Requests for Reauthorization of Faculty Positions and Proposals for New Positions

The faculty has established a procedure for review of the allocation of continuing faculty positions when they become vacant. The Curriculum and Educational Policy Committee undertakes this review annually in the Spring. Its role is to advise the President and the Dean whether vacant positions should be reauthorized (and potentially redefined) in the same department or program or be allocated elsewhere.

The purpose of this memo is to outline the process for requesting the reauthorization of a position. Such requests should be submitted in as timely a fashion as possible after notice of a resignation or retirement. Please consult with me about the individual circumstances that your department/program faces.

Criteria

In reviewing requests for reauthorization of faculty positions, the CEP has reviewed and will bear in mind the following criteria:

  • The importance of the particular subject matter in the curriculum, looked at from the point of view of the individual department or program;
  • The importance of the particular subject matter in the curriculum, looked at from the point of view of the College as a whole, including particularly the potential contribution to distribution requirements and to existing interdisciplinary programs and the relationship to course offerings in other departments;
  • The role that the position would play in satisfying student interest in the subject matter, either by maintaining existing offerings in which there is substantial student interest or by providing improved access to over-enrolled subjects;
  • The capacity of the position to reduce chronically heavy teaching loads and to reduce course size in the department or program applying for it; and
  • The likelihood that the faculty’s diversity goals could be advanced through recruitment to fill the position.

In reviewing these requests, the Committee’s general responsibility will be to reach qualitative judgments that look principally to the long-term curricular interests of the College. Materials that CEP may consult in the process of reviewing requests include departmental self-studies and reviews, enrollment patterns and course data, profiles of departments/programs at peer institutions. In reaching its recommendations, the CEP will give weight to departmental, program, and institutional considerations.

Procedure

A department in which a vacancy occurs in a tenurable position, and which desires authorization to recruit a replacement, has two options: the department may request reauthorization of the same position or it may request the authorization of a position in another field of specialization, in response to changing curricular needs or changing enrollment patterns within the discipline.

In order to ensure that it fully understands the role of a faculty position in a department or program, the CEP will consult with the chair/director of any department/program with a vacancy if it appears that the Committee is considering the possibility of moving that position to another department/program.

Format for requests. A request for reauthorization should be in the form of a memorandum to me. Please be reasonably brief, and feel free to attach any statistical information or other items that might help the Committee to understand and evaluate the request. Please be sure that the following questions are answered in the memorandum in whatever way you think would be most efficient:

1. In which field or subfield would the appointment be made? Please include a prototype job description and give examples of courses that an individual appointed to the position might contribute to the curriculum.

2. What is the rationale for reauthorizing the position in terms of the criteria listed above? Please consider the following points:

  1. With respect to subject matter, indicate how the field is related to other fields in your discipline and what educational values would be served by including the field in the department’s or program’s curriculum. How would this appointment contribute intellectually to the long-term direction of the department/program and Bowdoin’s position with relation to the disciplinary field represented.
  2. Describe how, if at all, this position would contribute to satisfying curricular needs beyond your department or program. If appropriate, comment on the potential contribution to distribution requirements; if appropriate, comment on the potential contribution to the interdisciplinary or departmental programs that would be touched by this appointment. (Where such a contribution is possible, it would be advantageous to discuss the position with the director of the pertinent program or department chair or chairs and to obtain their endorsement of the request.)
  3. With respect to enrollment and workload pressures, comment on any trends you observe in departmental or program course enrollments and in the numbers of majors and minors.
  4. Note specifically whether (and how) the position might be described so as to attract applicants who would contribute to a more diverse faculty. Please attach a description of a search plan for the position.

3. Would the position entail any additional non-salary costs in your department or program or the College budget generally? How much and for what purposes? Would it imply any additional staff costs (e.g., for a laboratory instructor)? How much and why?

Schedule

Requests for reauthorization of a position that falls vacant after CEP is in active session should be submitted as soon as the vacancy is known. Vacancies occurring after Commencement may be reauthorized at the discretion of the dean; however, no decision will be taken outside of the academic year to allocate a position to a department other than that in which it was last occupied. Please note that requests received after Commencement for vacancies which could have been reasonably anticipated during the semester will normally be deferred to fall semester. The CEP decision constitutes a recommendation for action; the President and Dean have final authority over reauthorizations.

I encourage chairs or program directors to be in touch with me to discuss intended requests. Feel free to call or drop me a note if you have questions. On behalf of all the members of the Committee, let me thank you and your colleagues for the time devoted to the preparation of these requests. The articulation of departmental and program priorities in these proposals provides helpful guidance to future development efforts as well as information to the CEP.