Previous Faculty of Mathematics performance guidelines

These guidelines should be used for the 2020 Evaluation period.

1.0 Purpose

The primary purpose of performance reviews for faculty members is to identify particular accomplishments as well as areas of difficulty, and to promote discussion between individual faculty members and the Chair or Director concerning ways to structure andenhance future contributions.

A review is also necessary for all regular faculty members (Lecturer through Professor) on full-time, part-time (≥ 50%), reduced load, and joint appointments in order that well-informed decisions can be made regarding selective salary increments (Ref: Memorandum of Agreement Article 13). In some cases this will also include definite term research professors, if specified in their contract. Probationary appointments and definite term contracts will be evaluated annually; tenured faculty and continuing lecturers will be evaluated every two years (evaluation to occur in odd numbered years for the previous two years).New continuing lecturers or tenured faculty may choose to be evaluated their first year, or take the averagefor their rank.

It is the responsibility of the Chairs/Director to assess the performance of each regular faculty member annuallyor biennially, to provide a written performance review and to be available to discuss it upon request. Performance reviews are especially important in helping new faculty members gauge their progress towards meeting the standards for reappointment and tenure. Annual performance reviews form part of the evidence in tenure and promotion considerations, together with reports fromexternal referees and more extensive career reviews carried out by the Department/School Tenure and Promotion Committee (D/STPC).

Article 13 of the Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) states the principles for the determination of salaries and the evaluation of faculty members. Specifically, section 13.5.1(c) of the MoA requires that each Faculty have Performance Evaluation Guidelines (this document) setting out the evaluation criteria specific to that Faculty. These Faculty-specific guidelines are intended to supplement the principles documented in the Memorandum of Agreement. If there is a conflict between these Guidelines and the MoA and/or Policy 77, the provisions in the MoA and/or Policy 77 shall take precedence. These guidelines are to be made available to all Members prior to the commencement of the calendar year(s)being evaluated.

2.0 Areas of review

A regular professorial faculty appointment involves three main responsibilities: to communicate the knowledge and nature of one's discipline through teaching, to advance the state of one's discipline through scholarship, and to contribute to the administrative functions that support these goals through effective service. The performance review will focus on recent activity in all three areas: teaching, scholarship, and service.

A regular lecturer appointment will involve teaching and service as described above. It may also include scholarship, depending upon the contract.

University teaching encompasses a wide range of activities. It takes many different forms (e.g., undergraduate and graduate courses, graduate seminars, distance education, project and thesis supervision), has many different components (e.g., lectures, tutorials, setting and grading of assignments and examinations, interaction with students outside the classroom, curriculum development), and can occur in many different environments (e.g., large lecture theatres, small seminar rooms, off-campus short courses and workshops, clinics, laboratories, one-on-one supervision). Graduate supervision is evaluated in the Teaching category for the Faculty of Mathematics.These guidelines should also be used for the 2020 Evaluation Period.

Scholarship is broadly defined to include research articles in refereed journals, research monographs, textbooks, expository articles at all levels, conference papers, reports, reviews, patents, addresses to professional/learned societies, etc. Peer-reviewed research with respect to pedagogy and peer-reviewed research with respect to innovative teaching also constitute scholarly activity. The originality, quality, impact, and quantity ofscholarly work are all considered in reviewing performance. The level of contract or grant support is not in itself to be used as a measure scholarly achievement, although the peer evaluation system in grant selection committees is respected.

Service includes contributions through administrative appointments and committee membership at all levels within the University, direction of laboratories, organizational involvement in Groups, Centres and Institutes, outreach, and student advising. It also includes service to the discipline through granting council committees, editorial boards, conference organization, and working committees of professional societies.

Although the official review period is one or two calendar years, it is desirable that the evaluation take place in the context of a somewhat longer viewpoint (2 years for teaching and service, and 4 years for research). Consecutive performance evaluations should not change dramatically from owing to sabbatical leaves, number of teaching terms, or publication delays. Chairs/Directors must also pay particular attention to the provisions of Section 13.5.4 of the MoA regarding evaluations for Members on leave.

3. Review procedure

Committee

Each Department or School with 15 or more members shall conduct their evaluations with a Departmental/School Performance Review Committee (D/SPRC), advisory to the chair/director. By December 1st, the Members of the Department or School shall elect an advisory committee of no more than five Members to assist the Chair/Director with their responsibilities.

Faculty members appointed in the Dean’s Office will be evaluated by an equivalent Performance Review Committee, advisory to the Dean.

