RPT Committee

The purpose of a college-wide RPT committee is to assess the sufficiency of the dossier and the conformity of the review process to established criteria and procedures for faculty in the College of Arts and Science who are candidates for reappointment, promotion, or tenure.

The committee will receive and review files of candidates and will write a letter of recommendation to the dean. The candidate will receive a copy of the letter and will have the opportunity to respond to the committee’s letter in writing within 14 days receipt of the committee’s letter.

The committee has nine tenured members of the bargaining unit, three from each division. The committee shall have no more than one member from any department, and no currently serving academic unit head. It will elect its own chair each year.

Committee members serve three-year terms. Terms will be rotated so that one-third of the committee will be elected each year. Faculty who, during the term of office, (1) expect to be on leave, (2) anticipate retiring, or (3) plan to come up for promotion during the term of consideration will be excused from service. Should a committee member be unable to complete a term, the position will be added to the list of positions to be filled at the time of the next election.

The committee will use the departmental RPT criteria of the faculty member being reviewed when evaluating a candidate’s file. When the file of a faculty member from a committee member’s department is being reviewed, that committee member need not recuse him or herself from the discussion of and the vote on the candidate unless he or she also served on the academic unit RPT committee.

At its discretion the RPT Committee can create subcommittees to review the reappointment, promotion, and tenure files of faculty. The subcommittee will forward the file and its recommendation to the full committee for a final vote. The deliberations of the subcommittee and the vote of the full committee will be reported in the letter that goes forward with the faculty member’s file to the dean.

Two-thirds of the full committee, excluding seats empty for such reasons as recusal, constitutes a quorum for deliberations and voting.

While the College-wide RPT Committee is independent of the senate, representatives of the committee whose service will continue into the next academic year shall meet each spring, after their work for the year has been completed, for discussions with the senate’s Executive Committee about ways in which RPT process and procedures in the college might be improved.