External Review for Promotion and Tenure · 33
“[We have] five librarian ranks. Outside reviewers are used only in those cases where librarians are being
considered for promotion to Librarian IV or V. Our Personnel Program for Librarians is under review and the
current way that we use outside reviewers is one area of the program that might very well be changed.”
“External reviews should be a critical component of gaining tenure or, in our case, continuing appointment
in any research institution. I believe our institution has been derelict in having not required it to date. Not
requiring rigorous external evaluations of librarians keeps them in a second-class citizenship in relation to the
professorate.”
“Librarians are library faculty, which is one of four types of faculty here. We are non tenure-track. For
promotion to assistant, associate, or full, librarians can certainly furnish names of external people as reviewers,
but we do not require external reviews. Second, when names of externals reviewers are given, we furnish a
minimum of information, but which does include the criteria and the candidate’s CV.”
“Solicitation for comments from librarians at our institution would come directly to the librarian and be
considered confidential. Therefore we would have no way of knowing the volume or the level of effort our
librarians may be putting into such solicitations.”
“Our librarians do not have faculty rank or status. They serve on yearly renewable appointments.”
“Our staff is involved in reviewing sporadically, and not frequently. The number I’ve given occurred within the
last five years. Eleven librarians out of 102 took part in at least one review in that time frame. At the top of the
range was someone who’s done five. I then asked them to gauge the time spent in work days (=7 hrs). Here
the range was from 2 hours to 21. I tossed out the person who spent three work days on one review(!) to get
the average of four hours.”
“Our University Library Director and some AULs do external reviews for individuals at other institutions on
occasion.”
“Question #4: The number of reviewers depends on the rank to which the candidate seeks promotion. The
candidate is the one who recommends the reviewers. Question #7: The library does not send candidate’s
portfolio to reviewers. Question #18: Library administration does not track who participates from existing
library staff in the external review of colleagues at other institutions. It is believed that tracking this type of
professional service would violate the confidentiality of the review process and that those persons who are
asked for an external review for a person at another institution would decline to reveal this information.”
“I am aware that some staff members, particularly at the higher levels, participate in external reviews of staff
from other institutions. However, we have no data or further information about numbers of reviews or time
used for that purpose.”
“Librarians are not faculty they are academic appointees. Career status is awarded after a suitable trial period.
Letters from referees/reviewers are required for promotion in rank and other actions, i.e., acceleration and
distinguished status.”
“We are strongly considering inclusion of external reviews in our rank and status process.”
“We have two librarians that spend about four hours on each external review. One librarian spent 12 hours
but it was her first (and only) external review.”
“We have an internal peer review process but do not require external reviews.”
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