Use Technology To Help Curate Your Tenure Portfolio

Tenure-track faculty are asked to keep track of their most important contributions from the very moment they are hired. That body of work, sometime in the future, will be used to determine their worthiness for receiving tenure, and must be managed diligently in the meantime. Over what can be a very long period, one of the biggest challenges of creating an excellent portfolio to showcase one's entire career up to that point is simply keeping track of everything. That's where technology can be a game-changer.

Robert Talbert, a mathematics professor at Grand Valley State University and contributing writer for the Chronicle of Higher Education blog, says that technology can help faculty preparing for tenure selection work smarter, not harder. Instead of relying wholly on traditional storage and hoping that, on submission day, everything is in the binder that's been accumulating important files for years, he suggests using some technological assistance to keep disciplined and organized. At the core of his advice is that you can use technology to implement a system you trust that can easily be categorized and searched that you are able to easily organize and settle on a weekly basis. This allows you to make sure you are staying ahead of the constant influx of materials you must track, such that you can rest easy knowing each item that came across your desk or screen is safely vaulted where you can access it easily at a later time if necessary. Talbert recommends using converting all paper documents into electronic formats using a scanner, then keeping track of them using a free storage and organization service like Evernote, Dropbox, a combination of both, or some other means. Talbert goes into pretty specific detail about how he recommends using Evernote and Dropbox to prepare a portfolio. But the basic takeaway is this: if you're preparing for tenure selection, get organized with technology or be risk being overwhelmed when your time comes.

UNF will be hosting two two vendor demonstrations for electronic tenure and promotion portfolios on Friday, March 11th: Interfolio’s By Committee (12:00-1:30pm) and Data180’s Faculty180 (2:00-3:30pm). Both demonstrations will be held in Building 51, room 1205. Faculty are encouraged to come out, ask questions, and provide feedback on these digital systems for managing the promotion and tenure documents and process.