The UCA Honors College is at the forefront of a growing movement across the country: full-time tenured and tenure-track faculty teaching Honors interdisciplinary studies. Currently the Honors College is home to eight full-time faculty members with a range of disciplinary training, from philosophical theology to environmental literature to the history of technology.
Four staff members, including a student programs specialist and a dedicated information technology professional, support the busy schedule and varied initiatives of the Honors College. Faculty and staff participate as a team in recruiting activities, special event planning, student advising and mentoring, and professional development.
For the Honors College Tenure and Promotion Criteria, click here:
General Statement
The Honors College serves the University of Central Arkansas (UCA) and the larger community by providing a specially designed curriculum of interdisciplinary studies for academically talented and motivated undergraduate students. Expectations for Honors College faculty members who are eligible for tenure and promotion are the same as those for all such faculty, including demonstrated effectiveness in teaching, accomplishments in scholarship, research, or creative activity, and service to the college, university, and community at-large. Because the focus of the Honors College is undergraduate teaching in an interdisciplinary setting and fostering undergraduate scholarship through mentoring, special emphasis is placed on teaching effectiveness and those scholarly pursuits that contribute to such efforts. The Honors College is charged with three main missions: (1) attract the best and brightest students to UCA by establishing and maintaining a reputation for excellence in superior academic and co-curricular programming; (2) provide personalized attention to Honors College undergraduate scholars, promoting the arts of inquiry, conversation, and collaboration, culminating in high quality undergraduate scholarship; and (3) function as a site for developing new and innovative models for classroom instruction and curriculum delivery that can serve as a campus-wide vehicle for the reintegration of interdisciplinary teaching and learning.
By virtue of its particular mission, a strong emphasis is placed upon teaching interdisciplinary studies and on other interactions between faculty and students, including mentorship, and on contributions to co-curricular programming that enhance student learning beyond the boundaries of the classroom. Although excellence is expected in the triad of teaching, research, and service, the sum of an individual’s contribution in the area of undergraduate instruction, in all of its manifestations, will be most heavily weighted in the decision to grant tenure or promotion.
Criteria for Tenure and Promotion
General
The Honors College values scholarship in all its forms—teaching, research/creative activity, and service. Honors College courses and programs specifically serve undergraduates, and the curriculum is interdisciplinary. Thus, emphasis in tenure or promotion is placed upon the faculty member’s contributions to undergraduate instruction in interdisciplinary studies.
Teaching
Effectiveness in teaching is the most heavily weighted criterion for the determination of tenure or promotion for a faculty member in the Honors College. Evidence of teaching excellence may be illustrated through supporting materials included in a “teaching portfolio.”
For seminars taught, the portfolio may include such items as syllabi; handouts given to students, including writing assignments; lecture notes; student evaluations of courses taught or alternative course-assessment instruments; peer (faculty) observation instruments; student e-mails/thank-you notes, and the like; photos, when applicable; xerox copies of marked student essays; student-conference sign-up sheets; outside recognition of teacher and/or the students in a course; instructional manuals and/or textbooks developed; non-print media when relevant, e.g. a website.
Mentoring students in Oxford Tutorials, Senior Thesis Projects, and Independent Studies is valued. For tutorials mentored, the portfolio may include such items as student-tutor contract; student progress reports, research plan, research proposal; student e-mails/thank-you notes; letter(s) from Oxford Tutorial course instructor; list of specific students mentored, identifying topics, semester, and year. For theses advised the portfolio may include such items as student-advisor contract; xerox copies of sections commented upon; student e-mails/thank-you notes; letter(s) from Senior Thesis Project course instructor; signed title pages from completed theses; letter(s) written to recommend theses for Outstanding Thesis Award. For independent studies courses taught, the portfolio may include such items as student course proposal; syllabi and other relevant handouts; student e-mails/thank-you notes; other materials as applicable. For guest lectures given in other courses the portfolio may include a list of courses and dates; lecture notes; thank-you notes or e-mails from the inviting professor(s).
Advising students is valued in all its forms. The applicant’s file may include documentation of such activities as informal advising regarding courses, majors, grant applications, resumes, applications to graduate school, and the like; copies of letters of recommendation (protecting student privacy by keeping the bulk of the letter not readily visible).
Development as a teacher is valued, and can include evidence of attending university-sponsored workshops and seminars, such as those offered by the IDC; work on curriculum development; innovations in teaching; grant writing related to teacher development.
Furthermore, it is expected that a faculty member will participate in an annual evaluation, that entails documenting a summary of the previous year’s performance, preparing a planning document for the upcoming year, and attending an oral interview with the director or associate director, and will anticipate announced classroom visitations for the purpose of evaluative review.
