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The category of professional service is more difficult to define than teaching or research, but deserves the same
kind of rigorous evaluation and positive credit given to teaching and scholarly activities. The chair has the
responsibility to seek out methods of evaluating quality of professional service, not merely to list the activities.
The task is sometimes complicated by the fact that much professional service takes place outside the department.
Ideally, each faculty member should exercise their professional expertise in all three areas of department, college
and University service, community engagement, and service to the discipline. Where individual faculty members may be
expected by the chair to play different roles, those specific roles should be defined and understood. In all cases,
service should be judged on the basis of quality and effectiveness, not just quantity. When distance education
technologies are used for providing service, evaluations should include items specific to these delivery formats.
In the following listing, items are not necessarily listed in priority order, and faculty are not expected to engage in service activities in each area.
Mentoring of students cuts across all areas of the faculty role – teaching, research, and service. Among service
activities, mentoring of students is one of the most important areas of faculty service. Review committees are
encouraged to recognize and reward faculty who mentor students in research, international work, service
learning, entrepreneurial and innovation activities, and work-related experiential learning.
Mentoring of faculty colleagues should be considered important service that promotes faculty advancement. Community engagement is a significant part of the University's mission and commitment to contributing to
the well-being of our local, state, and global communities. Community engagement is defined as the application
of a faculty member's professional skills to engage with the external community in a manner that both
assists the community and is consistent with fulfillment of the University's mission. Community engagement
in religious, political, or social organizations (although meritorious in itself) is not relevant to the faculty
member's professional area. Examples of community engagement activities to be evaluated include
participation in University outreach programs, teaching noncredit courses, workshops, projects, and colloquia in
the faculty member's expertise, speaking engagements, both reimbursed and unreimbursed consulting
activities, and other ways the faculty member uses his or her professional knowledge for service.
Consistent with the University's commitment to equity and inclusive excellence, faculty work that
contributes to the diversity of learners and scholars at the University and enhances our environment of equity
and inclusion is highly valued and should be recognized and rewarded in the review process.
Service to the discipline is exemplified by service to scholarly or professional societies, journal
editorships, peer review activities for scholarly journals, scholarly books and texts, and external funding
agencies, and other ways of contributing to the advancement of the discipline or appropriate interdisciplinary
fields other than in areas relevant to teaching and research.
Service to scholarly or professional societies may include holding of office, serving on
boards, chairing symposia and special sessions at conferences, editing proceedings, reading non-research papers,
being instrumental in bringing a professional group to the local community and serving on the local arrangements
committee, developing a teleconference, and any other ways in which the faculty member is active within the
professional society. It is the responsibility of the chair to evaluate the quality of the work done for the
professional society by the faculty member and the stature of the professional society itself and its relevance
to the mission of the University.
Departmental, college, and University service also includes special service assignments, sponsorship of student
activities, cooperation with the Office of Development in outreach to alumni and securing external funding for
the University, service on departmental, college and University committees and task forces, cooperation with the
Office of Admissions in recruitment of students to the University, and other service activities.
Recognizing that service expectations vary according to department needs and faculty expertise, each department should develop methods of evaluating, encouraging, and rewarding excellence in service activities related to student mentoring, peer mentoring, community engagement, diversity initiatives, service to the discipline, and service to the department, college, and University.
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