Activity Report

By early January, each faculty member under evaluation in that period will submit to the Chair/Director a completed Activity Report for the evaluation period, along with any other relevant documentation. Faculty members with probationary or definite term contracts shall provide documentation each year for the preceding year. Tenured faculty and continuing lecturers members shall provide documentation every other year on odd numbered years for the preceding two calendar year(s). For many, the completed Activity Report will be sufficient, but some may wish to include (or be asked by the Chair/Director to include) other material such as copies of publications, teaching materials, and letters of commendation. Failure to submit a report will result in an overall rating of at most 0.5 as outlined in the MoA.

The Activity Report shall include the weights that the faculty member believes should be used for their Performance Review. These weights will be reviewed by the D/SPRC and compared with any formal written agreements that are on file.

Review Procedures at Department/School level

Based on the Activity Report and any other relevant documentation, the Chair/Director, together with the Review Committee, will review each faculty members’ contributions in teaching, scholarship, and service. They will prepare a written review for each faculty member, addressing each of the three areas.

Role of the Dean

The Chair/Director will inform the Dean of the proposed ratings and weightings for each of the three categories. The Dean will carefully review and if necessary modify the proposed ratings to ensure that fair and consistent standards and criteria are being employed across the Faculty. The Dean may establish an advisory committee to assist with this review.

The Dean will evaluate the performance of the Chairs/Director,Associate Deans, Assistant Deansand Vice Dean,and shall forward the proposed performance ratings in the three categories and overall to the VPA&P for approval. The VPA&P will inform the Dean and the Chairs/Director or the Associate Dean in writing with reasons of any changes in the recommended ratings.

The Dean may choose to consult with the Review Committee of the individual’s home unit for input upon their teaching and service.

Communication of Ratings

By the end of March, each faculty member will receive a copy of his or her written performance review and overall rating from the Chair/Director or Dean. If a faculty member's performance is considered to be less than satisfactory, the written review should carefully explain the reasons for the assessment, and give reasonable and explicit expectations and the details of any plans to enhance contributions. Each faculty member will be provided with the opportunity to discuss his/her performance review.

Dispute resolution

A faculty member who disagrees with his/her performance evaluation should proceed first to the Chair/Director, and then, if no resolution has been reached, to the Dean of the Faculty for final disposition prior to the 15th of April. A Chair/Director,Associate Dean,Assistant Deansor Vice Deanwho disagrees with her/his performance evaluation should proceed first to the Dean, and then, if not resolved, to the VPA&P for disposition.

4.0 Ratings and weights

A faculty member's performance in each of teaching, scholarship, and service will be rated on a standard scale ranging from 0 to 2:

2.00 Outstanding

1.75 Excellent

1.50 Very good

1.25 Good

1.00 Satisfactory

0.75 Needs Some Improvement

0.50 Needs Improvement

0.25 Needs Major Improvement

0.0 Unsatisfactory.

Chairs and Performance Evaluation Committees should use the entire range of scores, as needed. The overall rating shall be computed as the weighted average of the individual ratings in teaching (t), scholarship (r) and service (s) for the period under review.

R = at + br + cs

where a,b,c are non-negative weights adding to 1. For members on a biennial performance review cycle, the rating and weightings for non-review years shall be equal to the rating for the previous review year. A continuing member who has been on leave shall receive, in any category where assessment is not possible as a result of the leave, a rating equal to the average ratings of the three previous years in which the Member was not on leave.

Weights

For professorial faculty members with normal responsibilities, teaching and scholarship are considered to be about equally important and are weighted more heavily than service in evaluating overall performance. Thus for most professorial faculty members the default weights of 40%R (scholarship), 20%S (service) and 40%T (teaching) will be used.

For lecturer positions, the default weights shall be 80% for teaching and 20% percent for service. These default weights do not apply to lecturer appointments made prior to May 1, 2008, and existing weights remain in effect for the duration of the appointment unless otherwise changed under article13.5.5(b) and (c) of the MoA. There is no intended linear relationship between the percent for teaching and the number of coursestaught.

