The following advice is offered by Sal Meyers, Director of Faculty Development, in an attempt to be helpful to faculty undergoing a summative review process. The information in this document has not been approved by the Faculty Personnel Committee nor the dean and is not official College policy. There is no guarantee that following this advice will lead to reappointment, tenure, or promotion.
Faculty members being considered for promotion need to have two colleagues from outside the department write a letter for their file. In addition, all the tenured members of the department will be asked to write letters for the file. Most of these people will probably not have access to your complete file. I recommend sharing your self-evaluation, vita, syllabi, and other materials with each of your letter writers. In addition, remind them that official guidance to letter writers is spelled out in Appendix B of the Faculty Handbook which is available online.