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Notes on The Identification of UW Faculty

Revised October 12, 2006

Correct identification of participating faculty is a key facet of our response to the NRC Assessment of Doctorate Research Programs since productivity of core faculty will be an important measure of program quality.  Only identified faculty will be able to respond to the NRC Faculty Questionnaire.  The Graduate School has used a combination of UW payroll records and doctoral committee records to "pre-populate" lists of faculty which can be refined by authorized departmental users of MyGradProgram.  This document describes data sources, methods which underlie the pre-populated data and help for those using MyGradProgram to refine the list of faculty.

Definitions

NRC defines faculty as those currently employed in faculty positions at UW and either have an appointment in the NRC participating program or have served on doctoral supervisory committees for students in the participating program.  The Graduate School has identified faculty as essentially "Graduate Faculty eligible" and thus as a superset of current Graduate Faculty.  NRC defines the following mutually exclusive categories:

1. Core program faculty. These are faculty members who have served as a chair or member of a program dissertation committee in the past 5 academic years (2001-2002 through 2005-2006) or who has served as a member of the graduate admissions or curriculum committee since Summer 2005. The faculty member must be currently and formally designated as faculty in the program and may not be an outside reader who reads the dissertation but does not contribute substantially to its development. In general emeritus faculty are not to be included except for those who, within the last three years, have either chaired a dissertation committee (i.e. been the PhD supervisor) or have been the primary instructor for a doctoral course listed in the catalog for credit.  The Graduate School has included emeritus faculty if they have chaired a doctoral supervisory committee or have taught a course (in any program) numbered 400 and above in the past three years.

The Graduate School has included faculty as core if they have a faculty appointment in the program and have served on one or more doctoral supervisory committees in the past 5 academic years.  UW adjunct faculty can be considered core.  Those with joint appointments will be core in each.  The Graduate School does not have central data on faculty service on graduate admissions and curriculum committees so it will be the program's responsibility to add faculty with appointments in the program and qualifying admissions or curriculum committee service.  Affiliate appointments are included in the data pre-populated by the Graduate School, but they should be remove if the affiliate has a core appointment at another doctoral university.

Another designation Core-no-supervis appears in MyGradProgram to designate Graduate Faculty who do not have qualifying doctoral supervisory committee appointments.  These records can by changed to core in MyGradProgram since we assume that many of the Graduate Faculty in your program may serve on admissions or curriculum committees.  If you leave them as core-no-supervis, they will be included as core in the list sent to NRC.

2. New program faculty. These are faculty members who are not listed as core faculty members, have been hired in tenured or tenure-track positions in the past 3 academic years (2003-2004 through 2005-2006), and who are expected to become involved in the graduate program.  Note that new Affiliate appointments are not included in the data pre-populated by the Graduate School.  New faculty who have qualifying doctoral committee service are counted as core instead of new.  Faculty hired Autumn 2006 should not be included.  The Graduate School pre-populated new faculty as those who do not meet core requirements and were appointed between 7/1/2003 and 9/1/2006.  Only tenure and tenure-track positions were included (Professor, Associate Professor, Assistant Professor).

3. Associated faculty. These are faculty who have chaired or served on program dissertation committees in the past five years (2001-2002 through 2005-2006), but who are not designated faculty in the program. Do not include outside readers or faculty currently employed at other universities. In general emeritus faculty are not to be included except for those who, within the last three years, have either chaired a dissertation committee (i.e. been the PhD supervisor) or have been the primary instructor for a doctoral course listed in the catalog for credit.  The Graduate School has included emeritus faculty if they have chaired a doctoral supervisory committee or have taught a course (in any program) numbered 400 and above in the past three years.  Those with affiliate appointments (in other programs) can be counted as associated.  Faculty who have separated from the UW cannot be classified as associate faculty, even if they continue to serve on UW program doctoral supervisory committees.

Procedures

Each participating PhD program must review and update their faculty lists as necessary using MyGradProgram.  Faculty lists have been pre-populated by the Graduate School for each participating program based on UW Payroll records and participation on doctoral supervisory committees.  Programs may add or remove faculty from their lists, but must supply a note of justification when doing so.  Programs should pay particular attention to "core-no-supervis" faculty since the Graduate School will submit them as core if they are not removed by the program.   MyGradProgram will write a transaction record for each change noting the date, time, and the person who made the change.

Data Sources

Data on faculty appointments - UW HEPPS payroll database for faculty appointments, Graduate School's graduate faculty database for graduate faculty status and interdisciplinary appointments.  Faculty appointments and committee service are as of the 10/6/2006; appointments after that date are not included.

Data on doctoral supervisory committees - Graduate School supervisory committee database.  Doctoral committees are managed by authorized departmental users of MyGradPgoram.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What will NRC do with the faculty information provided?

Each of the core and new faculty will receive an NRC Faculty Questionnaire asking them to rate their program and describe their own qualities.  Since not all faculty will respond to the questionnaire, the lists will also be used as the basis for research on faculty productivity for the program.  A sample of faculty who respond to the Faculty Questionnaire will receive the rating questionnaire and will be asked to rate peer programs at other universities.

2. Will associated faculty get questionnaires?

It is likely they will, but this is not yet certain (10/8/06).  Faculty who have joint appointments and doctoral committee service in multiple programs will probably get multiple questionnaires.

3. How will faculty productivity be allocated for faculty serving in more than one graduate program?

See NRC FAQ  #A2.

4. Should affiliate faculty be included?

Affiliate faculty appear in the Graduate School pre-populated lists when they are core or associated faculty in the program.  They can also be considered core if they have not served on doctoral supervisory committees but have served on admissions or curriculum committees since Summer 2005 and have an affiliate appointment in the program.  They should not be included as core if they have an appointment at another university.

5. The number of doctoral supervisory committee appointments seems low

The number of doctoral supervisory committees that a core or associated faculty member has served on or chaired includes only those committees for students in your program.  The number of chair appointments includes only those where the faculty member held chair status at any time on the given committee.  The number of member appointments includes only service as a member, it does not include committee service in which the faculty member's role was chair or GSR.

6. Can non-Graduate Faculty appointees be considered core?

Yes.  The Graduate School has pre-populated non-Graduate Faculty appointments in your program as core if the faculty member has qualifying doctoral supervisory committee service.  Non-Graduate Faculty can also be considered core despite the lack of qualifying doctoral committee service if they serve on admissions or curriculum committees.  If this is the case, please add them as core.

7. Are clinical faculty included in the faculty lists?

Clinical are included in the Graduate School pre-populated lists if they meet the requirement of qualifying doctoral committee service.  Programs should only add clinical faculty as core in MyGradProgram if they serve on admissions or curriculum committees.

8. Is GSR service counted as qualifying membership on doctoral supervisory committees?

No.  Membership as a committee GSR is not counted for core or associated faculty.

9. Are interdisciplinary faculty appointments counted even though they are not formal Payroll appointments?

Yes.  The Graduate School has pre-populated core faculty on the basis of "I" Graduate Faculty appointments even if the faculty member does not have a payroll appointment in the program.

10.  Are those with Graduate School Five-Year appointments included?

Yes.

11. Will associated faculty get a Faculty Questionnaire?

No. 

12. Will faculty with joint appointments can two or more questionnaires?

NRC will attempt to distribute only one questionnaire per faculty member.

Additional FAQ at NRC

 The Graduate School   G-1 Communications Building    Box 353770  
University of Washington  Seattle  WA   98195   Phone: 206-543-5900