With the exception of PHI 299 courses, all course proposals should be submitted in a timely fashion so that the chair can act prior to when the course must be submitted for inclusion in the local campus timetable. If a course proposal is submitted after this deadline, the person submitting the proposal must give special justification as to why there is an immediate need for the course in question.

A department member seeking approval for a PHI 299 course must give an indication that he or she will be seeking approval for a proposal no later than the middle of the registration week on the campus on which the course is to be offered. The proposal itself must be submitted within one week of this deadline.

The department member seeking approval is expected to submit whatever information is needed to allow the Chair to come to a reasonable decision. The Chair may request further information.

In evaluating Colleges philosophy faculty for appointment and promotion, all procedures and decisions will be made in accord with Senate Policy #34 (Criteria and General Procedures for Appointment, Retention, Tenure Progress, Tenure and Promotion).

The Colleges philosophy faculty seek to fulfill their role in the context of both the special mission of the UW Colleges and the academic excellence traditionally and rightly attributed to the University of Wisconsin System. Within this context we recognize four broad areas within which philosophy faculty make professional contributions: teaching, professional growth, service to the university or to the profession and, to a lesser extent due to the nature of our discipline, community outreach. However, we do not place equal emphasis on each area of faculty service for each level of advancement. Even so, in making all types of personnel recommendations we seek to encourage, reward and retain those colleagues who are good or excellent philosophy teachers and who, in addition, have demonstrated superiority in academically and institutionally related areas of professional growth and university service.

For initial probationary appointments the philosophy faculty seeks the best qualified candidates who, at a minimum, have significant graduate work in philosophy, preferably work evidenced by a conferred Ph.D. or a.b.d. status, and for whom there are positive indications of potential for quality philosophy teaching at the Freshman/Sophomore collegiate level. No candidate may be recommended for initial appointment unless the philosophy executive committee or its representative has made a careful review of the candidate's dossier, had the opportunity to check with his or her references and had the opportunity for a personal interview. Depending on the candidate the circumstances, initial probationary appointments may be at the rank of either Instructor or Assistant Professor.

The success of the Colleges philosophy faculty depends on their ability to provide quality teaching of the philosophy curriculum, so it is appropriate that evaluation of a faculty member's contributions as a teacher of philosophy be given first priority. We believe that while teaching ability alone is not a sufficient condition for promotion to tenure, it is a minimal necessary condition so that without it no philosophy instructor can reasonably expect to be retained or indeed to be advanced on the philosophy faculty. Further, since the Ph.D. is a generally accepted and important indication of academic achievement, recommendations to tenure for persons who do not hold the doctorate should be made only for persons who have clearly demonstrated proficiency for doing philosophy in some other way.

Evaluation of teaching involves a variety of considerations. Quality teaching in philosophy requires knowledge of the subjects taught, the time and demonstrated willingness to confer with individual students, the ability to present the subject clearly and as interestingly as possible, and continuing dialogue with students in relatively small classes. The philosophy teacher's knowledge of his or her subject has traditionally been measured in large part by the academic degrees held, or work completed toward such degrees, and we accept that tradition. Also, the effective philosophy teacher continues to expand his or her knowledge of the field after receiving such degrees. Evidence of the philosophy teacher's ability to present the subject soundly, clearly and interestingly may take a variety of forms, such as course syllabi, exams given, materials used and recommended, research in direct support of teaching, student evaluations, the teacher's own evaluations of his or her courses, new courses being developed and the informed judgments of faculty colleagues.

Evaluation of a colleague's contributions in the area of professional growth is appropriate for each type of personnel recommendation from the philosophy faculty, but contributions in this area take on special significance for recommendations to the rank of Associate Professor of Philosophy and they become even more critical for recommendations to the rank of Professor of Philosophy. Professional growth refers to a diversity of possible contributions related primarily to the discipline of philosophy, but also related to the academic profession generally. In all events, we tend to think of professional growth as professorial growth showing developing expertise in the profession. No list of such contributions could be exhaustive, and we recognize that there is more than one type of research and more than one kind of evidence of research. Contributions to philosophy do not always take the form of publications, but the results of such efforts provide one of the more clearly defined ways of evaluating a philosophy faculty member's ability to understand and contribute to the discipline. Certainly a faculty member gains his or her authority to teach philosophy in part from continuing activity within the field and such activity should be encouraged and rewarded. It has also become common to regard a faculty member's attendance and participation at professional meetings, symposia and colloquia, as some indication of continuing professional growth.

 Evaluation of a philosophy faculty member's contributions in the area of service to the university or to the profession must give due regard to both the multiple levels of the structure of the UW Colleges which provide opportunities for service to the institution and to the unusually heavy demands on the UW Colleges faculty to actively contribute to institutional governance and development. Philosophy faculty may also make significant contributions through active service to professional associations and societies. Such service must be recognized and appropriately rewarded, but neither the number of hours nor the intensity of effort devoted to such service are, by themselves, adequate measures of its value. Clearly, service on key policy making and program or personnel development committees has more significance than essentially social and recreational campus activities.

Evaluation of philosophical contributions in the area of community outreach is complicated by the nature of the discipline, but such activities directly related to philosophy or the academic profession are occasionally possible. Such activities may take a variety of forms, such as talks to community groups on philosophical or academic issues, the development and teaching of credit or non-credit philosophy programs for community groups, and the like. However, the involvement of a member of the philosophy faculty in community affairs when he or she is acting as a private citizen will not be relevant to any of our personnel recommendations. For example, membership or even leadership roles in civic clubs, political groups, churches and the like are not applicable in deliberating personnel recommendations for philosophy faculty.

The overall pattern for application of these criteria is this: Without demonstrated teaching ability and strong evidence of expertise in the discipline no instructor will receive tenure. Beyond promotion to Assistant Professor, promotion is governed largely by evidence of sustained professional growth. Certainly no one is expected to meet the output demanded of teachers in established graduate institutions--neither in terms of amount nor in terms of type (publication only in accepted journals). But for promotion to Associate Professor or to Professor a record of sustained growth (through talks, papers, reviews, participation in colloquia, etc.) must be present. Professor and Associate Professor are not to be seen as rewards for extensive university service or community outreach (except insofar as these efforts happen to demonstrate expertise in philosophy), and these ranks are not to be seen as rewards for length of service. They are instead to be regarded as certification of attainment in terms of growth in the discipline. Unusual university service or community outreach may be properly rewarded through letters of commendation and through merit increase. It should be re-emphasized however that evidence of continued growth as a teacher is a sine qua non of any appointment, including to Professor or Associate Professor.

The Philosophy Department is committed to the idea that, in order for post tenure review to be of benefit to both the faculty member and the UW Colleges, it should be conducted in a manner such that it encourages the faculty member to fulfill his or her potential. The following procedures should be implemented with this positive goal in mind.

1. The following materials shall be provided by the faculty member:

If either the chair or the associate chair are under review or if either of these parties is from the same campus as the faculty member, the most recent past chair without a similar conflict shall serve as a substitute.

The chair and the associate chair shall decide among themselves who is write the final report reflecting the outcome of this conference. All parties attending the conference, including the faculty member, will have a chance to review this report and recommend changes before the report is placed in the faculty member's file.

4. The self assessment materials are not to be used for any other purpose beyond post tenure review. Specifically, they are not to be disseminated to other members of the department nor to the faculty member's campus colleagues. Furthermore, they are not to be used in any merit review.