Weightings and duties may be adjusted in a formal written agreement between the faculty member and the Chair/Director with the approval of the Dean. The weights shall be at least 20% in every category, except in the case of lecturer appointments which allows for 0% or 10% weight on the Scholarship component. Weight redistribution does not modify the performance quality standards expected in any of the three areas, though expectations for quantity will change. Some examples of non-standard weights used in the Faculty of Mathematics are:

• 60%R, 20%S, 20%T for individuals with special appointments or national awards that entail increased research expectations and reduced teaching loads (e.g., salary award holders such asSteacieandKillamFellows,NSERCIndustrialResearchChairs,CRCsetc.);
• 20%R, 60%S, 20%T for individuals with major administrative duties and reduced teaching loads (e.g., Vice Dean, Chairs/Director and Associate Deans.
• 20%R,20%S,60%Tforindividualswhohavenegotiatedincreasedteachingloadsand reduced expectations inscholarship.
• 0%R, 30%S, 70%T for lecturers who have negotiated an agreement for minimal/noscholarship contribution, provide extra service contributions, and teach up to 6 courses per year.
• In the case of appointments starting or ending partway through the evaluation period, the practice in the Math faculty is to use a weighted average to determine the weightings for the evaluation period. For example, if an individual had weights 40%R, 20%S, 40%T for the first six months of the two year cycle, and had weights 20%R, 60%S, 20%T for the last 18 months of the two year cycle, then you would use the weights 25%R, 50%S, 25%T. Here 25%R=624×40%R+1824×20%R,etc.

5.0 Salary increases

A pool of funds for selective salary increases is provided to the Faculty in accordance with Memorandum of Agreement Article 13.3.2. A faculty member’s selective salary increase depends bothonher/hisannualperformancerating(actualR)andonthepositionofher/hissalaryrelativeto the threshold T1 and T2 for her/his rank. The selective increases are described in detail in MoA Section13.3.

Additionally, the MoA allow for adjustments for salary anomaliesand for Outstanding Performance Awards, both of these are described in Section 13.3.3€ of the MoA.

6.0 Approvals and documentation

This document will be circulated annually to members of the Department/School.; The guidelines will be used to evaluate performance over the course of the next calendar year(s).It shall be reviewed and updated no less than once every five years with any changes approved by a majority vote of the Faculty Council by October 15thin the year before the evaluation calendar year to which the changes would apply.

Documents related to the Performance Evaluation process, including this guideline document, are available at https://sharepoint.uwaterloo.ca/sites/DOM/FacultyPerformance

These guidelines should be used for the 2017-8 Evaluation period.

1.0 Purpose

The primary purpose of performance reviews for faculty members is to identify particular accomplishments as well as areas of difficulty, and to promote discussion between individual faculty members and the Chair or Director concerning ways to structure andenhance future contributions.

A review is also necessary for all regular faculty members (Lecturer through Professor) on full-time, part-time (≥ 50%), reduced load, and joint appointments in order that well-informed decisions can be made regarding selective salary increments (Ref: Memorandum of Agreement Article 13). Probationary appointments and definite term contracts will be evaluated annually; tenured faculty and continuing lecturers will be evaluated every two years (evaluation to occur in odd numbered years for the previous two years).

It is the responsibility of the Chairs/Director to assess the performance of each regular faculty member annually, to provide a written performance review and to be available to discuss it upon request. Performance reviews are especially important in helping new faculty members gauge their progress towards meeting the standards for reappointment and tenure. Annual performance reviews form part of the evidence in tenure and promotion considerations, together with reports from external referees and more extensive career reviews carried out by the Department/School Tenure and Promotion Committee (D/STPC).

Article 13 of the Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) states the principles for the determination of salaries and the evaluation of faculty members. Specifically, section 13.5.1(c)of the MoA requires that each Faculty have Performance Evaluation Guidelines (this document) setting out the evaluation criteria specific to that Faculty. These Faculty-specific guidelines are intended to supplement the principles documented in the Memorandum of Agreement. If there is a conflict between these Guidelines and the MoA and/or Policy 77, the provisions in the MoA and/or Policy 77 shall take precedence. These guidelines are to be made available to all Members prior to the commencement of the calendar year(s)being evaluated.

2.0 Areas of review

A regular faculty appointment involves three main responsibilities: to communicate the knowledge and nature of one's discipline through teaching, to advance the state of one's discipline through scholarship, and to contribute to the administrative functions that support these goals through effective service. The annual performance review will focus on recent activity in all three areas: teaching, scholarship, and service.

University teaching encompasses a wide range of activities. It takes many different forms (e.g., undergraduate and graduate courses, graduate seminars, distance education, project and thesis supervision), has many different components (e.g., lectures, tutorials, setting and grading of assignments and examinations, interaction with students outside the classroom, curriculum development), and can occur in many different environments (e.g., large lecture theatres, small seminar rooms, off-campus short courses and workshops, clinics, laboratories, one-on-one supervision). Graduate supervision is evaluated in the Teaching category for the Faculty of Mathematics.

