Do you actually know what tenure is?
What better way to start a new blog about being a mid-career academic than talking about tenure?
New faculty members are tirelessly working towards this mythical goal, but interviewing for a job as a mid-career academic and going through the process myself made me realize that tenure can mean many different things that can be highly specific to each institution.
First of all the timing and criteria for promotion can vary widely and do not necessarily translate from school to school. In alternative to the usual 6-year clock, some universities have longer 9- or 10-year clocks. On a 6-year clock in a research-intensive institution, you may need one NIH R01 award or equivalent for promotion, but for a 9-year clock, you'll need to get your R01 renewed or even a second one. Everyone will say you need scholarship, teaching, and service, but different weights for research and teaching can be applied depending on the values of the administration (and these can be ever-changing). Nobody gets tenure out of service alone, but you still need to do some to show you care about the institution and you're a team player. Some schools will have clear published criteria for promotion (number of papers/grants/teaching hours), some will not and may apply criteria somewhat arbitrarily with a lot of leeway to keep or eliminate junior faculty. The only way I found to assess how clear the tenure criteria are is to ask everyone I interviewed with, especially the mid-tenure-track faculty. If "I'm not sure" is a frequent answer either there is no communication from the top, or the criteria are volatile. Then you need a serious discussion with the department chair and some higher-level dean-type on what they expect. When does the clock start? If you start in January or mid-Spring (as I did the first time) do you gain months or lose months? If you move mid-tenure track, how much time will you have to meet the expectations? When are you expected to put in your dossier?
And so what is in the dossier? A very comprehensive CV in some insane university-specific format often with regional, national and international activities, a research statement detailing your accomplishments and the impact of your work, and often a teaching statement with your teaching philosophy/track record and a summary of your teaching evaluations. The dossier must be ready to go a few months before the application deadline which is usually September of year 5 or year 8, so that it can be sent from your chair to the letter writers. Here comes a part that's trickier than I ever expected! Who should write your promotion/tenure letters? The university will want 7-10 letters from tenured faculty at national and maybe international institutions who will state that you deserve tenure. In general, these individuals should be "at arm's length", i.e. not mentors, not collaborators, not co-authors, or not at any of your previous institutions. Each school will have rules on what "at arm's length" means and whether you have any input in suggesting who these people are. In some cases, you will also need different letters of support from collaborators and trainees. If you are in a small or highly-collaborative field, you may have published with almost everyone and will need to identify adjacent/similar fields with comparable criteria for scientific productivity. Letter writers should also be at comparable schools: someone on a 9-year multi-R01/multi-glam paper clock may not be able to state you will get tenure where they are if you're on a 6-year clock. This is why you need to build relationships with possible letter writers months or years in advance, at conferences, on study section, on visits for seminars. It's always best if you're on their radar and they have seen you speak about your work or talk about science. I've known many people to do "the rounds" before tenure, get invited to speak at other universities, strategically attend small conferences, accept to be on review panels or committees. And remember, letters will be needed for every promotion step. If you are on a longer tenure clock, you may be promoted to Associate Professor at year 6 anyways and will need to go through a similar promotion process AND then go up for tenure 2-3 years later. Some schools may also do a miniature version of this for your three-year review.
After the glowing letters come in and your department votes to keep you forever, the whole package still needs to move up the chain of command for several months: provost, dean, university tenure and promotion committee, faculty affairs committee and so forth up to the top to the president or chancellor for the signature on the coveted appointment letter! The length and timing of this process can vary greatly. If you are moving without tenure, the process is even more nebulous. Some schools will have the power to push tenure through before you even start the new job. Other universities will require that you spend 1-2 years there and publish something with their name on it before they promote you. Others may require you go back on the tenure-track even if you already have tenure, especially, if it's a big step up. I can be a moving target.
Then tenure does not afford the same perks everywhere. While it may be true that a tenured faculty cannot be fired, the same doesn't apply to their annual salary...in some fancy schools, tenure could mean the Dean's office will pay $100,000 towards your salary for life and you still need to pony up the rest. You could get an endowed chair (a dedicated pot of money named after the donor) with a named professorship, but that still could only cover only a small amount depending on how much money was donated and annual returns. Of course, you can always catch up with teaching or administrative responsibilities when research funds run dry, but this is at the mercy of the department and the university. There is also the little known secret that if your department dissolves (e.g. most faculty leaves, the university reorganizes) and your tenure was granted by the department, your tenure goes poof! This is an interesting magic trick for schools to cut tenure lines or eliminate unproductive senior faculty. While I've heard rumors about this scary bogeyman coming to take your job security away, I've never seen it done and would be interested to know if someone has seen this happen.
All this to say that tenure comes in many forms and that a mid-career faculty identity doesn't necessarily come with tenure. As you progress in your career you'll need to figure out what the best formula is for you and your lab. Having grown scientifically both in places where the equivalent of tenure came the day you started the job and places where real tenure didn't mean anything, I've always looked at it with a somewhat skeptical eye. I have wondered at its many forms and their effect on scientific productivity but also worried about its disappearance and what that would do if we all became contractors for corporations of higher learning instead of tenured academics. I tried to find a happy medium that allows me to sleep at night.
What is tenure like where you are? How do you see it changing?
