Governance and Committees

BYLAWS of the Department Earth Sciences
Formerly the Department of Geology

(As approved October 2021)

The following bylaws apply to the full-time faculty hereafter referred to as “the Faculty”.  Students, part-time faculty, and professional staff are referred to only as is necessary to define the Faculty’s responsibilities and privileges.

These bylaws exist within the context of the Policies of the Board of Trustees of SUNY, the University at Buffalo’s Bylaws of the Voting Faculty, and the Bylaws of the College of Arts and Sciences.  To the extent that parts of Department of Earth Sciences’s Bylaws are in conflict with any provisions of these bodies of legislation, those parts of the bylaws are null and void.

The purpose of the Department of Earth Sciences Bylaws is to provide a structure for departmental governance within the framework of the College of Arts and Sciences. The Faculty of the Department of Earth Sciences affirms its commitment to collegiality as the most effective basis upon which to manage the affairs of, and maintain excellence within, the Department.

I. The Faculty

A. Officers

The Department Chair is appointed by the President upon recommendation by the Dean after consultation with the department’s voting Faculty. The Chair normally serves a term of three years and may be reappointed after consultation by the Dean with the department’s voting Faculty.

The  officers of the department include the Chair and other officers determined as described in sections II.A. and III. (e.g., Associate Chair, Director of Graduate Studies, Director of Undergraduate Studies). The Chair may also create ad hoc committees to deal with specific and temporary tasks, such as searching for new faculty or staff.

The Chair shall guide the department’s teaching, research, and services and conduct its administrative operations. The Chair shall represent the department to the College and the University, report promptly to the Dean on matters affecting the department’s welfare, and report and recommend actions regarding its programs, activities, and Faculty, including faculty appointments, promotions, and the terms and conditions of appointments.

B. Meetings

The Faculty shall normally meet at least once a month during the academic year, at the behest of the Department Chair, with the Chair or a representative designated by the Chair presiding. The Chair may call a special meeting whenever necessary, giving at least 24-hour notice. For a meeting of any kind to be legitimate, a quorum of 50% or more of the voting faculty members, excluding those on official leave, is necessary. Part-time faculty, adjunct faculty, faculty with joint appointments where the primary appointment is in a department other than Earth Sciences, office staff, and professional staff are invited to attend and participate in discussions, where appropriate, but they cannot vote.  Clinical faculty hold the same voting rights as ladder faculty, except they cannot participate or vote on any action related to ladder faculty, including hires, tenure actions and promotions. The student body may choose representatives to attend open faculty meetings, but their representatives cannot vote.

Meetings, elections and ballots of the Department and its committees shall be conducted according to Robert’s Rules of Order, latest edition, except as otherwise provided by these bylaws and the College of Arts and Sciences standing orders. No substantive issue may be voted on at the regularly scheduled meetings without written notice to the Faculty at least twenty-four hours in advance.

Minutes of each faculty meeting will be recorded by someone at the behest of the Chair. The minutes will be distributed before the next faculty meeting. The Faculty present at the next meeting will have an opportunity to correct any errors and insert omitted items. Finally, the voting faculty will or will not approve the minutes of the previous meeting.

The Faculty may call a faculty meeting if 40% or more of the full-time faculty members not on official leave agree to hold a meeting.

C. Faculty Membership

The Faculty is subject to the Policies of the Board of Trustees and the Bylaws of the College of Arts and Science, both of which provide for proper notice and faculty consultation; therefore, the Chair may not make a recommendation for or against a new appointment, a reappointment, the granting of tenure, or a promotion without first seeking the advice of the Faculty of the appropriate rank, by means of a secret ballot, following informed discussion and review of the candidate’s dossier. In cases of new appointments, the Faculty shall also consider the recommendation of the search committee.

