Rank Promotion External Review Guidelines for Candidates & Deans

Faculty applying for rank promotion must undergo evaluation by an external reviewer. Evaluations by accomplished professionals who are not a part of the UNCSA community provide a valuable element in assessing the accomplishments of faculty. External evaluations must be solicited and reviewed in the form of letters of evaluation. The purpose of these letters is to provide an independent and unbiased assessment of the individual’s creative activity/research, teaching, and service work with a focus on local, regional, and national engagement and recognition within the discipline.

Selection of External Reviewers
Reviewers should be highly regarded and recognized professionals in the candidate's field and able to evaluate the quality, productivity, and significance of his/her professional activity. Reviewers may be individuals who know the candidate through professional interactions. External reviewers may not be members of the UNCSA faculty, and should be selected so as to minimize the possibility of conflicts of interest; actual, potential, or apparent. Outside reviewers should not be selected from among those with whom the candidate has had familial or close personal relationships.

Advice for Identifying Appropriate External Reviewers
Work with your dean and/or appropriate individuals at UNCSA to determine the best and most appropriate mix of peers outside of the university setting. The following questions may help you identify appropriate external reviewers:

Are they from academic, arts, or practice organizations?
Are they familiar with your field(s) of service, teaching, or engaged creative activity/research?
Have you met and established some relationship with a potential reviewer?
Are they familiar with your areas of initiative?
Do they understand the definition and value of engaged and sustained activity?
Will they write about your local, national, and/or international excellence in one of your three areas of evaluative criteria?
Will they write about the impact your work has had on your artistic, academic, or professional communities?
Can they document experience with specific examples?
Will they write with integrity about your integrity, commitment, passion, engagement, long-term projects and/or engagement with specific communities?

Nomination of External Reviewers
Using the External Reviewer Nomination Form, candidates should recommend at least five reviewers to their dean. Candidates will provide brief bios of the proposed reviewers including their professional/artistic credentials, most recent professional accomplishments, and a summary of their creative activities and scholarly work. If reviewers who have had significant previous contact with the candidate are recommended, reasons for that choice should be presented in sufficient detail to facilitate a reasonable and fair decision about the approval of the reviewer.

Following the submission of the External Reviewer Nomination Form, the dean will review the submitted list and identify the approved reviewers. The dean will work with the candidate to select a minimum of three from whom reviews will be solicited.

At least one approved reviewer will be from the list submitted by the candidate.
The second reviewer will be selected jointly by the dean and candidate, and may or may not be drawn from the submitted list.
It is the dean’s discretion to select the final reviewer from the submitted list, or an external reviewer of their own choosing.
The dean and the candidate may also select two alternates to ensure the participation of three external reviewers.
If the list does not provide a sufficient number of approved reviewers, the candidate and dean will add additional names until a sufficient number of external reviewers are approved.

Solicitation of External Reviews
All contact with the reviewers is to be done by the dean.

The dean will send the Request for External Review for Rank Promotion to at least three nominees requesting their participation. In this request, the external reviewer will be asked to comment on the quality, quantity, impact, and creativity of the candidate’s accomplishments. The request also informs the external reviewer that their review will become part of the personnel file of the candidate, and that, accordingly, the review may be examined by the candidate upon request. The Request for External Review should be sent from the dean's UNCSA email address and should be retained until the evaluation process has concluded.

Upon a nominee’s agreement to provide an external review, the dean will send a formal request using Instructions for Confirmed External Reviewers for Rank Promotion via Interfolio RPT. The instructions include links to the External Reviewer Evaluation for Rank Promotion, the Guidelines for Reviewers of Rank Promotion Applications and Definitions & Sample Criteria for ESP Rank Promotion).

The external reviewer will be given access in Interfolio RPT to the following materials from the candidate’s packet:

Application for Rank Promotion
Self-Evaluation (self-evaluation narrative and engaged & sustained résumé)
Curriculum Vitae
Student Course Evaluations
Syllabi
Annual Evaluations
Supplemental Support

If less than three external reviewers are available, the dean will return to the list of nominees to the candidate for other potential reviewers. If necessary, additional names will be added as needed to help ensure a minimum of three participating external reviewers.

Inclusion of External Review Letters in the Rank Promotion Case
External reviewers will be directed to upload the External Reviewer Evaluation for Rank Promotion to Interfolio RPT.

By rule and ethics, all solicited external evaluation letters received are to be included in the candidate’s portfolio for review at the departmental and university levels. The arrival of a late letter does not affect subsequent deadlines; the dean and provost are not obligated to re-evaluate a candidate in the event an external evaluation letter arrives after the stated deadline.

The dean or designee, will complete the Final List of External Reviewers and upload it to Interfolio RPT by the published deadline.