Office of the Provost
The evaluation of college administrators is guided by the Academic Personnel Procedures Handbook.
College administrators hold the following titles:
In addition, a number of EPA staff hold college administrative positions.
Dean
The Dean is evaluated in compliance with the guidelines from Academic Affairs. The College Review Committee distributes the dean’s self-assessment and goals to both the Administrative Council (minus the Dean’s Executive Staff) and the Faculty Council, asking for input.
Every five years the dean undergoes a comprehensive review. This review is initiated by the Office of the Provost.
Associate Deans
The associate deans are evaluated in compliance with the guidelines from Academic Affairs. The College Review Committee distributes each associate dean’s self-assessment and goals to the Administrative Council (minus the Dean’s Executive Staff) and to appropriate other groups, asking for input.
Every five years each associate dean undergoes a comprehensive review.
Department Chairs
Department Chairs undergo two different kinds of evaluation:
Criteria for Evaluation
These general criteria are the basis for the evaluation of chairs in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. The chair should align his/her annual goals within these general categories. All reviewers (Department Review Committees, Chair Comprehensive Review Committees, and the Dean) should use these criteria as the basis for evaluation.
Individual departments may elect to write a chair job description that is unique to the department. However, the description should adhere to the following broad categories, as appropriate.
1. Leadership
The Chair:
- leads by example
- places the good of the department over personal ambitions
- promotes a shared vision
- demonstrates ability to articulate and achieve goals in the context of institutional strategic planning
- advocates for the department with external constituencies
- works cooperatively and effectively with the Dean
- shows initiative in advancing departmental and College missions
- takes an active role in program development
- plans, organizes, and successfully concludes faculty recruitment
- promotes diversity of faculty through hiring and mentoring
- promotes a culture of shared commitment to teaching, research, and service
- through both recruitment and program development, maintains expertise in the discipline’s knowledge areas
- advances the public image of the department (through the website, departmental publications, participation in college, university, community, and professional activities, etc,)
- works with alums, donors, and external agencies to attract funding and provide services, as appropriate
2. Personal and management styles
The Chair:
- communicates effectively both within and outside the department
- shows ability to (a) listen, (b) negotiate, (c) compromise, (d) delegate, (e) address conflict, (f) solve problems, and (g) make difficult decisions
- demonstrates (a) trustworthiness, (b) candor, (c) fairness, (d) flexibility, (e) collegiality, and (f) decisiveness
- maintains an even temper, basing decisions on policy, precedent, and evidence
3. Administrative effectiveness
The Chair:
- is available through the workday
- manages resources responsibly
- explains budgetary and other decisions to colleagues
- schedules regular department meetings and establishes a governance structure appropriate to the size and complexity of the unit
- facilitates group discussion of departmental business and achieves consensus when possible
- consults a broad spectrum of faculty on important issues
- responds promptly to deadlines
- runs an efficient office responsive to the needs of faculty, students, and visitors
- maintains and safeguards records
- promotes collegial relations among the staff
- shows skill in dealing with other administrators and external agencies
- understands and works knowledgeably in the context of institutional policies and practices
4. Faculty and staff support
The Chair:
- knows the research programs, teaching abilities, and service strengths of individual faculty
- encourages faculty to set professional goals
- mentors and is otherwise accessible to colleagues
- evaluates colleagues by reference to shared, promulgated, professional standards
- supervises the RPT process, making clear, properly documented arguments and responsible judgments
- maintains morale and fosters collegiality
- respects confidentiality
- treats staff professionally and evaluates them accurately
5. Student support
The Chair:
- develops and supervises an effective system of advisement
- insures that class and lab schedules enable timely progress toward degree
- promotes and monitors student satisfaction with programs, accessibility of faculty, and helpfulness of staff
- insures the disciplinary pertinence and currency of the curriculum
- takes initiative to retain students
- takes initiative to attract a diverse cadre of majors
- responds promptly and appropriately to student concerns
6. Professional engagement
The Chair:
- maintains a personal program of research and scholarship
- participates effectively in the Department’s instructional programs
- demonstrates citizenship in the University, the profession, and the community
Source Documents:
CLAS Criteria for Chair Evaluation (Submitted February 2007) View
Task Force on Annual Chair Evaluation Report (Submitted April 20, 2018) View
Implementation of Chair Evaluation Task Force Recommendations (Submitted February 15, 2019) View
Timeline for Annual Evaluation
April 1
The Department Chair provides the following to the Department faculty and to the Dean:
- Goals for the current academic year
- Self-assessment, including a list of accomplishments and how they have met the previous year’s goals
- Goals for the next academic year
- Criteria for the Evaluation of Chair (The college template may be modified by the Department)
- Job Description
April 1 – May 15
The faculty committee will distribute this document to each voting member of the administrator’s academic unit and to staff as deemed appropriate by the dean. Because surveying faculty can be a particularly laborious task at a busy time of year, it is recommended that reviewing committees decide when a more complete collection
May 15
The faculty committee prepares an evaluation report to be submitted to the chair and to the dean.