D. Affiliated Faculty

Individuals with appropriate professional qualifications may be appointed as faculty affiliates of the Department through a volunteer appointment. Volunteer faculty members are appointed in two titles that serve two different purposes.  The title Research (Assistant, Associate, or Full, as merited) Professor is used for affiliates who will seek extramural funding through UB and typically work on joint research related to the nominating faculty member's area of expertise. The title Adjunct (Assistant, Associate or Full, as merited) Professor is used for affiliates who will not seek funding through UB but will be involved in matters more academic in nature, such as serving on MS or PhD student committees. The term for either appointment is usually three years but can be of shorter duration as appropriate for the specific case and is renewable. Affiliated faculty members enjoy the full public use of their titles but are not voting members of the Faculty.

Any voting faculty member may nominate an affiliate. Nominations consisting of a paragraph of support explaining the candidate’s research or academic affiliation and experience with their CV shall be submitted to the Faculty, discussed at a regular faculty meeting, and approved by a simple majority in a secret ballot. The nominating faculty member will be listed as a supervising faculty on the volunteer’s appointment form and will be directly overseeing the faculty affiliate during their appointment. The Faculty may, by a majority vote, terminate an affiliate appointment before the end of its term or a termination decision may be made at the discretion of the chair in consultation with the supervising faculty member.

To serve on a graduate student committee, affiliate faculty members must be appointed to the Graduate Faculty of UB, which is accomplished in a process similar to that described above. Nominations consisting of a paragraph detailing the academic affiliation and advisement experience of the candidate with their CV shall be submitted to the Faculty, discussed at a regular faculty meeting. If supported at the departmental level by a simple majority in a secret ballot, the nomination is forwarded to the appropriate academic units for final approval.

At the Chair’s discretion, these votes can occur by mail or email subject to the following conditions: faculty are provided complete nomination materials and given no less than one week to vote. A ‘majority’ is considered a majority of all full-time faculty members not on leave during balloting.

E. Emeritus Faculty

Upon retirement, faculty receive Emeritus status which continues an affiliation with the University. However, Emeritus status does not provide access to space, storage or campus services needed for grants research or student advisement. If a faculty member expects to be engaged in research or graduate student advisement, a volunteer appointment with the qualifying title of Research is needed for grants (and covers student advisement) or Adjunct if only student advisement is involved.  It is College Policy that Emeritus status does not entitle faculty to stand-alone office or lab space. Prior to retirement, faculty must engage in discussions with the chair to reach an understanding about resources and needs if they are seeking phased release of spaces where research and student advisement continue while they have active grants or students to graduate.

II. Standing Committees

A. Regular Committees

The Faculty, as a whole, is the regular legislative body of the Department.  The committees specified below report to the Faculty at least once each semester. While the committees may make routine decisions, departmental policy matters must be referred to the whole Faculty.   Appointments to vacancies on committees are nominated by the Chair and/or the Faculty for a specified term and confirmed by secret ballot (a simple majority) of the attending Faculty.  This is done during the last faculty meeting in the spring semester for the following academic year, or as needed when vacancies arise.  The Department Chair is an ex-officio member of each standing committee. Members can be appointed to any permanent committee at the Chair’s discretion for defined periods and specific identified tasks.

1.   Executive Committee: The composition of this committee includes the Chair, the Associate Chair, the Director of the Graduate Studies Committee, and the Director of the Undergraduate Studies.

2. Graduate Studies Committee: There are three members of this committee, each with a three-year term. Except when circumstances are disadvantageous, it is expected that the committee will be composed of faculty members from different research groups and includes an assistant professor. The committee is responsible for the design and implementation of the graduate educational program, admission and expulsion of graduate students, appointment of teaching assistants, oversight of the teaching assistant’s duties, and evaluating their performance, and graduate program assessment.

3. Undergraduate Studies Committee: This is a three-member committee, each for a two-year term. It includes a director who is a tenure-track faculty member and ideally two clinical faculty members so they can assist or cover responsibilities over the summers.  The committee is responsible for the undergraduate educational program’s oversight, admission of students as majors or minors, participation in the honors program, approval or denial of student petitions, student advisement, certification of students for graduation, student retention efforts, advisement to the undergraduate club, and undergraduate program assessment.

