Dossier Preparation Guidelines For Promotion To Distinguished Professor

According to the Faculty Handbook, the Distinguished Professor Review Subcommittee (DPRS) reviews all nominations for promotion to the rank of Distinguished Professors (DP) and makes recommendations to the Provost.

I. Instructions and required documents for candidates considered by their academic units.

List of required documents:

1. An updated CV including teaching activities, student advisement, publications, patents, research funding, professional/community service, awards, etc.
2. Two lists of external reviewers (with brief description of their credentials) including (a) names submitted by the Department/Academic Unit P&T Committee (at least 6 names) and (b) names submitted by the nominee (also at least 6 names). Reviewers with potentially disqualifying conflicts of interest shall not be included (e.g., close relatives, current or former collaborators, former thesis advisor/student, people employed at the candidate’s current or most recent former employer, or visiting committee members at the candidate’s current employer, etc.).
3. Department/Academic Unit P&T Committee recommendation/nomination letter and the Department/Academic Unit P&T Committee Form. 
4. The Dean will review the dossier and prepare a letter giving his/her recommendation along with the corresponding Dean’s Form.

Instructions regarding solicitation of the reference letters:

1. Reference letters must be solicited for nominees for promotion to Distinguished Professor that are recommended by a 2/3 majority of the senior members of the P&T committee eligible to vote for promotion to Full Professor of their department.
2. See II. 2 for candidates recommended by a majority of their P&T committee who are eligible to vote for promotion to Full Professor of their department.
    

II. Instructions and required documents for candidates not considered by their academic units.

1. Candidates for promotion (or nominators) provide dossiers including a nomination letter (explaining their professional accomplishments), a CV in the required format, and a list of six external reviewers. Reviewers with potentially disqualifying conflicts of interest shall not be included. See I.2 for details.
2. The DPRS reviews each nomination. If the DPRS concludes that the candidate does NOT meet the criteria for promotion, the case is not considered further by the subcommittee.
3. If the DPRS concludes that the candidate should be considered for promotion, a list of 6 additional external reviewers should be produced by the DPRS. If the DPRS decides that they are not qualified to produce such a list, it is provided by the Dean of the corresponding college. After a complete reference list of 12 names is produced, the reference letters will be solicited.
    

III. Discussion and recommendation

After reference letters are received, all active cases are treated identically. The cases are discussed in a random order. If a DP subcommittee member is from the same department as the candidate, the member speaks last. The DPRS is voting by secret ballots, and cases receiving a majority of “Yes” votes are recommended for promotion to DP.
 

IV. Timeline

1. September/early October – DPRS is appointed, meets the Provost, and elects the DPRS Chair.
2. November – all nominations are received by the Office of the Provost and dossiers are checked for completion.
3. December - Reports are provided by the NJIT Library (publications), the Office of Research (research funding), the Office of Graduate Studies (graduated PhD and MS students), and the Office of Institutional Effectiveness (teaching evaluations).
4. February - Nominations are reviewed and compared with the independent reports, if no discrepancies, the external reference letters are requested.
5. Early April - All reference letters are received, and the subcommittee begins the considerations of all active candidates.

6. May 1st – The DPRS provides written recommendations to the Provost.