonstrate excellence in their areas of emphasis; in the College of Medicine, demonstration of this excellence includes the expectation of scholarship in the faculty member's area of emphasis.

 For promotion, Researcher, Clinician, and Medical Educator faculty members must meet the terms outlined in their letters of appointment (or reappointment). These terms should be consistent with the university title series to which they are assigned. In addition, these faculty members must demonstrate excellence in their areas of emphasis. Scholarly productivity is not mandated for promotion of faculty members in contractual positions (unless specified in a letter of appointment); however, scholarly productivity may be a demonstration of excellence.

This document provides the definitions of scholarship and excellence in use in the College of Medicine. It also provides examples of scholarship and excellence. The document presents guidelines for appointment and promotion to various academic levels for the various faculty designations.

Guidelines for promotion should be included in any letter of appointment and should, with the letter of appointment, serve as the basis for faculty evaluation, reappointment, and promotion decisions for an individual faculty member. Department chairs and College administration are responsible for assuring that there is consistency among promotion expectations for those appointed to a particular faculty designation.

Definition of Scholarship
Scholarship relates to an intellectual and creative synthesis or analysis that leads to new knowledge or different insights, processes, and approaches. Given the complexity of the academic environment and the great diversity of talent within the College of Medicine faculty, it is imperative that the various kinds of academic work be recognized through a broad vision of scholarship. The individual Departmental Statement of Evidences provides examples of the scholarship germane to each of the sub disciplines represented in departments.  A broad and dynamic definition of scholarship is one incorporating the categories of teaching, research, and service. Such a definition of scholarship brings legitimacy to the full scope of academic work. We subscribe to the following definitions of scholarship as adapted from Ernest L. Boyer's document Scholarship Reconsidered: Priorities for the Professorate.

Scholarship of Discovery - comes closest to the meaning of "research." Scholarship of discovery contributes not only to the inventory of human knowledge, but also to the intellectual climate of the College of Medicine. Scholars engaged in discovery ask, "What is to be known; what is yet to be found?"

Scholarship of Integration - gives meaning to collecting isolated facts and synthesizing them into a new perspective. Scholarship of integration means making connections across disciplines, placing specialties in a larger context, and illuminating data in a revealing way. Scholarship of integration seeks to interpret, draw together, and bring new insight to bear on original research and is closely related to the discovery of new information. Scholarship of integration also means interpretation, fitting one's own research or the research of others into larger intellectual patterns. Those engaged in discovery ask, "What is to be known; what is yet to be found?" Those engaged in integration ask, "What do the findings mean?" or "How can these findings be combined in a new or unique fashion?"

Scholarship of Application - is the application of knowledge to deal with consequential problems. In clinical medicine, application of scholarship is tied directly to one's special field of knowledge and relates to, and flows directly out of, this professional activity. Such scholarship of service is serious, demanding work, requiring the rigor and the accountability traditionally associated with research activities. New intellectual understandings can arise out of the very act of application, whether in medical diagnosis, treatment, shaping of public policy, etc.

Scholarship of Teaching - recognizes that the work of academic faculty members becomes consequential only as it is understood by others. Teaching both educates and entices future scholars. Teaching is also a dynamic endeavor involving all of the analogies, metaphors, and images that build bridges between the teacher's understanding and the student's learning. A scholarly teacher stimulates active, not passive, learning and encourages students to be critical, creative thinkers with a capacity to go on learning after completing their formal education.

Measures of Scholarship
Measures of scholarship include evidence of capacity to persuade, influence, or inspire. Regardless of the type of scholarship, it should possess the qualities of excellence, capability for review by peers, and dissemination in the public domain.

In the broadest sense, demonstration of scholarship takes place when a faculty member (1) questions assumptions, (2) takes risks by testing new hypotheses, and (3) disseminates ideas and findings to colleagues who critically evaluate the substance and implications of the scholarly work and its impact on the profession.

The scope of this definition clearly encompasses more than the research publication that, to date, has been typically offered as evidence of scholarship. Although publications in peer-reviewed journals, monographs, meeting proceedings, and peer-critiqued grant proposals will continue to provide prominent evidence of scholarly activity, an expanded concept of scholarship is becoming more commonplace and should receive recognition in the promotion and tenure decision process. Such evidence may consist of publication, or similar communications for areas in which publication is not possible or appropriate. For example, documentation in teaching could consist of a widely used text or videotape. Documentation of research productivity is evidenced by publications in scientific journals. In service, such documentation could consist of published clinical reviews, reports of innovative treatment, editorials, or authorship of special reports by major commissions or committees concerning health-related issues. Although no single form of documented achievement in scholarship need be presented to achieve promotion, there must be tangible evidence of scholarship by any of a variety of objective measures.

Excellence
Excellence relates to a quality of performance or product. This quality is of sufficient magnitude to satisfy the expectation for promotion in any faculty designation. In some instances, measures used to describe excellence will be the same as those used to describe scholarship. In other instances, the measures will be related but different.

Measures of Excellence
Demonstration of excellence sufficient to satisfy the judgment of the faculty member's peers, Department, and the College of Medicine Appointment, Promotion, and Tenure (APT) Committee will be based on at least one of the following. Excellence must be demonstrated in an objective way. Examples of how this excellence may be demonstrated are included in this section. These examples are not intended to be prescriptive or restrictive.

Research: Documentation of excellence is based on research presentations and publications. However, it must be clear that the quality of research is evidenced by innovation in published research, by the significance of the problems addressed, and by the opinions of outside reviewers, rather than by a simple compilation of lengthy bibliographies. The College of Medicine APT Committee will ordinarily will discount publications in journals that are known not to employ referees before publication. Success in obtaining continued grant support after peer review may represent meaningful documentation.

Teaching: Evidence for excellence in teaching may be the design and delivery of superior courses for either predoctoral or postdoctoral students. Evidence should include favorable evaluations by these students and Department or College of Medicine teaching awards. Peer review and the judgment of the members of the department will be given more weight in the evaluation of teaching than in other areas of excellence that are more easily documented. Nevertheless, anecdotal reports of outstanding ability in teaching will not by themselves suffice to establish this criterion. Widespread use of teaching materials developed by the faculty member, requests to demonstrate curricula, and presentations about teaching methods may demonstrate excellence.

Service: Excellence in clinical service will include extensive participation in patient care, and also may be manifested by recognition as a consultant through referrals of significant numbers of patients, by provision of unusual types of service not otherwise available in the region, by the organization of new types of patient care programs, and by other clinical services in addition to routine supervisory assignments. Measures of patient and referring physician satisfaction may demonstrate excellence.

Educational administration, planning, or analysis is to be considered as a contribution to service. Creditable service also may involve direction of a clinical laboratory, direction of clinical programs considered to be of benefit to the entire College of Medicine, important assistance with departmental or University administration, or educational administration, planning, or analysis of educational programs. Holding offices in national or state professional societies, service on commissions or editorial boards, or other forms of outside recognition of general contributions to the profession are evidence of professional service by the faculty member.

Although credit toward promotion will be accorded to members of the academic faculty who make exceptional contributions through administrative activities, administrative functions are a part of academic life, and some participation is expected of all faculty members. Extraordinary contributions associated with senior administrative responsibilities may carry considerable weight in the promotion and tenure process.

One criterion of excellence that may apply, but should not be considered a primary criterion, is time-in-grade, which is a consideration to the degree that consistency of performance is a favorable indication.

Guidelines for Promotion

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