Scholarship is broadly defined to include research articles in refereed journals, research monographs, textbooks, expository articles at all levels, conference papers, reports, reviews, patents, addresses to professional/learned societies, etc. Peer-reviewed research with respect to pedagogy and peer-reviewed research with respect to innovative teaching also constitute scholarly activity. The originality, quality, impact, and quantity of scholarly work are all considered in reviewing performance. The level of contract or grant support is not in itself to be used as a measure scholarly achievement, although the peer evaluation system in grant selection committees is respected.

Service includes contributions through administrative appointments and committee membership at all levels within the University, direction of laboratories, organizational involvement in Groups, Centres and Institutes, high school liaison, and student advising. It also includes service to the discipline through granting council committees, editorial boards, conference organization, and working committees of professional societies.

Although the official review period is one or two calendar years, it is desirable that the evaluation take place in the context of a somewhat longer viewpoint (2 or 3 years). Performance evaluations should not change dramatically from year to year owing to sabbatical leaves, number of teaching terms, or publication delays. Chairs/Directors must also pay particular attention to the provisions of Section 13.5.4 of the MoA regarding evaluations for Members on leave.

3.0 Procedure review

Committee

Each Department or School with 15 or more members shall conduct their evaluations with a Departmental/School Performance Review Committee (D/SPRC), advisory to the chair/director. By December 1st, the Members of the Department or School shall elect an advisory committee of no more than five Members to assist the Chair/Director with their responsibilities.

Faculty members appointed in the Dean’s Office will be evaluated by an equivalent Performance Review Committee, advisory to the Dean.

Activity report

By early January, each faculty member under evaluation in that period will submit to the Chair/Director a completed Activity Report for the evaluation period, along with any other relevant documentation. Faculty members with probationary or definite term contracts shall provide documentation each year for the preceding year.Tenured faculty and continuing lecturers members shall provide documentation every other year on odd numbered years for the preceding two calendar year(s).For many, the completed Activity Report will be sufficient, but some may wish to include (or be asked by the Chair/Director to include) other material such as copies of publications, teaching materials, and letters of commendation. Failure to submit a report will result in an overall rating of at most 0.5 as outlined in the MoA.

The Activity Report shall include the weights that the faculty member believes should be used for their Performance Review. These weights will be reviewed by the D/SPRC and compared with any formal written agreements that are on file.

Review procedures at department/school level

Based on the Annual Activity Report and any other relevant documentation, the Chair/Director, together with the Review Committee, will review each faculty members’ contributions in teaching, scholarship, and service. They will prepare a written review for each faculty member, addressing each of the three areas.

Role of the Dean

The Chair/Director will inform the Dean of the proposed ratings and weightings for each of the three categories. The Dean will carefully review and if necessary modify the proposed ratings to ensure that fair and consistent standards and criteria are being employed across the Faculty. The Dean may establish an advisory committee to assist with this review.

The Dean will evaluate the performance of the Chairs/Director and Associate Deans, and shall forward the proposed performance ratings in the three categories and overall to the VPA&P for approval. The VPA&P will inform the Dean and the Chairs/Director or the Associate Dean in writing with reasons of any changes in the recommended ratings

Communication of ratings

By the end of March, each faculty member will receive a copy of his or her written performance review and overall rating from the Chair/Director or Dean. If a faculty member's performance is considered to be less than satisfactory, the written review should carefully explain the reasons for the assessment, and give reasonable and explicit expectations and the details of any plans to enhance contributions. Each faculty member will be provided with the opportunityto discuss his/her performance review.

Dispute resolution

A faculty member who disagrees with his/her performance evaluation should proceed first to the Chair/Director, and then, if no resolution has been reached, to the Dean of the Faculty for final disposition prior to the 15th of April. A Chair/Director or Associate Dean who disagrees with her/his performance evaluation should proceed first to the Dean, and then, if not resolved, to the VPA&P for disposition.

4.0 Ratings and weights

A faculty member's performance in each of teaching, scholarship, and service will be rated on a standard scale ranging from 0 to 2:

2.00 Outstanding

1.75 Excellent

1.50 Very good

1.25 Good

1.00 Satisfactory

0.75 Needs Some Improvement

0.50 Needs Improvement

0.25 Needs Major Improvement

0.0 Unsatisfactory.

Chairs and Performance Evaluation Committees will be instructed to use the entire range of scores. The overall rating shall be computed as the weighted average of the individual ratings in teaching (t), scholarship (r) and service (s) for the period under review.

R = at + br + cs

where a,b,c are non-negative weights adding to 1.For members on a biennial performance review cycle, the rating for non-review years shall be equal to the rating for the previous review year.

A continuing member who has been on leave shall receive, in any category where assessment is not possible as a result of the leave, a rating equal to the average ratings of the three previous years in which the Member was not on leave.

