By Erin Fields

Staff Writer

Ever wondered what tenure is and how certain professors have managed to acquire the status? Ever thought that (or complained to friends about how) once professors have tenure they stop working; that life for them becomes a party, except for the occasional times they must teach a class and grade tests and papers? Have you ever contemplated whether Calvin has an official policy on tenure - to whom it is awarded, what is required in order to achieve it and whether tenured professors must meet any particular requirements?

Well, Calvin does in fact have a set procedure through which professors must make their way before attaining tenured positions, and responsibilities for those professors who already hold tenure positions.

Whether the requirements are good, bad or indifferent is, as with any and all administrative policies, up for debate. Of the 284 full and part-time faculty teaching at Calvin for the 2001-02 school year, 138 have tenure and 96 are in tenure-track positions; the rest hold term or temporary positions. The teaching faculty ranges in rank from instructor, requiring only a master's degree, up through assistant professor, associate professor, and finally full professor, requiring a doctorate degree and a minimum of 10 years college teaching experience. So, what exactly must these professors do in order to acquire and maintain tenure status?

When hired, most professors are given a ``regular'' position, which means they are appointed to a three-year term. After this term, they can be reviewed and possibly reappointed to two two-year terms, making them candidates for the tenure program. Professors are reviewed in the areas of teaching, research and scholarship, advising, and community service. Written summaries reviewing a professor's successes and failures in these areas are considered, as well as peer reviews from tenured colleagues, student evaluations, and a written self-evaluation from the professor.

The professor under consideration must also write a paper (length depends on whether reappointment or tenure is sought by the professor) in which he or she explains ways in which he or she has integrated faith in the classroom, how faith has affected his or her teaching and any difficulties or rewards from integrating faith and learning that have resulted.

The handbook for faculty stresses that the administration realizes that not everyone will be outstanding in each of the areas, but that each candidate must demonstrate some proficiency in each.

The Board of Trustees also interviews those under consideration for tenure or for reappointment, after the initial three-year term, concerning the candidates personal faith, church influence, teaching, and research and publication goals.

All of the information from the review process is compiled and presented to the department, the dean, the Professional Status Committee, the provost, the president, and the Board of Trustees, any of whom can give the candidate a negative recommendation and end the review process, after which the candidate is usually retained for the coming school year and then let go.

Every three years, students and advisees evaluate the professors who already have tenure. Tenure professors must also write up a self-evaluation about their teaching, research, and publication goals -- both goals they have met and those they are planning to meet. This evaluation is ``a means of encouraging and assisting faculty members in their professional development.''

All of this sounds very impressive and rigorous but how many of these requirements are actually met? How hard is it for professors to meet the requirements? Is tenure ever denied? How does the tenure process compare to other liberal arts colleges relatively equivalent to Calvin?

Just how much weight do those student evaluations completed each semester actually carry in the process of acquiring tenure? What effect, if any, do they have after tenure has already been awarded.

Most professors believe the college takes the requirements outlined in the handbook very seriously. Most important, several said, is the professor's teaching skills.

Professor Roger DeKock, Chair of the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department, says his department relies largely on student evaluations in reviewing the teaching abilities of its professors.

English Professor William Vande Kopple, of the English Department, said that all the student evaluations are read in their departments by the chair and the professor who is being evaluated even after tenure has been awarded. He added that in his years on the Professional Status Committee he did not know anyone who took the requirements for tenure lightly or anyone who did not read ``every last one'' of the student evaluations.

The dean receives all the evaluations first, then delivers them to the chairs of the departments - DeKock said they read all of them - and then on to the individual professors. If theevaluations consistently address a problem, department chairs talk to the Professor about the problem. DeKock claims that if a professor receives only a few bad evaluations, and many good evaluations, it is the bad reports that the professor remembers.

Both Vande Kopple and DeKock agreed that the requirements for research and publication are fairly high but manageable. They noted that the requirements have become more rigorous in the last 20 years, which VandeKopple feels is not necessarily a good thing because it potentially makes professors less available to students.

DeKock said that while he thinks the requirements are high, perhaps higher than other Christian liberal arts colleges, he also believes that Calvin provides its faculty with more than adequate resources.

Communication Arts and Science Professor Randall Bytwerk maintained that although Calvin does demand much of its faculty, the demands are easily met, due to the excellent perfomance of the professors.