University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point
ER-19: Interdisciplinary Research in Tenure and Promotion

There isn’t specific acknowledgement of interdisciplinary research; the UWSP criteria for scholarship should have disciplinary and/or pedagogical value.

The University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point University Handbook contains very general statements on the institution’s expectations for faculty achievements in teaching, scholarship, and service for purposes of making personnel decisions. By way of this booklet, the Chancellor and Provost/Vice Chancellor give an institutional interpretation to each of these statements. These interpretations set the university’s minimum performance and peer evaluation expectations for faculty. Each academic department is responsible for having personnel guidelines that give the department’s interpretation of these general statements, and which set performance and peer review expectations at least as high as those communicated in this booklet. Each department is also responsible for specifying the relative importance of teaching, scholarship, and service in the evaluation process preceding a departmental recommendation on retention, tenure, and promotion. Since teaching is the primary faculty responsibility at UWSP, the Chancellor and Provost/Vice Chancellor normally put the greatest importance on this performance area in personnel reviews. The next most important performance area normally is scholarship; therefore, a positive tenure or promotion review requires first and foremost that the candidate present a continuing record of teaching ability at least at the norm of the department AND a continuing and growing record of scholarly achievements. Though the performance area of service is important to positive personnel reviews, a strong record in it normally will not compensate for the lack of continuing, positive records of achievements in teaching or scholarship. Similarly, it is not likely that a strong record of scholarship will compensate for the lack of a continuing positive record of achievements in teaching. CRITERIA FOR SCHOLARSHIP: The University Handbook description of scholarship specifies six criteria that activities must meet in order to be regarded as evidence of scholarship. The activities must: 1. Be clearly defined 2. Require a level of expertise that reasonably could be expected of a university faculty member 3. Use methods and procedures appropriate to the task 4. Be well-documented 5. Be available to the academic community for review and comment 6. Have disciplinary and/or pedagogical value Clearly, traditional, discipline-focused research and publication activities satisfy the description of scholarship and these criteria. However, pedagogical scholarship and other scholarly activities that support the greater engagement of the university may also constitute scholarship when they fulfill the six criteria listed above. Some departments might decide that activities such as the following may be considered: • Conducting and reporting on pedagogical research • Developing and testing of an innovative approach to a given topic • Consulting • Preparing and submitting a grant proposal to an outside agency • Writing a laboratory manual used only on this campus • Serving on a panel on curriculum at a national meeting (note that simple attendance at such a meeting would not meet the criteria for acceptable scholarship) • Applying one's academic expertise to discipline-related issues at the local, state or national level • Involving undergraduate, as well as graduate, students in activities that develop research skills and lead to presentations and publications • Exhibiting one's work • Performing public recitals • Serving on a research panel