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Introduction 

This document lays out the criteria for promotion from assistant to associate professor.  It also describes evidence considered and timing of promotions. 

outlines the qualifications for associate professor:  

“Appointment to the rank of associate professor requires a record of substantial success in teaching and/or research. For tenured, tenure-eligible, or WOT appointments, both of these shall be required, except that in unusual cases an outstanding record in one of these activities may be considered sufficient.” 

Other relevant documents and policies are: The iSchool and, the , and . 

Expectations for tenure and promotion 

The decision about tenure and promotion from assistant professor to associate professor is one of the most important decisions that we make. It is a decision that combines an assessment of the record to date and a projection of a career into the future. While the precise opportunities and expectations vary, they all involve some measure of quality, quantity, and trajectory in the record. 

At the Information School, we value interdisciplinary work and collaborative work with other units and disciplines within UW, nationally, and internationally. Work that is integrated and cross-disciplinary is very important in the information field. Nonetheless, we recognize that Information School faculty members work within a variety of disciplinary styles and traditions, and that the scholarly record of each of us may reflect a particular style or tradition. Therefore, it is incumbent upon the faculty member to articulate within what field(s) their record of accomplishments in scholarship, teaching, and service is to be judged, to convey which scholarly forms and venues are used for scholarly dissemination, and to provide evidence their record meets the school’s, the University’s, and the field’s expectations.  

What follows are criteria the iSchool expects to see from assistant professors who are being considered for promotion to associate. 

Research and Scholarship 

At the Information School, expectations regarding the independent scholarly record of our faculty are high. In general, quality is more important than quantity, although there must be sufficient quantity to provide evidence of a significant level of scholarly productivity. When reviewing the candidate's materials and external letters, faculty above rank will look for evidence of depth, richness, and nuance in thinking. Several additional factors can inform the assessment of the quality of a scholarly record. 

At more senior levels, quality is often measured by citations or other indicators of the impact of scholarship. At the junior level, quality is most often demonstrated by the quality of the journals, conference proceedings, presses, or other venues in which the individual publishes. You are encouraged to use a range of metrics and evidence to demonstrate the impact of your work. Metrics (whether quantitative or qualitative) without context cannot always tell the full story. The and are resources for demonstrating the impact of your work using a variety of metrics and evidence.  

The impact/significance of the scholarship is determined by the comments from outside reviewers, tempered by the assessment of the faculty above rank with the same or similar expertise. 

The composition of the portfolio of published works constitutes a significant part of the scholarly record. For example, a collection of good but unconnected articles may not produce the same sense of impact that a set of articles advancing a coherent line of scholarship would. It is not unprecedented, though, for faculty to shift scholarly areas of focus, even at the junior level. The personal statement provided by the candidate is a very important guide to the significance of each scholarly piece and their connection to each other. 

The scholarly record should provide clear evidence of independent thinking and research. Thus, although many junior scholars continue to do some collaborative work with a former Ph.D. or postdoc advisor, it is important to establish a record of growing independence from former advisors. 

We do encourage collaborative work; thus, co-authored articles and creative works are given important weight. It is, however, necessary to identify the contributions of the candidate to these articles and works. A significant portion of the overall research record should include articles and works to which the candidate has made the primary contributions, and all contributions in the scholarly record should be clearly identified. 

The University of Washington recognizes community engagement as a core component of its public mission. Further, the UW Faculty code explicitly recognizes community-engaged research as a form of scholarly achievement (). The contains resources for defining and evaluating community-engaged scholarship and research, as distinct from other community-engaged activities. Community-engaged scholarship includes not only original research but also the integration of knowledge across disciplines, the application of knowledge to real-world problems, and the study and improvement of teaching. High-quality community-engaged scholarship is intellectually rigorous, involves reciprocal and non-extractive engagement with community partners, and yields demonstrable public impacts beyond individual encounters. In addition to providing evidence of impactful and ethical community-engaged work, candidates are encouraged to demonstrate how their community-engaged research has advanced knowledge in their scholarly field. 

Outside funding of research from prestigious foundations and institutes (in those disciplines where it is available and when adequate funding opportunities exist) can be viewed as a significant part of the scholarly record, depending on the relative size of the grant and the significance of the questions posed. 

We expect to see evidence of the ability to acquire and manage resources needed to support the chosen research path.  This may include grants, but could also be fellowships, stipends, bursaries, or other relevant and appropriate resources to carry out the work. 

It is recommended that candidates have their mentors review all documentation, including the external reviewer list, well before June 15 of their fifth year.  If desired, the candidate can invite other faculty above rank, other than their mentor, to weigh in on their candidacy.  There is an expectation that faculty above rank will be as generous with their time as is reasonable.  If a draft of the documentation for promotion is mostly complete in the Autumn Quarter of the fifth year, then this provides maximum flexibility to arrange such conversations. 

Once the candidate submits their documentation, the school sends the CV, external self-assessment, the co-authorship document (if present), and three to five representative publications to external reviewers who have agreed to review the case.  These reviews are due in late summer/early fall at the end of the fifth year and beginning of the sixth. 

These letters, and all other evidence listed above, except the external self-review, are provided to the faculty above rank, who then meet to discuss and vote on the case. 

Pauses to the tenure and promotion clock 

There are many reasons why an assistant professor on the tenure track will want to pause their tenure and promotion clock. The Office of Academic Personnel and Faculty provides a complete list of promotion and tenure clock waivers (APF: ). Contact the Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs or the Director of Faculty Human Resources if you have questions. 

When a pause to the tenure and promotion clock is observed, this is recorded and accounted for in both the timeline for the case and in review of the materials prepared for the case.   

Going up early for promotion and tenure 

In some instances, candidates may desire or be encouraged to go up for promotion early, that is, before the sixth year of their appointment at the University.  The candidate is then encouraged to provide the Dean and the faculty above rank a full, error-free, and up-to-date CV so they may counsel the candidate on timing. This should happen before March 15 of the year before consideration. That is, if the candidate wants to be considered for promotion and tenure in their fifth year, counseling on going up early should happen before March 15 of the fourth year at the University. 

It is desirable that a letter, detailing the candidate’s rationale, accompany the self-assessment and other promotion materials.  A letter will have a rationale for early consideration based on evidence of quality, peer reviewed, impactful, sustained, and coherent scholarship that is demonstrated, among other ways, with comparisons to peers, appropriate metrics of impactful and useful scholarship, an adequate number of good teaching evaluations, and a statement on service commitment to the school, university, and the profession.     

In some cases, assistant professors arrive with experience as an assistant professor at another institution.  In these cases, Faculty Affairs discloses the amount of time negotiated by the dean and the candidate on the tenure clock. In these cases the Dean will ask that the entire record, post terminal degree, be considered, not just time at the University of Washington.