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| Alma Mater by Daniel Chester French (Beyond My Ken CC BY-SA 4.0) |
First of all the timing and criteria for promotion can vary widely and do not necessarily translate from school to school. In alternative to the usual 6-year clock, some universities have longer 9- or 10-year clocks. On a 6-year clock in a research-intensive institution, you may need one NIH R01 award or equivalent for promotion, but for a 9-year clock, you'll need to get your R01 renewed or even a second one. Everyone will say you need scholarship, teaching, and service, but different weights for research and teaching can be applied depending on the values of the administration (and these can be ever-changing). Nobody gets tenure out of service alone, but you still need to do some to show you care about the institution and you're a team player. Some schools will have clear published criteria for promotion (number of papers/grants/teaching hours), some will not and may apply criteria somewhat arbitrarily with a lot of leeway to keep or eliminate junior faculty. The only way I found to assess how clear the tenure criteria are is to ask everyone I interviewed with, especially the mid-tenure-track faculty. If "I'm not sure" is a frequent answer either there is no communication from the top, or the criteria are volatile. Then you need a serious discussion with the department chair and some higher-level dean-type on what they expect. When does the clock start? If you start in January or mid-Spring (as I did the first time) do you gain months or lose months? If you move mid-tenure track, how much time will you have to meet the expectations? When are you expected to put in your dossier?
And so what is in the dossier? A very comprehensive CV in some insane university-specific format often with regional, national and international activities, a research statement detailing your accomplishments and the impact of your work, and often a teaching statement with your teaching philosophy/track record and a summary of your teaching evaluations. The dossier must be ready to go a few months before the application deadline which is usually September of year 5 or year 8, so that it can be sent from your chair to the letter writers. Here comes a part that's trickier than I ever expected! Who should write your promotion/tenure letters? The university will want 7-10 letters from tenured faculty at national and maybe international institutions who will state that you deserve tenure. In general, these individuals should be "at arm's length", i.e. not mentors, not collaborators, not co-authors, or not at any of your previous institutions. Each school will have rules on what "at arm's length" means and whether you have any input in suggesting who these people are. In some cases, you will also need different letters of support from collaborators and trainees. If you are in a small or highly-collaborative field, you may have published with almost everyone and will need to identify adjacent/similar fields with comparable criteria for scientific productivity. Letter writers should also be at comparable schools: someone on a 9-year multi-R01/multi-glam paper clock may not be able to state you will get tenure where they are if you're on a 6-year clock. This is why you need to build relationships with possible letter writers months or years in advance, at conferences, on study section, on visits for seminars. It's always best if you're on their radar and they have seen you speak about your work or talk about science. I've known many people to do "the rounds" before tenure, get invited to speak at other universities, strategically attend small conferences, accept to be on review panels or committees. And remember, letters will be needed for every promotion step. If you are on a longer tenure clock, you may be promoted to Associate Professor at year 6 anyways and will need to go through a similar promotion process AND then go up for tenure 2-3 years later. Some schools may also do a miniature version of this for your three-year review.
After the glowing letters come in and your department votes to keep you forever, the whole package still needs to move up the chain of command for several months: provost, dean, university tenure and promotion committee, faculty affairs committee and so forth up to the top to the president or chancellor for the signature on the coveted appointment letter! The length and timing of this process can vary greatly. If you are moving without tenure, the process is even more nebulous. Some schools will have the power to push tenure through before you even start the new job. Other universities will require that you spend 1-2 years there and publish something with their name on it before they promote you. Others may require you go back on the tenure-track even if you already have tenure, especially, if it's a big step up. I can be a moving target.
Then tenure does not afford the same perks everywhere. While it may be true that a tenured faculty cannot be fired, the same doesn't apply to their annual salary...in some fancy schools, tenure could mean the Dean's office will pay $100,000 towards your salary for life and you still need to pony up the rest. You could get an endowed chair (a dedicated pot of money named after the donor) with a named professorship, but that still could only cover only a small amount depending on how much money was donated and annual returns. Of course, you can always catch up with teaching or administrative responsibilities when research funds run dry, but this is at the mercy of the department and the university. There is also the little known secret that if your department dissolves (e.g. most faculty leaves, the university reorganizes) and your tenure was granted by the department, your tenure goes poof! This is an interesting magic trick for schools to cut tenure lines or eliminate unproductive senior faculty. While I've heard rumors about this scary bogeyman coming to take your job security away, I've never seen it done and would be interested to know if someone has seen this happen.
All this to say that tenure comes in many forms and that a mid-career faculty identity doesn't necessarily come with tenure. As you progress in your career you'll need to figure out what the best formula is for you and your lab. Having grown scientifically both in places where the equivalent of tenure came the day you started the job and places where real tenure didn't mean anything, I've always looked at it with a somewhat skeptical eye. I have wondered at its many forms and their effect on scientific productivity but also worried about its disappearance and what that would do if we all became contractors for corporations of higher learning instead of tenured academics. I tried to find a happy medium that allows me to sleep at night.
What is tenure like where you are? How do you see it changing?
Re. tenure going away (and tenured faculty being dismissed) after a department dissolves - I believe this is what happened in several departments at Tulane in the aftermath of Katrina. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effect_of_Hurricane_Katrina_on_Tulane_University#2005%E2%80%9306_Renewal_Plan
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