4. Student Awards Committee: This is a three-person committee including the Director of Undergraduate Studies and two additional members, one serving as chair of the committee. The committee is charged with identifying, with the Faculty and Department Chair’s help, deserving undergraduate and graduate students for all of the department’s awards and scholarships. The Director of Undergraduate Studies compiles undergraduate student data and guides the discussions on the awards and scholarships for undergraduate students presented at the spring graduation. The committee chair organizes and guides the discussions for all other departmental awards and scholarships.  The term of the appointments is two years.

5. Faculty Awards Committee:  This is a three-person committee, each for a two-year term with one member serving as chair. Ideally, the committee should be composed of faculty members from different research groups to include knowledge of awards in the wide breadth of sub-fields in the discipline. The committee is charged with (1) identifying awards available in both the profession (e.g., society awards and fellowships, private foundations) and internally within SUNY (e.g., UB and SUNY awards, etc.) for Earth Sciences faculty members and (2) compiling award dossiers, identifying and approaching letter writers, and/or seeking leaders in the discipline as nominators.

6. Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) Committee:  This is a three-person committee, each for a two-year term with a committee chair. It also includes two student members, one graduate and one undergraduate, as determined by the respective student clubs, who would be advisory to the committee with no voting rights. The committee is charged with developing and implementing department-wide strategies to create an inclusive, accessible, and safe research and work environment and build opportunities and pathways for recruitment, retention, and advancement of a diverse community of faculty scholars, students, and staff to UB Earth Sciences.

B. Ad Hoc Committees

The Chair may establish ad hoc committees with specified duties and specified fixed terms of existence.  Members of ad hoc committees are appointed at the discretion of the Chair. The most important ad hoc committees are the search committees whose tasks are to identify and evaluate potential new department members.

III. The Executive Functioning of the Department

The President appoints the Chair after a recommendation from the Dean.  In addition to those mentioned above, the Chair is responsible for the followings:

1. The Chair is responsible for all fiscal matters and for sharing fiscal information with the Faculty.

2. The chair determines Faculty teaching assignments in consultation with the Faculty.

3. The Chair shall be an ex-officio, non-voting member of every departmental committee, and shall be informed of committee meetings, their agenda, and results of such meetings.

4. The Chair may appoint an Associate Chair for a one-year term, renewable as desired.  This appointment will be subject to the same confirmation method by the Faculty as are other administrative appointments. The responsibilities of the Associate Chair will be communicated to the Faculty each Fall at the earliest reasonable opportunity.

5. In cooperation with the various committee chairs, the Chair shall annually make available all policies and regulations resulting from the exercise of these bylaws to the Faculty.

IV. Grievance Procedures

Should any matters arise either from the Faculty or the student body that cannot be resolved by collegial discussion between the parties involved, the normal grievance procedures of the University will be followed.

V. Amendments

The bylaws of the Department may be reconsidered at any time, as determined by the Chair. At the limit, the bylaws must be reviewed every five years, determined from the date of adoption of the bylaws or the most recent revision. Adopting changes to the bylaws shall be accomplished by a majority vote of the voting faculty, as specified in section I.B.

VI. Separability and Compatibility

If any portion of these bylaws is adjudged by any court of competent jurisdiction to be invalid, such judgment shall not invalidate the remainder of these bylaws.

These bylaws shall be compatible with and subordinate to the College of Arts and Sciences Bylaws, The University at Buffalo’s Bylaws of the Voting Faculty, the authority and policies of the Trustees of the State University of New York, the authority and policies of the Council of the State University of New York at Buffalo, and the laws of the State of New York and the United States of America.

VII. Appendix I. Departmental Procedures

A. Mentoring and Annual Evaluation^[1]

All faculty, regardless of rank, shall have a mentor. All senior faculty will mentor one or more junior faculty in Earth Sciences. Senior faculty (and sometimes junior faculty) may be paired with mentors outside the department but should have at least one mentor at the department. Beyond assigned mentor-mentee pairing (typically by the Chair), mentoring networks and peer mentoring are also encouraged.