July 1
By this date, the College office has the following items on file for the Dean:
- Chair goals for the current academic year
- Chair’s Self-assessment
- Chair’s goals for the next academic year
- Department committee report
- Department faculty comments, with names redacted
- Chair’s Performance evaluation by the Department Committee from the previous year (provided by Dean’s Office)
- Chair’s performance evaluation by the Dean from the previous year (provided by Dean’s Office)
- Department annual report (Provided by Dean’s Office)
- Criteria for evaluation
June and July
The Dean meets with each chair to discuss the committee report and relevant departmental issues. (These dates may be adjusted according to chair/dean summer schedules.) The dean provides the chair with an evaluation of their performance during the past year.
June-September
The dean prepares a summary of both the committee’s report and the actions mutually agreed upon by the chair and the dean, with respect to the recommendations made by the committee. This summary is provided to the chair who may then revise their goals for the upcoming year as appropriate. The chair then disseminates their self-assessment, goals, and summary of accomplishments for the current academic year as well as their goals for the upcoming year (revised, if applicable) to the faculty of their unit. This dissemination is required and all materials must be accurate depictions of those submitted to the dean.
CLAS Chair – Timeline for Annual Evaluation (Submitted March, 2021) View
Comprehensive Review
The UNC Charlotte Faculty Council on February 20, 1997, established processes and procedures for the evaluation of academic administrators. These became effective Fall Semester, 1998. The guidelines below utilize the processes and procedures set forth by the Faculty Council, with adaptations, to outline the process of the Comprehensive Review of Chairs in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.
Background and Guiding Principles
Evaluation and Comprehensive Review
A regular, ongoing evaluation of chairs is essential to improve administrative performance and assure accountability for the achievement of institutional, college and department goals. There are two elements in a successful evaluation procedure: formative and evaluative. The formative element involves a process of collecting information of current performance, analyzing this information, and providing feedback to the person being evaluated to improve current performance. The evaluative element is a much more comprehensive evaluation procedure carried out at much less frequent intervals. While it also involves the collection and analysis of information on performance, its perspective is broader than simply current performance, and its purpose is more judgmental–as to whether it is in the institution’s best interests to continue with or replace that chair.
Guiding Principles
The following are guiding principles for the design of thorough, fair, and unbiased processes and procedures for evaluation of administrators:
- Where the normal, annual evaluation process is designed to improve the current performance of administrators and requires a two-way, ongoing exchange of information, much broader input is required for a comprehensive review. This includes self-assessment, formation of representative committees, input from faculty, chairs, the Dean, staff, students and, in some cases, relevant off-campus constituencies.
- A performance review requires the development of a comprehensive job description where a clear and thorough job description does not already exist. These job descriptions must be consistent with campus-wide criteria that address expectations common to all academic administrators. The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences has provided Criteria for Chair Evaluation (Appendix 1) and has recommended that department descriptions of the job of the chair adhere to the broad categories as appropriate. These criteria should include considerations of performance in the main areas of academic administration: leadership, vision and planning; faculty and staff allocation, recruitment, development, retention and support; personal and management styles as they relate to job performance; administrative effectiveness; instructional, research and service programs; student recruitment, advising and oversight; professional engagement and budget and management. In addition, criteria should include attention to the performance of the chair in enhancing the presence of diverse groups and creating a positive climate in their unit for the development of faculty, staff, and students.
