• Home
• Footer
• Vacancies
• HR Policies and Procedures
• Policy and Procedure

Academic Promotions - Policy and Procedure

 

Date Approved by SLT	Executive Board: 25th January 2012 Executive Board: 23rd January 2013 Executive Board: 8th November 2019
Date of EQIA	6th November 2012 30th November 2019
Document Owner	Human Resources
Last modified	September 2021
Next review date	September 2022

 

1.0 Introduction

QMU’s Academic Promotions Policy and supporting procedures are part of our Reward and Recognition Policy. The University wishes to recognise and reward excellence in academic achievement.

2.0 Policy Aims

The Academic Promotions policy is designed to:

• Support and enhance the quality of our academic performance
• Provide benchmarks for future promotion and recognition
• Recognise and reward the achievement of our academic staff

3.0 Academic Promotions Panels

The remit of the Academic Promotions Panels is to consider all applications for promotion (supported or unsupported) and make recommendations to the Reward and Recognition Committee on the award of academic promotion. The Academic Promotions Panels meet annually to consider applications from academic staff seeking promotion. The Deputy Principal chairs the Academic Promotions Panels and its members include: Deans of School, HR representative (panel secretary), one member from the other school and one external member. Heads of Division will attend Panel meetings to provide information. They will not be required to contribute to final decision.

The external member’s term of office is three years, renewable. Normally a maximum membership of six years is permitted.

Academic members of staff are required to show evidence of their performance against the criteria for the award of a Lecturer, Senior Lecturer or Reader. The University is committed to the assessment of the quality of teaching, scholarship, research and academic leadership through its Academic Promotions Panels. This is in recognition of the external dimension of the role of an academic, with a particular emphasis on the contribution to and development of the discipline.

Once the process is completed, the Chair of the promotions panel, supported by HR as secretary to the panel, will normally give feedback to each applicant. If the application is unsuccessful, the staff member will be told of the reasons for the decision. The outcome of the application process will be confirmed to the staff member in writing.

Applicants can appeal the decision of the panel on procedural grounds, the procedure to be followed is set out in the Application Guide.

4.0 Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

The Academic Promotions Panels will consider all applications fairly and transparently, irrespective of age, race, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, sexual orientation, religion or belief, gender or contractual status. Panels will be gender balanced and all panel members will be required to undergo unconscious bias training.

5.0 Procedure

Detailed information on the Academic Promotions procedure is set out in the Application Guide.

Each year, Human Resources publish, via the HR intranet page, a set of procedures and a supporting timetable which is integrated with the overall Reward and Recognition policy timetable for the year. Staff will be notified by moderator notice annually when the Reward and Recognition timetable is launched.

This policy applies to all members of staff with a minimum of twelve months continuous service.

6.0 Promoted Roles

Applications for the following promotions are invited:

Lectureship

A Lectureship is awarded to Assistant Lecturers who can demonstrate achievement in at least two out of three criteria areas.

Senior Lectureship
A Senior Lectureship is awarded for contributions to teaching, scholarship, research and/or academic administration. If research is the primary claim then a Readership may be the more appropriate promotion. Applicants promoted on the basis of achievements in teaching and academic administration will normally be issued with a teaching and scholarship contract.

Readership

A Readership is awarded primarily to Academic staff for achievements in research.

Professor

Applications for Professorship should follow the procedure detailed in the Professorial Review Policy and Procedure.

Applicants promoted on the basis of achievements in teaching and academic administration will normally be issued with a teaching and scholarship contract, subject to discussion between the staff member and relevant Head of Division.

7.0 Evaluation criteria for promotion

To ensure the Academic Promotions Panel award promotions fairly, it bases its recommendations on the criteria in Appendices 1, 2 and 3. The criteria are grouped into three categories, there are three sub categories under each areas:

Teaching and scholarship

• Your teaching practice
• Your professional development and Support to others
• Your experience of quality assurance and validation activities

Academic leadership and contribution and academic and/or professional or practitioner impact

• Your contribution to leadership within your division
• Your contribution to leadership within your school
• Your contribution to leadership within the University and beyond

Research and commercialisation

• Your outputs and awards generation
• Your contribution to the University research culture
• Reach, impact and profile of your research

The performance criteria tell the staff member the level of performance the panel expects successful candidates to have reached. The types of evidence are designed to help the staff member decide how they can demonstrate they have reached the required level.

For clarity, teaching is taken to encompass the teaching of undergraduate, postgraduate and continuing education students. Teaching is not to be regarded as confined to classroom-based activities such as lectures, tutorials and practicals, fundamentally important though these are. The definition includes all activities that contribute directly or indirectly to the quality of teaching and learning, such as:

• course development, including interdisciplinary courses
• design of study and learning materials
• assessment of and feedback on coursework and examinations
• supervision of student dissertations, projects and placements as part of undergraduate or postgraduate taught courses
• academic advising
• quality assurance and enhancement
• external examining, validation and review
• innovative use of technology in teaching and learning
• supervision of postgraduate research

The Academic Promotions Panels will consider excellence in teaching as being evidenced on one or more of the following grounds, as appropriate to the level of promotion

• impact on the quality of students’ learning
• impact on the quality of courses and programmes of study
• impact on the quality of teaching at Subject, School or University level
• impact on the national and/or international quality of the teaching

Applicants claiming excellence in teaching should indicate explicitly which of the above criteria they consider to be the most relevant to their case. This statement should be supported by evidence which, inter alia, may take the form of feedback from students, colleagues, peers or external examiners, together with any comments about how the candidate has been able to put such feedback into practice. The academic promotions criteria and examples of evidence are set out in Appendix one of the Application Guide.

8.0 Roles and Responsibilities

The Principal is accountable to the University Court for the proper management of the academic promotions system within the context of the University’s Reward and Recognition Policy.

The Academic Promotions Panel is responsible for considering all applications for promotion (supported or unsupported) and make recommendations to the Reward and Recognition Committee on the award of academic promotion.

Human Resources is responsible for managing the process, for providing advice, support and guidance and for the consistency of decisions with statutory requirements and with the published policies of the University.