Departmental RTP Guidelines

Departments may find that their candidates’ dossiers exemplify the criteria for tenure and promotion in ways that are unique to their academic field or area(s) of expertise. University Policy S15-7 [pdf] provides a mechanism for those departments to develop and Departmental RTP Guidelines that help evaluators better understand how candidates might meet the different levels of achievement.

Why Develop Department RTP Guidelines

Departmental RTP guidelines are an outward-facing document for colleagues and administrators “up the chain,” i.e. a resource for evaluators who may be unfamiliar with the variety of contributions that meet each level of achievement within your field. As such, they should be written in such a way that enables someone outside the department to gain a clear understanding of what your department values and why, as illustrations of the current RTP policy.  [pdf]

The guidelines are also a tool within a holistic mentoring process, as colleagues going through the RTP process can use the document to help them frame their accomplishments for reviewers beyond the department.

Guidance on Developing Departmental RTP Guidelines

For an idea of how these guidelines work, please review the list of currently approved Departmental RTP Guidelines, maintained by UP-Faculty Services. 

The Office for Faculty Success in conjunction with the Professional Standards Committee of the Academic Senate has developed the following guidance for departments that are interested in developing their own guidelines:

Recorded Info Session on Department RTP Guidelines (Passcode: 7K1!W#Uc): A recording of an April 2022 workshop that provides all you need to know to get started with crafting guidelines. 

Creating Departmental RTP Guidelines: A presentation shared in the recording that offers an overview of the purpose of departmental RTP guidelines, a map of the approval process, and best practices for crafting strong guidelines.

Developing Departmental RTP Guidelines: A one-page guide that helps departments decide whether to develop their own guidelines and provides a suggested structure for the document.

Departmental RTP Guidelines Template: A generic template that offers the basic structure for the guidelines, featuring a table format to showcase sample candidate profiles.

Once approved, the guidelines come up for review every five years. Faculty Success will reach out to departments with RTP guidelines that need to be renewed for another five years.

Department chairs and directors may find additional resources and tips in the Canvas shell for Leadership Excellence for Academic Departments (LEAD).