Weights

For facultymembers with normal responsibilities, teaching and scholarship are considered to be about equally important and are weighted more heavily than service in evaluating overall performance. Thus for most faculty members the default weights of 40%R (scholarship), 20%S (service) and 40%T (teaching) will be used.

For lecturer positions, the default weights shall be 80% for teaching and 20% percent for service. These default weights do not apply to lecturer appointments made prior to May 1, 2008, and existing weights remain in effect for the duration of the appointment unless otherwise changed under article13.5.5(b) and (c) of the MoA. There is no intended linear relationship between the percent for teaching and the number of coursestaught.

Weightings and duties may be adjusted in a formal written agreementbetween the faculty member and the Chair/Director with the approval of the Dean. The weights shall be at least 20% in every category, except in the case of lecturer appointments which allows for 0% weight on the Scholarship component. Weight redistribution does not modify the performance quality standards expected in any of the three areas, though expectations for quantity will change. Some examples of non-standard weights used in the Faculty of Mathematics are:

• 60%R, 20%S, 20%T for individuals with special appointments or national awards that entail increased research expectations and reduced teaching loads (e.g., salary award holders such as Steacie and Killam Fellows, NSERC Industrial Research Chairs, CRCs etc.);
• 20%R, 60%S, 20%T for individuals with major administrative duties and reduced teaching loads (e.g., Chairs/Director and Associate Deans); in the case of appointments starting or ending partway through the evaluation period, the practice in the Math faculty is to use a weighted average to determine the weightings used in the first and last years of the appointment (e.g. use 30%R, 40%S, 30%T in the first and last years of an administrative appointment starting on July 1 and ending 3 or 4 years later onJune30).
• 20%R,20%S,60%Tforindividualswhohavenegotiatedincreasedteachingloadsand reduced expectations inscholarship.
• 0%R, 30%S, 70%T for lecturers who have negotiated an agreement for minimal/no scholarshipc ontribution, provide extra service contributions, and teach up to 6 courses per year.

5.0 Salary increases

A pool of funds for selective salary increases is provided to the Faculty in accordance with Memorandum of Agreement Article 13.3.2. A faculty member’s selective salary increase depends both on her/his annual performance rating (actualR) and on the position of her/his salary relative to the threshold T1 and T2 for her/his rank. The selective increases are described in detail in MoA Section13.3.

Anomaly adjustments

As described in MoAArticle 13.3.3(e), the University will provide annually an Anomalies Fund for each Faculty equal in value to five percent of that Faculty’s Selective Increase Pool, to correct individual salary anomalies. These are determined by the Dean based upon recommendations made by the Chairs/Director, and require the approval of the Vice-President Academic and Provost who will consult with the President of the Faculty Association.

Outstanding Performance Awards

As described in MoAArticle 13.3.3(e), the University will provide annually an Outstanding Performance Fund for each Faculty equal in value to ten percent of that Faculty’s Selective Increase Pool, to provide special permanent salary increases. For members on a biennial review cycle, eligibility for consideration for OPA during non-review years are based on the previous year’s performance ratings.

Members in each Faculty unit (department or school) whose annual performance rating for the current year is within the top twentieth percentile of ratings within the unit may be considered for a special permanent salary increase. Members who have received a special increase in either of the previous two years are not eligible to receive a special increase, and are excluded for purposes of determining the twentieth percentile and those within it. A report of previous recipients is available from the Executive Officer.

All Members identified by the process above will form a single Faculty-wide pool. The Dean of the Faculty, in consultation with the chairs/director and the Vice-President, Academic & Provost, will review the performance of all Members in this pool, and make special salary increase awards equal in value to one Selective Increase Unit (SIU) to a subset of them. For at least eighty percent of the awards, the sole criterion will be outstanding performance in teaching and scholarship. Remaining awards may be given on the basis of outstanding service to the University. Consideration also should be given to dispersing the awardsacross Faculty units, ranks, and to both women and men. Awards given on the basis of outstanding service will not be limited to Members holding administrative positions. The Vice-President, Academic & Provost will publicly announce the award recipients.All salary increases are reviewed by, and require the approval of, the Vice-President, Academic and Provost.

6.0 Approvals and documentation

This document will be circulated annually to members of the Department/School. The guidelines will be used to evaluateperformance over the course of the next calendar year(s).It shall be reviewed and updated no less than once every five years with any changes approved by a majority vote of the Faculty Council by October 15thin the year before the evaluation calendar year to which the changes would apply.

Documents related to the Performance Evaluation process, including this guideline document, are available at https://sharepoint.uwaterloo.ca/sites/DOM/FacultyPerformance