1.      Untenured Assistant Professors, Clinical Assistant Professors, and Full-time Research Assistant Professors.  One of the tenured faculty’s responsibilities is facilitate the untenured faculty’s professional development to the maximum extent possible. To assure this, a faculty mentor, or a mentoring committee, will be appointed by the Chair in consultation with the untenured faculty member and considering their career goals and the tenured faculty talents. It is expected that the untenured faculty members and their mentors will establish annual goals and meet regularly during the academic year to make progress on the stated goals. Mentors are expected to support untenured faculty members through the range of activities required to become fully integrated members of the Department, University, and broader academic community. The mentoring relationships’ success will be evaluated annually by the Chair through separate communications with the untenured faculty members and their mentors. Examples of mentoring activities include regularly scheduled meetings (lunch or coffee break) to discuss mentee development (e.g., work-life balance, CV check, “shifting the pie” to meet promotion criteria (see figure), student recruitment, student mentoring, strategies for research productivity in ways that 'count' for tenure, 5-year plan, including research proposals in the works, etc.).

2.      Associate Professors and Clinical Associate Professors.  Full Professors’ responsibility is to continue encouraging and supporting Associate Professors and mentoring them towards promotion to Full Professor as appropriate for each individual case. Each Associate Professor should have a mentor selected in a process parallel to that described for untenured faculty. The Chair will appoint a mentor for each Associate Professor during the first five years of the Associate Professor’s appointment to this rank and beyond this duration if appropriate for the individual. If the specialized nature of research and/or rank demographics prohibit selection of an appropriate mentor from within the Department, the Chair, in consultation with the Full and Associate Professors, will endeavor to appoint a mentor elsewhere in the University to assist the Associate Professor in achieving their professional goals

3.      Full Professors and Clinical Professors. Experts agree that mentoring should never stop, and even senior faculty benefit from mentoring, especially those who obtain their first academic position at the Full Professor rank. Also, many senior faculty find themselves in administrative roles for the first time (e.g., Chair, member of Appointments, Promotions and Tenure (APT) Committee), and mentor advice from others with experience in these roles is invaluable. The Department’s Executive Committee will assist with assignments for Senior Faculty mentorship.

All ladder and clinical faculty will receive an annual evaluation of their accomplishments and discuss future plans with the Chair. A mentor can take part in a portion of these meetings.

B. Faculty Workload

We Department of Earth Sciences Faculty are a diverse, motivated, and productive group. Because we are different, we contribute and excel in various areas, and our involvement in them change with time. Recognizing and building on our diverse aptitudes and interests helps us to excel collectively. Few of us match the average or norm.

1.      Ladder Faculty. The following are guidelines to be used by the Chair to adjust workloads – most easily accomplished through changing teaching or service contributions. The following is the model for faculty work norm in Earth Sciences: teach ~2.5 courses per year, of which one is typically a required course in the undergraduate curriculum; advise ~2-3 graduate students in the MS (thesis) or PhD programs in any given year with average time-to-degree graduation rates. The Chair reserves the right to provide course releases to faculty who have unusually high workloads on tasks that benefit the Department’s well-being or provide a major contribution on a university/national/international level. Reasons to reduce teaching by ~0.5-1 class per year in the context of an otherwise full plate include: departmental service as a member of the executive committee (Director of Graduate Studies, Director of Undergraduate Studies), particularly demanding departmental or UB service appointments (e.g., EDI committee chair, space committee chair during planning and execution of an active move, service on College APT Committee or President’s Review Board (PRB)) or service for the professional community (e.g., editorship of a major professional journal), as well as exceptionally large research and/or graduate advising contributions. An increase in teaching or service load is appropriate for tenured faculty when the research and/or graduate supervision is lower than the norm.