- As far as is possible, the comprehensive review process is the responsibility of the members of the department with appropriate guidance and oversight from the Dean.
- The results of the annual review process will form an important component of the comprehensive evaluation procedure.
- Deadline dates for collection of data, delivery of the data to the review committee, and designation of personnel to assemble the data are the responsibility of the Dean. Material provided to the Review Committee will include copies of the unit goals and planning documents.
The Chair Comprehensive Review Process in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
Interval for Comprehensive Review
The comprehensive review of the chair is generally conducted in conjunction with the reappointment decision. In that most chairs are appointed for a three-year term, the review will be triennial. For those few chairs on a five-year term, the review will be quinquennial. If a chair does not want to seek reappointment, or if a dean or the Provost will not consider reappointment, there is no need to do the review.
Review Committees
The dean, after consultation with the DRC and the chair, selects a 5-7 person Review Committee (hereafter the Review Committee). This committee should be broadly representative of the interests of the department. At a minimum, one person should be an elected member of the DRC, one will be a current administrator from outside the department, and one member will be from outside the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Optionally, one member can be from an interested group outside the university such as a departmental advisory committee or professional organization with ties to the department. The committee is established before the end of the academic year (by the last workday in April) prior to the comprehensive review of the chair and elects its own chairperson.
Input
Before the end of the academic year prior to the review year, the Review Committee meets with the administrator to jointly review the evaluation process, to decide on an appropriate timetable for the submission of documentation from the chair, and to establish a list of individuals (both internal and external to the unit) who have had an opportunity to work with the chair and who are in a position to comment knowledgeably upon his/her performance. This list of individuals to be contacted for input must include the full-time faculty and staff of the department; other administrators of the college and university; and students. The Committee may or may not survey other groups, suich as the departmental advisory (or visiting) committee (if any); alumni groups; community representativesalumni, etc. . In those units with significant numbers of part-time and non-tenure track faculty, feedback from these individuals should also be sought.
Early in the fall semester, at a date to be established by the chair and the Review Committee, the department chair should submit to the Review Committee the following documents:
- A Retrospective Review of the Current Term as Chair
- Department Criteria for Evaluation of the Chair
- Job Description
- Goals for the Next Term as Chair
- Current Vita
- Chair Goals for the Previous Years of the Current Term
- The Department’s Annual Reports for the Previous Years of the Current Term.
The Dean’s Office will provide to the Review Committee the following additional documents:
- Chair’s Annual Evaluations by the DRC for the current term
- Chair’s Annual Evaluations by the Dean for the current term
In addition to the committee summary report and attachments (noted in the next section), the final report sent to the Dean should include the nine bullets above.
During the fall semester of the review year the Review Committee solicits evaluations for the chair’s performance and effectiveness from appropriate interested parties. The individuals contacted will include, but are not limited to, those persons or groups identified above. In soliciting this input, it is critical that the Review Committee remind individuals and groups that this is an administrative review process not a review of programs and that input should focus on the performance of the chair as an administrator.
Faculty input on the chair’s performance is often calibrated by the use of surveys. If surveys are used in the review process, it is important that the process is systematic and that all respondents be asked to address the same issues. The criteria (major headings) for chair evaluation outlined in Appendix 1 should be the basis for evaluation and should be distributed to faculty as examples. It should be stressed that chairs are not necessarily expected to do every activity listed. Two sample surveys are provided in Appendices 2 and 3. Review committees, in consultation with the department, should determine whether the surveys should be signed.
Analysis and Reporting
The task of the Review Committee is to address the effectiveness and the methods of the chair in performing his/her job. Effectiveness is to be principally judged on the basis of the chair’s job description, and the progress made by the chair’s unit toward meeting articulated academic and institutional goals.
