Overview:

Tenured faculty are required to undergo periodic intensive review via the comprehensive periodic review of tenured faculty (CPR) process every six years in tenured rank.

This article is intended to help department staff understand the COLA-specific requirements for this process, as well as provide links to policies and related information.

Relevant Definitions:

CPR: The “Comprehensive Periodic Review of Tenured Faculty”, a.k.a. Post-Tenure Review, process; occasionally used to refer to the final evaluative report(s) produced by the process.

BC/EC: Department's faculty governing body: either Budget Council (BC), Extended Budget Council (EBC), or Executive Committee (EC). [see also Governance [https://wikis.utexas.edu/display/larc/Departmental+Governance+Review]

Department: the person(s) responsible for tracking faculty reviews, administering the review process, and communicating with the Dean’s Office on behalf of an academic department during this process; typically 1 (or 2) senior staff of department, along with Chair.

COLA: the person(s) responsible for communicating on behalf of the Dean’s Office; for this process, this is currently Ann Kelble.

FY: Fiscal Year; Sept. 1 through Aug. 31.

EVPP: Provost Office; specifically/usually Faculty Affairs and/or Academic Personnel Services (APS)

FWP: Liberal Arts Tenured Faculty Workload Policy Review; revised version to go into effect beginning Sept. 1, 2022. (see also FWP page)

Process:

COLA Review Deadline: February 1 (FY of review)

Annual Check (For All Departments)

  1. In March, Department reviews records to determine whether or not any of their tenured faculty are due for CPR in upcoming FY. Department emails this information to COLA (cc: cola_hr@austin.utexas.edu) (along with expected P&T reviews or third-year reviews). [see P&T; Mid-Prob].
    1. Note: Even if no faculty appear to be due for review, it is still important to confirm this in writing.
  2. COLA checks Department list against college records; confirms or requests more info.
  3. No later than March 31, when applicable: Department notifies faculty member(s) due for review in the next FY.


Review Process:

  1. By May 31, prior to FY of review, Department provides faculty member copies of department-maintained materials that will be assessed as part of CPR. (see EVPP Guidelines, sec.14, Timetable). Presumably, the Chair and BC/EC will establish the CPR review committee and internal department timeline.
  2. Oct. 1 (of review year): deadline for faculty member to submit their updated CV, Faculty Annual Report [for the previous FY], and any other materials they would like included as part of their evaluation.
    1. This is added to whatever the department gathered/shared in May for the review.
  3. Hopefully by mid-November, COLA distributes to Department two reports for each faculty member undergoing review. Will distribute via shared UT Box folders established for each department, called "(DEPT) Faculty Reports and Reviews": 
    1. COLA-generated: Summary of CIS (6-Years) Report: a report of the course-instructor survey results from all of the faculty member’s teaching during the CPR review period.
    2. Provost Office-generated, “Committee Report, Masters and Doctoral”: a report of all of the thesis, Master’s report, and dissertation committees on which the faculty member has served.
  4. Sometime from October through January, the BC/EC (or delegated committee) will conduct their evaluation and communicate their preliminary results to the faculty member being reviewed. Please note that when the faculty member being reviewed is the Holder of an Endowed Professorship (or Endowed Chair), the committee ought to include whether the faculty member is still eligible of continuing as Holder.  (Please see COLA Endowment Holder Policy). *Beginning in FY22-23: As part of this evaluation report, the BC/EC shall include FWP promotion, workload, and/or action plan details, as required under the COLA Tenured Faculty Workload Policy. See FWP review for full details.
    1. Please carefully read the Guidelines sec. 5 for the correct procedural steps. I will list them here in brief--not to replace the guidelines, but to stress that there is a decent chance that your department is not following all the steps:
      1. Eval committee shares preliminary report with reviewee.
        1. If the initial rating is "Unsatisfactory," we strongly encourage the department/Chair to reach out to the Dean's Office (c/o Ann K) in advance of the Feb. 1 deadline so that the dean(s) might assist with navigating the additional procedural steps required by the process.
      2. Reviewee can request meeting, submit additional materials, and/or write a response.
      3. Eval committee sends everything to Chair for review.
      4. Chair provides EvalComm with their comment(s); if they wish to give the reviewee a different overall rating than the EvalComm, Chair provides separate statement. [Chair can do other stuff too at this step, but…]
      5. By February 1, EvalComm provides reviewee with final evaluation report including final overall ratings category (see Guidelines, sec. 4.a.) , attaching Chair statement (if applicable), and previous written response from reviewee (if applicable).
  5. By February 5: Department uploads--to the CPR portal--1 PDF per faculty member being reviewed, containing the following documents:
    1. CPR evaluation report, including FWP review details and/or endowment holder review details, as applicable.
    2. Chair evaluation, if applicable
    3. Faculty written response, if applicable
    4. FWP Action Plan (if applicable)
    5. Faculty CV
    6. Summary of CIS report
    7. Graduate Committee report
  6. February 28: COLA submits a report to EVPP of all college CPR results; if Dean wishes to follow-up re: any of the CPRs, will be in touch with department.
    1. Starting FY22, COLA will notify department of FWP action plan approvals or any related follow-up.

Process to Request a Deferral:

  1. If a faculty member is scheduled for a post-tenure review and would like to request a deferral of that review to the following year, Department shall first check the CPR Guidelines, sec. 3.c., to see if the request is allowable per the policy guidelines.
  2. If the deferral request meets the criteria of the Guidelines, the Department shall forward the written request (can be email) to COLA HR, including whether the Chair supports the request.  (Chair can also forward the request.) Please note that the Department, et. al., shall proceed with the review as scheduled until they receive confirmation that the deferral request has been approved.
  3. COLA HR will check with Dean(s) and then forward request to EVPP.
  4. EVPP will approve or deny the request, based on the Guidelines, and COLA HR will send this notification to back to Department. Please note that, if approved, the faculty member will need to be reviewed in the following year. (i.e. A second deferral is not permitted under policy.)

Related Policies:

HOP 2-2150: Comprehensive Periodic Evaluation of Tenured Faculty 

Provost Guidelines 

COLA Tenured Faculty Workload Policy (revised 2021)

FWP Review



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