Presenter: Debbie Apsley, Director of HR and Business Affairs
Wiki notes written by: Devan Ray Donaldson

Topics:

1) Offer Letter
2) Mentorship
3) Culture
4) Tenure
5) Benefits
6) Salaries

1) Offer Letters for assistant professors (at Michigan/SI) consist of:
Title of appointment
3 year review (at Michigan)
Moving/relocation funds (1/9 of income--negotiable)
Workload Information
Start up funds (in addition):

• Seek out what research support is available at the school you're looking at

• Find out what kind of staff support is available

• Find out whether you have to pay for your own doctoral students or graduate assistants

Contingency--if you haven't defended your dissertation when you've been offered the job

2) Mentorship
Ask if they have a formal mentorship program for you
If they don't have a formal mentorship program, ask what you should do or where you
should go to get the mentoring you need to get started

3) Culture
Find out what the culture of the school is. Find out what is NOT written down!

4) Tenure
Tenure Review--at Michigan (every 3 years)
Letters of Recommendation

• Recommenders should be five-arms length away, meaning:

• They can't be your mentor

• You shouldn't have published/co-authored with any them

• etc.

There is no time-line for going from associate professor to full

• Considerations for going from associate to full include:

• Graduating a doctoral student is important

• Publishing books (how many)

Ask professors who've already gone through tenure review if you can see
some of their review files (it could be helpful to see how someone else went
through the process)

5) Benefits
Health, life, dental, disability, TIAA-CREF retirement
Last 12 months/year

6) Salary
Average salary for new assistant professors

• At public institutions with Doctoral Programs: $101,836

• At all institutions: $99,431

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Sample offer letter (SI example)

• Usually 3year appointment. 3rd year review depends on schools/ Moving and relocation fund information included.
• Assistant professors usually teach 2 courses/ year.
• Salary negotiation: discuss about it with your faculty advisors. Need to know what kinds of things (doctoral student support, travel fee, research support) are covered by the fund. Verbal negotiation with dean not with staffs.

How to get information which is not listed on the offer letter

• Ask HR person about work load expectations and salary payment more in detail

Ask if the school have mentorship program.

Get informed about work load expectations

Research publications for tenure: book vs. journal article/ first author vs. coauthor – different schools evaluate differently.

Timeline (SI example)

• 3rd year review
• 6th year: tenure- whole year process
• Recommendation letters required varies from 12-15. – can’t be arm’s length (thesis advisor, mentor, etc.).All the letters have to be included whether they are positive or negative.
• From associate to full professor- no time line

Modify duties

• if you are pregnant or nurturing leave, you can be excused from teaching.
• Scholarly activity (duty off campus) leave.

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Notes by Pae

• Sample of offer letter (from U of M):

Basic part is the title; appointment term – three year appointment, third year review, and tenure review; salary; pay scales; moving and relocation fund; workload information (number of hours to teach, i.e. SI is 3 courses for a year (Fall and Winter)); contingency (pending when you finish your dissertation); start upfront; research fund; mentorship; research publication.

You can talk to your faculty advisor about negotiation, ask Debbie for what’s not written down in the letter.

• Timeline:

The promotion process from tenure to associate professor is separated from associate professor to full professor. Some faculty members retire with associate professor.

U of M suggests that you have at least five arm lengths for the letter of recommendation, but it depends on the area. See provost website for detail who can be your recommenders.

• Salary (on the third from the last page of the handout):

U of M’s fiscal year is July to June. Although your contract starts in July, the first salary will be paid on September to make sure that you will come to the school.

• Personal statement:

You could ask your professors to share their personal statement with you because it’s very important when you become a professor.

• Tenure clock:
  

You have to have at least 80% appointment to start the tenure timeline. To stop the clock, you need approval to do that, i.e. nurturing leave, modified duties, duty off campus, scholarly activity leave, and sabbatical (after teaching 12 semesters) are paid leave, and all these privileges need approval.


Notes from David Lee
Experiences at Michigan are not necessarily representative of all universities. In fact, experiences at SI are not necessarily the same as with other departments. Eg. Teaching requirements at psych are 4 courses per year whereas it’s 3 per year at SI.

This session is necessary because there’s so much that’s not written down. Resources for this tacit knowledge might be available from other faculty and people like Debbie.

Startup costs for incoming faculty:
It’s not always possible to have a graduate student, doctoral students cost a lot of money. There are also a significant number of other expenses including material, conferences, and things that academics do. Research grants and other sources of funding are likely necessary for the acquisition of a doctoral student.

Publishing:
Being first author is important. Publishing with students is important. Publishing is necessary, but there isn’t a magic number required to achieve tenure.

Promotions:
You go up for tenure around 6 years and there is no set time period when you are up for promotion to full professor.

Letters of evaluation:
You want to start keeping names early so that you can provide a list of people writing letters. People that you can ask for letters are available on the provost website.

Compensation:
It’s probably a good idea to ask the HR person how things will work out.

Cultural shifts:
Transitioning from a student to a professor.

Personal statement:
You can ask another faculty member for a copy of theirs.

Tenure clock:
There are ways to have your tenure clock stop. You just need approval. At 80% or above, your clock is ticking.



Other resources to check out:
AAUP: http://www.aaup.org/aaup