The Review Committee should provide a final report to the Dean and the chair under review. The Dean should also receive all raw data collected during their review and utilized in the analysis, to include all surveys, and additional documents submitted by any of the respondents. However, the Review Committee should take care to convey the sense of the data to the Dean. For example, the Dean should be provided with the numbers of faculty who have responded and the numbers who have offered particular comments about the performance of the chair. There is a significant difference between a situation where only one or two faculty offer many separate comments, as opposed to many faculty offering the same comment. It is important to communicate this type of distinction in the raw data. For privacy reasons, all surveys should be distributed and returned as hard copy not via email. If a vote of the faculty is recorded, the Review Committee should specify the process used, secret ballot, voice vote, show of hands, etc.
In order to provide the chair under review an opportunity to correct any errors of fact or omission in the Committee’s report, the Review Committee should present a final draft of its report by the first Tuesday in December of the review year. The chair should communicate directly with the Dean on any issues of fact or omission. The Review Committee submits the final report of its evaluation to both the chair and the Dean prior to the Fall Commencement of the review year.
After discussing the committee’s report with the chair, the Dean prepares a summary of both the Review Committee’s report and the actions mutually agreed upon by the chair and the Dean with respect to the recommendations by the committee. This summary is disseminated to the faculty of the department on or before March 1 of the review year.
Sample Surveys
CLAS Comprehensive Chair Evaluation – revised August 2010 View
Program and Center Directors
Similar to Department chairs, program and center directors undergo an annual evaluation. At the time of reappointment, the steering committee of the program or center asks the faculty to provide a vote of confidence for the director’s continued leadership.
Criteria for Evaluation
For both the annual evaluation and the comprehensive review, program directors and center directors are evaluated according to criteria outlined in their individual letters of appointment. In general, program directors have the following responsibilities:
- organizing the faculty in support of the program
- developing and presenting an appropriate curriculum
- recruiting and admitting students
- representing the program on and off the campus
- preparing budgets and course schedules
- writing an annual report
In general, center directors are evaluated in accordance with the mission of the Center, whether research, community engagement, instruction, or a combination of any of these.
Timeline for Annual Evaluation
April 1
The Program or Center Director provides the following to the Program Steering Committee and to the Dean:
- Goals for the current academic year
- Self-assessment, including a list of accomplishments and how they have met the previous year’s goals
- Goals for the next academic year
- Criteria for the Evaluation of Director, if the program or the center have developed these
- Job Description
April 1 – May 15
The faculty committee distributes this document to each voting member of the program or center and to staff as deemed appropriate by the dean. Because surveying faculty can be a particularly laborious task at a busy time of year, it is recommended that reviewing committees decide when a more complete collection of faculty opinion is required to inform the annual review.
May 15
The faculty committee prepares an evaluation report to be submitted to the director and to the dean.
July 1
By this date, the College office has the following items on file for the Dean:
- Director goals for the current academic year
- Director’s Self-assessment
- Director’s goals for the next academic year
- Steering committee report
- Written backup, as appropriate.
- Director’s Performance evaluation by the Steering Committee from the previous year
- Director’s performance evaluation by the Dean from the previous year (college will provide)
- Program annual report (college will provide)
- Criteria for evaluation.
June and July
The Dean meets with each director to discuss the committee report and relevant program or center issues. (These dates may be adjusted according to chair/dean summer schedules.) The dean provides the director with an evaluation of their performance during the past year.
June-September
The dean prepares a summary of both the committee’s report and the actions mutually agreed upon by the director and the dean, with respect to the recommendations made by the committee. This summary is provided to the director who may then revise their goals for the upcoming year as appropriate. The director then disseminates their self-assessment, goals, and summary of accomplishments for the current academic year as well as their goals for the upcoming year (revised, if applicable) to the faculty of their program or center. This dissemination is required and all materials must be accurate depictions of those submitted to the dean.
CLAS Director – Timeline for Annual Evaluation (Revised March, 2021) View
Comprehensive Review
In the final year of the appointment period, the steering committee, as part of the annual review, polls the affiliate faculty of the program for a vote of confidence in the Director, and includes the results of this survey in the Director’s annual evaluation.
EHRA Staff Administrators
EHRA staff in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences are evaluated in accordance with their work responsibilities, as provided in their job descriptions. See: EHRA Non-Faculty Position Management