2.      Clinical Faculty. Clinical faculty are full-time faculty appointed to multi-year, renewable term appointments with an emphasis on teaching and service. Clinical faculty typically teaches four courses per semester, or equivalent, and may carry additional service and/or administrative responsibilities associated with the Department's undergraduate programs. 12-month positions carry additional responsibilities in the summer and winter sessions.

C.  Faculty Obligations

1.      Ladder and Clinical Faculty. Ladder and clinical faculty are obligated to abide by the rules annually promulgated by the Provost.  These obligations generally consist of the following requirements: 1) to be available for university service for the 9-month academic year consistent with their departmental assignments, program responsibilities, and the university calendar; for 12-month appointments, this includes service and/or teaching responsibilities over the summer; 2) give final examinations during finals week, not during the last week of regularly scheduled classes; and 3) directly supervise graduate teaching assistants.  Departmental policy also requires faculty to notify the chair if a faculty meeting, retreat, or teaching duties will be missed due to travel or unforeseen urgent circumstances.  In cases of class sessions missed due to travel, it is faculty member’s responsibility to find an appropriate way to cover the material, generally by asking a colleague or well-trained graduate student to cover the missed session(s).

2.      Volunteer Research & Adjunct Faculty (non-paid). As stated in the bylaws, the department might have Research and Adjunct affiliated faculty.  Affiliated faculty are not expected or obligated to attend faculty meetings and do not have any voting rights.  There is no formal evaluation for renewal in these positions. However, the appointment of research faculty not showing signs of research activity in the form of either grant proposals jointly submitted by full-time faculty or refereed journal articles using departmental affiliation will, in general, not be renewed.  Likewise, adjunct faculty’s appointment’s, not teaching or advising students, will not, in general, be renewed.

Either research or adjunct faculty may also become members of the Graduate School faculty and be available for student advisement.  This allows the department to take advantage of expertise that might otherwise not be available.  Any resident affiliated faculty may request to be considered for nomination to the graduate faculty.  Also, faculty who previously held a ladder appointment, and are no longer in the department, typically must remain on the graduate faculty until all their graduate students have finished their degrees.  Once all degree-seeking candidates have left the program, the appointment is typically allowed to lapse at the end of the last term.

3.      Adjunct Instructors (paid per-course): Adjunct Instructors (State title of Lecturer 10) are temporary hires to fill the instructional gaps in the department teaching loads based on instructional need in any given semester.  These instructors are not expected or obligated to attend faculty meetings and do not have any voting rights.  There is no formal evaluation for renewal of these positions.

D. Promotion and Tenure Guidelines

Activities that contribute to equity, diversity, and inclusion: The department, UB, and our professional communities consider Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) to be a priority. All faculty are expected to support efforts that promote EDI. In addition, the department considers, but does not require, consistent efforts (through teaching, mentoring, advising, and/or service with UB, professional, or public communities) that measurably increase EDI in our department, university, or professional community to be an important and strong contribution to any tenure and promotion case, should a faculty choose to pursue such efforts.

Public Service: Public service efforts that meet UB’s mission of “…bringing the benefits of our research, scholarship, and creative activities and educational excellence to local and global communities in ways that impact and positively change the world,” can be an important and strong contribution to the service component of any tenure and promotion case.

D.1 Ladder Faculty

D.1.1 Promotion to Associate Professor with tenure

The following guidelines are developed to assist non-tenured faculty in understanding the basis for tenure decisions. In addition to the productivity expectations described below, tenure decisions include many qualitative evaluations of aspects of the candidate’s work, such as the quality of the research, the quality of journals in which the work is published, and evaluations by external reviewers of the effect of the candidate’s work on their field. Thus, these criteria are not a “checklist,” in that simply meeting these criteria does not guarantee that tenure will then be granted. See also the document on Policies, Procedures, and Criteria for Faculty Personnel Actions of for the official University procedures and expectations

at http://www.buffalo.edu/provost/admin-units/faculty-affairs/presidents-review-board/procedures.html

Publications:  Faculty are expected to publish their research results and foster publications that result from supervising student researchers. Generally, an average of two peer-reviewed publications per year in well-regarded, high-ranking disciplinary journals is expected. However, the appropriate number depends upon the specific research field, the journal’s quality, and ranking, the nature of the contribution to the publication (single author vs. multi-author, the significance of the work, etc.).  Depending on the faculty’s research area, publications in peer-reviewed conference proceedings can also be considered, but with lesser weight than journal publications.

