Sample letter of recommendation for tenure and promotion

A professor recommendation letter can be written in a number of situations. For example, it can be for a professor who is being considered for a promotion or a grant or it can be for a professor who is changing colleges.

Sample:

This sample professor recommendation letter is written on behalf of an associate professor who has been working diligently at his university to become a full professor. The Dean of his particular school is addressing the university president and board of directors on his behalf requesting that he be made full professor.

Dear President Carlson and Distinguished Board of Directors:

I would like to take this opportunity to highly recommend Benjamin Preston, Ph.D. for the position of professor of anthropology at XYZ University. He has held the distinction of associate professor at the university for the past five years although recently he has essentially been performing the tasks of a full professor. As his dean, it is my view that Dr. Preston is fully qualified to be promoted to the position of professor and I urge you to award him this title and the responsibilities and benefits that go along with it.

Dr. Preston has conducted fascinating research over the last five years, particularly in the area of population migration. His numerous publications on the topic have been well-received and have made a significant impact on the theories regarding human migration from the seat of civilization in Northern Africa to what is now the continent of Europe. He has made several trips to dig sites in Ethiopia with members of the Archeology Department to offer his expertise in population migration theory as well as the impact of the environment on cultural changes within a population.

Students clamor to register for Dr. Preston’s courses in population migration as well as human-environmental interactions, linguistics, origins of domestication and forensic anthropology. He is an exceptionally gifted lecturer who keeps his students enthralled with his compelling arguments and well-documented research. I know absolutely no other professor who is as passionate about anthropology and who desires to understand how we as humans got where we are today than Dr. Preston. All of his classes are packed to capacity.

Dr. Preston has worked closely with the Archeology Department to obtain grants for archeological digs and anthropological research. As you know, the two disciplines go hand in hand. Dr. Preston has been instrumental in the award of two grants in particular that have served to place XYZ University in the forefront of research in these two exciting fields. We experienced a noticeable upsurge in applicants for anthropology and archeology majors following the award of these two grants.

It is my honor and privilege to recommend Benjamin Preston, Ph.D. for a promotion from associate professor of anthropology to the position of full professor. I am easily accessible should you wish to further discuss Dr. Preston’s qualifications. Please contact me at (555)-555-5555 or via email at [email]

Respectfully Submitted,

John Cooper

John D. Cooper, Ph.D.

Dean, College of Anthropology

XYZ University

While graduating, I have often seen a few faculty members striving to put together their tenure file. The academic tenure file is similar to that of a promotion file; however, a tenure protects the faculty member’s academic freedom. Furthermore, it protects the quality of teaching and research and thus the integrity of institutions of higher education. In simpler terms, it means lifetime employment!

A tenure review process is conducted between 5 and 7 years after the professor commences with his/her recruited position. In this process, the departmental committee not only evaluates a professor’s contributions in research, teaching, and service to the university, but also solicit tenure review letters from prominent senior scholars and some of the students of the candidate.

• What is a Tenure Review Letter?
• Important Elements of a Tenure Review Letter
• How to Write a Tenure Review Letter?

An academic tenure review letter is a document solicited from five to ten prominent senior scholars in the field and also from some of the students of the candidate, whose tenure track is being reviewed. Despite their ubiquity, the format and important elements of the academic tenure review letters are not discussed usually. These letters are confidential within and outside the academic communities, especially to tenure candidates.

Academic tenure review letter is written by external reviewers who could be colleagues, supervisors, faculty members, students, and other individuals who are closely related to the tenure track professor’s field. They evaluate the candidate’s work and impact on the field to make a recommendation about whether they should be awarded tenure or not.

Important Elements of a Tenure Review Letter

While review letters are not the only deciding factors to grant tenure, they are however the significant ones. Therefore, it is imperative to write the review letter in a standard format inclusive of the elements mentioned below:

1. Brief statement of your qualifications in the field that explains how you are a suitable person to write a tenure review letter.
2. One or two statements on your working relationship with the tenure candidate, and a clear statement that there is no identifiable conflict of interest. Furthermore, you must explain in a sentence or two, what you reviewed before writing the letter.
3. A detailed and longer section of the tenure letter must be devoted to analyzing the candidate’s contributions to the field.  This paragraph should summarize what you think the contributions of the candidate are to the field. It must include— both the quality of and the extent of those contributions. Adding to this paragraph, describe the common trajectory of competent scholars at comparable points in their career (compared with the tenure candidate).
4. If possible, mention what you have learned from the scholar’s work, and what the candidate’s writing samples tell you about the body of work.
5. Talk about prior collaborative research work in the context of the candidate’s scholarly trajectory.
6. Furthermore, discuss the scholarly publication outlets as an indication of focus and readership.
7. Be vigilant while mentioning any serious flaws in the candidate’s record. Ensure that this section is explained clearly and with a neutral tone. Furthermore, remember that there must be reasons behind your judgment.
8. Following that section, depending on the field of study, write a short paragraph on other dimensions of scholarship that are relevant to the candidate’s position.
9. In addition, explain how the candidate mentored new scholars in the field; and how is he/she most suitable for the tenure.
10. Lastly, the closing statement must include an explicit recommendation.

How to Write a Tenure Review Letter?

As academics, we are trained to collate and evaluate information from authentic resources by following ethical practice. While norms and practices across academic disciplines vary as to how to write a useful and academically rigorous tenure-review letter, there are certain things that need to be followed.

10 things to consider while writing an academic tenure review letter are as follows:

1. As a tenure review letter writer, your job is not to critique the individual but to provide a broader context of the scholar’s academic career and potential future work.
2. Do not confuse emotions with facts. Be pragmatic and do not let your emotions influence your letter.
3. Do not overwhelm the tenure department with irrelevant information. Typically, the institution asks a set of questions about the candidate. Answer all the questions asked by the institution explicitly.
4. Importantly, remember to evaluate the candidate based on the university’s tenure standards.
5. Avoid writing multipage letters. Contextualization about the candidate’s academic growth helps the department in making the decision; however, some major points in the letter can be missed by the readers due to its length. Therefore, be succinct as the readers are more likely to read shorter yet informative letters entirely.
6. Provide an overall assessment of the candidate’s work along with critiques of each work individually. This offers competitive differentiation of the candidate from their peers.
7. Do not view the candidate’s publication placement as a correlation with the work’s merit. If not all, read some of the works with no bias or presumption attributable to its publication.
8. Remember that no tenure candidate is perfect. There’s a scope of improvement for all. You can note areas of potential improvements in the tenure review letter. This makes the tenure department believe that you have been an honest critique, which further results in enhancing the credibility of the compliments mentioned throughout the letter. Furthermore, on successful completion of the tenure review process, the tenure committee will aggregate and share the constructive feedback with the candidate. This helps candidates in receiving candid and valuable insights into how their peers view their work. However, be fair with your feedbacks as the tenure committee will focus on any negative remarks to determine its significance.
9. Don’t write anything in the letter that you wouldn’t say to the candidate’s face. It isn’t a place to air dirty laundry or unsubstantiated rumors.
10. The tenure committee puts in a lot of effort and energy to assemble a fair and complete tenure file for the candidate, as do you. Hence, you must deliver your review letter on time to avoid holding up of the review process or create a void in the candidate’s tenure file.

Tenure review letter sample: Click here to download.

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