Checking off your tenure to do list

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Checking off your tenure to do list
Maureen Gannon, PhD Vanderbilt University Medical
Center Associate Professor of Medicine, Molecular
Physiology and Biophysics, and Cell and
Developmental Biology December 18, 2008
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Tenure time?

• When should I aim to go up for tenure?
• What do I need to do to get ready?
• publish
• get funding
• teach
• university service
• service to scientific community
• make yourself known!
• How do I know if Im ready?
• Are there advantages/disadvantages to
• going up early?

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The tenure check list
(Department of Medicine)

• Chair recommendation
• External references (8)
• Teaching references (10)
• CV in correct format
• Five reprints
• Critical references
• Documentation of teaching

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Chair recommendation letter

• Summary of academic career
• Consistency and importance of research theme
• Summarize over-riding research theme
• Summarize each individual project
• Summarize funding obtained for these projects
• Quality and originality of scientific work
• Significant publications
• Productivity
• Independence
• Evidence of contribution to education and
  teaching
• Awards

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The tenure check list
(Department of Medicine)

• Chair recommendation
• External references (8)
• Teaching references (10)
• CV in correct format
• Five reprints
• Critical references
• Documentation of teaching

?
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External references

• Give more names than they ask for
• Usuallyreferences must have the following
• Tenure at their institution
• Never published with you
• Cannot be a collaborator on your grant
• Do not be shy
• You may have to write the letter yourself

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Where do these references come from?

• Get known in the scientific community
• Body of work
• Networking
• Go to meetings (present a poster)
• Study section
• Meet with visiting speakers
• Interact with other labs
• Hit people up for seminar invitations!

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The tenure check list
(Department of Medicine)

• Chair recommendation
• External references (8)
• Teaching references (10)
• CV in correct format
• Five reprints
• Critical references
• Documentation of teaching

?
?
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Teaching references

• Give more names than they ask for
• Teaching references can come from the following
• Medical students (classroom and clinic)
• Graduate students (in class)
• Current and former graduate students in your lab
• Current and former postdocs in your lab
• Thesis committees
• Faculty you have team taught with

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The tenure check list
(Department of Medicine)

• Chair recommendation
• External references (8)
• Teaching references (10)
• CV in correct format
• Five reprints
• Critical references
• Documentation of teaching

?
?
?
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CV should include

• Education and training
• Professional/society memberships
• Intramural activities
• Department/university committees
• Seminar series organizer
• Training grant director
• Mentoring committees
• Extramural activities
• Editorial boards
• Grant review panels
• Peer review (list journals)
• Professional activities
• Organizing local or national meetings
• Session chair at a conference
• Abstract review for conference

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CV should include

• Honors and awards
• Teaching
• In the clinic
• In the lab
• In the classroom
• Giving seminars or journal clubs on campus
• Thesis committees
• Course director?

Do not just give a listsummarize changes you
made to the course if a course director. You
should list former and current trainees by name,
if they graduated, give date and where they are
now.
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CV should include

• Current and past funding
• list title, funding period and dollar amount
• Publications
• Primary research articles
• Reviews and book chapters
• Published abstracts
• Invited lectures (4 per year)

Yes, quality of publications is important, but so
is regularity and quantity. Dont sit on
thingsget them out! Average rule of thumb one
paper per grant per year.
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The tenure check list
(Department of Medicine)

• Chair recommendation
• External references (8)
• Teaching references (10)
• CV in correct format
• Five reprints
• Critical references
• Documentation of teaching

?
?
?
?
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Reprints
Try to pick publications without your former
mentor. Could be a review article if in a good
journal and/or is significant to the field
(demonstrates your expertise in an area).
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The tenure check list
(Department of Medicine)

• Chair recommendation
• External references (8)
• Teaching references (10)
• CV in correct format
• Five reprints
• Critical references
• Documentation of teaching

?
?
?
?
?
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Critical References
Minimum of five references...can be same as
reprints. Need to summarize each reference
briefly and your role on the project. Need to
highlight significance of this publication to the
field (new reagent now being shared with
community, challenged a prior dogma, new insight,
new gene, demonstrates your collaborative nature,
etc.)
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The tenure check list
(Department of Medicine)

• Chair recommendation
• External references (8)
• Teaching references (10)
• CV in correct format
• Five reprints
• Critical references
• Documentation of teaching

?
?
?
?
?
?
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Documentation of teaching
Medicine has a specific form that needs to be
filled out. Need to know course title and how
many student contact hours you had. Also need to
list names, status, inclusive dates for all
supervised research. A lot of this is redundant
with your CV.
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The tenure check list
(Department of Medicine)

• Chair recommendation
• External references (8)
• Teaching references (10)
• CV in correct format
• Five reprints
• Critical references
• Documentation of teaching

?
?
?
?
?
?
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• Update your CV with accomplishments,
  responsibilities, and activities as they happen!
  Dont wait til you need to compile it for your
  tenure package!

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Questions?