For multi-author publications, it is generally perceived that the senior author led the effort and contributed to the greatest extent to the manuscript’s intellectual content. Senior authors are typically listed either first, following their student(s), or last (in some sub-disciplines). It is desirable and appropriate for students to be the first author on publications. External evaluators generally recognize the significant contributions of a student’s major advisor, i.e., senior author, in fostering and supporting such publications. Abstracts of talks, conference proceedings, book reviews, and other non-peer-reviewed publications provide evidence of research activity but are not substitutes for peer-reviewed articles that report original research.

Research: Faculty are expected to conduct sponsored research at a level that results in broad recognition among their disciplinary colleagues that they produce outstanding quality work.  Work of this sort requires extramural funding.  The level of annual support will depend upon the specific research area and whether the effort is individual or part of a team.  The record of submitted proposals is evidence of the pursuit of sponsored research; however, the level of support achieved is more important in the long-term.  As faculty approach tenure, it is expected that they will have established a successfully funded research program.  A critical level of support should be secured to cover the cost of gathering and analyzing data, purchasing or maintaining (or both) necessary instrumentation, purchasing expendable supplies (including computers), supporting graduate and undergraduate students, and attending professional meetings. It is acknowledged that specialized instrumentation or other individualized but capital-intensive activities that may be essential for the particular faculty’s success may require university cost-sharing.  Thus, the actual funding level consistent with a nationally recognized research effort will vary with the specific research program’s needs.

Teaching and graduate supervision:  All faculty are expected to be effective teachers.   Teaching evaluations should meet departmental and college averages by the time tenure is considered.  Additionally, all faculty are expected to be effective mentors for graduate research students and to supervise 2-3 graduate students per year and graduate 1-2 students prior to tenure as part of a mature, on-going research program with average time-to-degree graduation rates. It is recognized that the professional working degree in Geosciences is the MS (thesis). Although the ratio of master’s and doctoral students varies by sub-discipline and individual faculty member style subject to the employment market, all faculty are expected to have both master’s (thesis) and doctoral students within their research groups.

Service: All faculty are expected to participate in departmental and University administration. However, the service roles of untenured faculty will intentionally be kept to a minimum whenever practicable.  Similarly, public (in contrast to professional) service outside the University is not expected to be a significant activity for untenured faculty. Some professional service that contributes to knowledge and reputation is expected for untenured faculty and may include activities such as manuscript and proposal reviewing and service as a journal associate editor or member of a professional society committee.

D.1.2 Promotion to Full Professor

Promotion to the rank of Full Professor is based on the same three fundamental criteria that guide the evaluations for promotion to the rank of Associate Professor, namely scholarship, teaching/advisement, and service. Research and teaching/advising levels are to be maintained; the service expectations will be demonstrably higher.

Trajectory: It is expected that the candidate has compiled a significant record of accomplishments since the time of the tenure review and has achieved a positive international reputation.

Timing: Unlike promotion to Associate Professor with a six-year tenure clock, promotion to Full Professor has no mandated period. Six years is considered normal for the disciplines represented by the Faculty, however. To be considered for early promotion, the faculty member should demonstrate outstanding scholarly growth.

