The creation of a dossier is required of all candidates seeking promotion and/or tenure. It is also required of tenure-track faculty undergoing fourth year review. The Ohio State University has standardized the dossier creation process with Research in View, a software tool developed by Thomson Reuters that permits users to create and store a dossier online.
By design, Research in View helps to organize scholarly activity, streamline the building of a dossier, and end duplicative efforts in reporting to help save time and money across the academic enterprise. The dossier produced with Research in View aligns with the guidelines established by the Office of Academic Affairs.
The dossier is a faculty member's only opportunity to fully demonstrate how promotion criteria have been met. It is essential that any faculty member undergoing promotion and/or tenure review the requirements for dossier creation. The College Office of Academic Affairs has created a to assist with this process.
The College has created a set of guidelines to facilitate dossier creation.
TIP: Don’t undersell
In preparation of the promotion dossier it is important that faculty members (and departmental review bodies) appropriately recognize credit for the accomplishments of the faculty. Some activities meet criteria for several aspects of faculty evaluation, and the dossier should reflect those activities in multiple sections. Since the dossiers are reviewed by faculty peers and administrators outside of the department, it is highly likely that those individuals will not appreciate the importance of accomplishments that may seem self-evident to people inside the discipline. It is therefore important that the faculty member and the department put those accomplishments in the appropriate perspective. For example, in some highly specialized areas of research the impact factor of the very best journals may be relatively low. It would be important in that case to include the necessary context for publications in those journals to be properly evaluated.
TIP: Use the narratives to tell your story
The narratives are the only place in the dossier that a candidate can tell his or her story. The data points are important, but they are subject to a wide variability of interpretation if context is not provided. Remember that faculty members from other departments will evaluate the dossier. They will not know what the important achievements are in other disciplines. The candidate must use the narratives to contextualize his or her achievements. A candidate should assume that reviewers have very little prior knowledge, and should therefore write in layman's terms as much as possible.
If you have questions about how to use Research in View or how to contextualize your accomplishments, dossier consultation is available from the Office of Academic Affairs. Please contact Heather Brod.
Reappointment Requirements
Clinical track faculty are up for reappointment in their penultimate contract year. For reappointments, departments may decide whether they wish for faculty to submit a CV or a dossier. Reappointment is subject to the vote of the eligible faculty and a positive evaluation from the Department or Division Chair. The decision of the Dean of the College of Medicine is final.