It is also envisioned that excellent classroom teaching will be demonstrated through characteristics seen in traditional classroom interaction between students and faculty (e.g., thorough and up-to-date knowledge of subject matter, well-organized and clear presentation of relevant material, clear and willing responses to students’ questions, overall ability to maintain students’ interest, overall ability to maintain an appropriate classroom atmosphere, effective and timely integration of appropriate audio-visual materials, and fair and responsible grading.) Effective and excellent instruction may also be demonstrated through non-classroom activities (e.g., contributions to team-teaching in the Freshman Honors Seminars, tutoring, advising, supervision of Honors College Thesis Projects, grooming for national scholarship competition, fostering SURF/SILO grant proposals, design of courses or curricula, development of academic programs and non-classroom activities, development of textual materials or manuals, and other activities which indirectly support student learning, such as counseling students and general accessibility to students).
Scholarship, Research or Creative Activity
Scholarly productivity, in the form of research or creative activity, is vital in advancing the discipline/field of study or state of the art. An applicant for tenure or promotion must demonstrate acceptable work in research or creative activity. This criterion is the second most heavily weighted, behind teaching effectiveness. Because Honors College faculty members can represent a multitude of disciplines, evaluation of work in the area will make allowance for individual differences and for the unique requirements of specialized fields (see Tenure and Promotion Procedures and Guidelines below). In addition, contributions toward the “state of the art” of the Honors movement (ie., the development, delivery, and administration of a specially designed, interdisciplinary university education to high-achieving students) are encouraged and will be credited equally to those in the faculty member’s discipline/field of study. Contributions to the Honors movement might include publications or other efforts related to Honors-specific pedagogy, or other areas related specifically to serving high-achieving students.
Evidence of productivity in scholarship, research, or creative activity may include books and/or major creative works (if applicable); journal articles, scholarly or creative; and conference presentations. The applicant’s file should contain xerox copies of papers; conference programs, and the like.
In addition, other professional development may be included for evaluation, such as non-peer reviewed publishing, including book reviews, minor articles, etc.; other conference presentations; and grant writing, documented by xerox copies of papers; conference programs; grant abstracts and award letters.
To provide a context for evaluation of the applicant’s published items, documentation should be presented indicating the approximate rate of acceptance for peer reviewed journals and conference papers or presentations.
Service
Because of the nature of the Honors College and its emphasis on personalized relations between students and faculty; because of the centrality of interdisciplinary work and the concomitant need for faculty to develop relations across disciplines; because of its aim to enhance and expand teaching and learning beyond the classroom through co-curricular programming; because of its goal to invite members of the university community and the community of Central Arkansas to participate in fora that present scholarly ideas, public policy, or creative activity; and because of its emphasis on teaching and the corresponding importance for Honors College faculty members to support and foster the teaching culture and undergraduate scholarship campus-wide, the Honors College emphasizes the service function. This criterion is weighted lower than that of teaching effectiveness and scholarly productivity. Candidates for tenure or promotion must demonstrate professional contributions through service to the college, the university, the Honors movement, their disciplines/fields of study, the community at large, or other appropriate areas.
The applicant’s file may document items for service in the Honors College such as attending/directing co-curricular activities, such as the Freshman Fall Retreat; High Tables; Mind Television; the Contemporary Foreign Cinema Series; Soapboxes and other ad hoc presentations within the Honors College; Fridays in the Field or other service learning and/or other student community service activities; Sophomore Orientation Saturday; Challenge Week; Issues in the Public Square; Senior Thesis Day presentations; attending or helping to organize Freshman Family Day, Parents Day, Orientation Banquet, December Senior Banquet, or May Senior Banquet. Documentation would include such items as a sample schedule of sophomore lectures/thesis presentations; relevant e-mails, posters, etc.; annual review and/or letter from the Honors College director or associate director.
Other service activities for the Honors College may include developing new web sites or other communications devices (documented by print-outs, or compact disks); advising Honors College student groups such as the Vino and Paradigms staffs, the Honors Council, the Chess Club, and the like (documented by e-mail correspondence, minutes, photos, publicity, publications); conducting recruiting interviews; making recruiting phone calls, or writing recruiting letters, or making recruiting trips.
Service to the university may include items such as membership on university-wide committees, membership in the Faculty Senate, sponsorship of university-wide clubs and student or faculty organizations.
Service to the community may include items that demonstrate involvement in community affairs and organizations expressed through the applicant’s professional training and memberships. This service may also include membership in and leadership of regional and national organizations of the applicant’s professional discipline/field of study, or those in the Honors movement.