Scholarly products: The trajectory statement above is intentionally non-specific about the definition of "record of accomplishments." It is recognized that tenured faculty can follow diverse paths of scholarship, which may involve different types of products and evidence of scholarly achievement. A traditional route is for the candidate to continue publishing a minimum of two peer-reviewed publications per year in well-regarded disciplinary, high-ranking journals after the promotion to Associate Professor. Alternatively (or in addition), depending upon the research community that a candidate participates in, other products may be evaluated as measures of achievement. These can include but are not limited to: (1) digital contributions, (2) published geologic maps; (3) scientific leadership and coordination of significant team research efforts; (4) book authorship and/or editorship; (5) peer-reviewed book chapters; and (6) peer-reviewed conference papers/proceedings. These are not listed in order of importance. While the contributions or products might take several forms, it is critical that there is evidence of impact on the appropriate research community (for example, citations, usage statistics, recognition by evaluators). Given the diverse range of products that might be evaluated, it is not reasonable to specify a minimum number; the critical parameter is sustained impact on the research field.

Grants: Obtaining external funding for research is a significant part of the scholarly record and should show a continued trajectory from pre-tenure time for promotion to Full Professor. Continuing support by a single agency, demonstrated by multiple grants (or a series of follow-ons), is critical evidence of scholarly productivity and impact. It shows the agency's commitment to the candidate as an independent PI.

Teaching and graduate supervision: For promotion to Full Professor, the faculty member should maintain good teaching and advising records. Proof of ability to advise at the Ph.D. level is required, as demonstrated by the successful completion of at least one student dissertation. Continued evidence of advising MS students who find employment is helpful but cannot be construed equivalent.

Service: Candidates for promotion are expected to demonstrate service to the broader (national, international) scholarly community and within the university at the departmental, college, or university level.

D.2 Clinical Faculty

The following guidelines for the promotion of clinical faculty were developed in compliance with the CAS bylaws and the CAS Policies, Procedures, and Criteria for Appointment and Promotion of Clinical Faculty document (October 2016).

D.2.1 Appointment of Clinical Assistant Professors

Clinical faculty are expected to hold a Ph.D. at the time of the appointment and demonstrated competence in teaching. Candidates should show a promise for advancing pedagogy and scholarship through developing educational resources and mentoring undergraduate students.

D.2.2 Promotion to Clinical Associate Professor

Promotion to this rank (Clinical Associate Professors are untenured) is based on demonstrated excellence in teaching and service. While clinical faculty may be engaged in research and creative activity, their primary contributions should focus on the department’s teaching, learning and service goals. Clinical Assistant Professors are typically considered for promotion after a minimum of six years.

Teaching and undergraduate supervision: Clinical faculty are expected to be effective teachers. Teaching evaluations should support teaching ability. Evaluation of teaching is done each semester.  It is expected that the evaluations will meet or exceed departmental and college averages for comparable courses by the time promotion to clinical associate professor is considered. Additionally, all clinical faculty are expected to mentor and supervise undergraduate students teaching and research. Evidence of teaching effectiveness may include a variety of achievements, some of them listed below, and must be evaluated concerning the individual’s responsibilities at the department.

•   Honors or special recognition for teaching achievements

•   Development of innovative teaching materials and instructional techniques

•   Development or significant revision of courses, including the development of online courses

•   Advancing pedagogy through publications, research grants and presentations and attendance of professional meetings

•   Introducing and applying experiential learning in teaching and advising

Service: Clinical faculty are expected to participate in departmental and University administration, particularly by contributing to the goals of undergraduate education. Clinical faculty are also expected to actively participate in outreach activities and recruiting new students. Professional services of the junior clinical faculty may include manuscript and proposal reviews, participation in organizing professional meetings, and serving as members of professional society committee members.

D.2.2 Promotion to Clinical Professor

Faculty being considered for promotion to this rank must have achieved a sustained level of excellence in instruction, demonstrated by outstanding contributions to teaching and service. The candidate should be recognized as a strong leader within the department and the university and contribute to the development of junior faculty and the profession.

For promotion to Clinical Professor, it is expected that the faculty member has compiled a significant record of accomplishments since the promotion to clinical associate professor with a promise of continued professional growth.

Typically to be considered for promotion, clinical associate professors should have been in rank in a minimum of five years.

^[1]All mentors and mentees are expected to read the Office of the Provost’s faculty mentoring resources: http://www.buffalo.edu/provost/admin-units/faculty-affairs/mentoring.html