NSF ADVANCE: Institutional Transformation for Faculty Diversity

The University of Texas at El Paso

Quarterly Report

September- November 2007

Significant Accomplishments:

Policy and Recruitment: Faculty Fellows are now involved in interviewing faculty candidates.

Faculty Development: FMPW: Heightened discussion of having children before tenure, negotiating this with your chair and stopping the tenure clock—including women with experience in these areas as presenters. Many women are pregnant or planning to be and this is a rising need on the campus.

Collaborative Leadership: Have completed most interviews of 60 women in ADVANCE departments, studying their pathways to the PHD and their faculty positions.

Evaluation: The process of interviewing past job candidates has begun. Several interviews have been completed and recorded.

Areas of Difficulty/Resistance:

Policy and Recruitment: Developing guidelines for dual career hiring.

Faculty Development: Making sure the Mentoring relationships continue. Giving Mentors some kind of incentive.

Collaborative Leadership: Collecting all critical information about the best software program to use in order to create research networks at UTEP, so as to maximize opportunity for faculty women to become part of such networks.

Evaluation: Difficulties have been encountered while trying to contact past job candidates who are not on campus.

Best Ideas Yet:

Policy and Recruitment: Interviewing past faculty candidates to evaluate UTEP’s interviewing processes.

Faculty Development: Instituting “teas” and breakfasts instead of only lunch time brownbags.

Collaborative Leadership: system for creating an online database of research interests among all UTEP faculty, through which women faculty can share their interests and become part of research networks, and therefore research/grant-making groups; currently this system is in place at the University of Texas at Arlington, and ADVANCE is working with UTEP's Vice-President for Research to bring the system to UTEP.

Evaluation: None.

NSF ADVANCE: Institutional Transformation for Faculty Diversity

The University of Texas at El Paso

Quarterly Report

December 2006-February 2007

Significant Accomplishments:

Policy and Recruitment: Fourteen junior faculty were awarded GRA awards to advance their research agendas.

Faculty Development: FMPW: Provost Jarvis attended the November Mentoring Meeting and answered questions from junior faculty about the tenure process.

Collaborative Leadership: A CD of best practices has been compiled.

Evaluation: The faculty database is complete. The database will be used to report NSF 12 data.

Areas of Difficulty/Resistance:

Policy and Recruitment: Developing guidelines for dual career hiring.

Faculty Development: The Director of the Center of Effective Teaching and Learning left UTEP. ADVANCE has been part of the discussion to define the mission of the Center and advocates the inclusion of FMPW and IMPACT as part of the Center’s charge.

Collaborative Leadership: Determining an effective process to distribute best practices.

Evaluation: Response rate for Job Candidate study is still low.

Best Ideas Yet:

All: A mid-year retreat that included Co-PI’s, Faculty Fellows, and Associate Provost Hurley was held in January. A sustainability plan and timeline was developed.

NSF ADVANCE: Institutional Transformation for Faculty Diversity

The University of Texas at El Paso

Quarterly Report

March-May 2007

Significant Accomplishments:

Policy and Recruitment: The ADVANCE team interviewed all candidates for the Dean of Science and Dean of Engineering positions.

Faculty Development: Eight faculty participated in the 2007 IMPACT Seminar. John Hadjimarcou, Faculty Fellow and Chair of Marketing and Management, co-led the seminar with Tine Reimers and will lead the seminar in 2008.

Collaborative Leadership: Five department Chairs participated in Chair Chats, and 17 women faculty participated in Women Faculty Forums. Both provide opportunities for faculty to discuss issues regarding the recruitment, retention, and promotion of women.

Evaluation: Jennifer Greene, Professor of Educational Psychology from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, was hired as the UTEP ADVANCE external evaluator. She visited UTEP in April 2007 and submitted a report in May.

Areas of Difficulty/Resistance:

Policy and Recruitment: Identifying resources for the continued funding of dual career hires.

Faculty Development: Identifying resources and a home for ADVANCE faculty development activities.

Collaborative Leadership: Identifying a process to include a diversity module in the UTEP Departmental Compacts.

Evaluation: Finalizing online version of the Work-Life survey and identifying the best time to administer it. A number of surveys and questionnaires are currently being administered and ADVANCE is concerned about survey fatigue.

Best Ideas Yet:

Policy and Recruitment: Developing a plan to highlight the successes of dual career faculty in order to justify continued financial support for dual career hires.

Faculty Development: Inviting past FMPW participants to facilitate brown bags on issues such as time management and balancing work and family.

Collaborative Leadership: Working with the UTEPDonaldsonCenter to institutionalize Collaborative Leadership activities.

Evaluation: Sending questionnaires to job candidates that did not respond to the request to be interviewed over the phone.