{"id":60,"date":"2016-08-24T08:30:49","date_gmt":"2016-08-24T12:30:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/?p=60"},"modified":"2016-08-21T17:32:25","modified_gmt":"2016-08-21T21:32:25","slug":"what-counts-evaluating-public-communication-in-tenure-and-promotion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/blog\/2016\/08\/24\/what-counts-evaluating-public-communication-in-tenure-and-promotion\/","title":{"rendered":"What counts? Evaluating public communication in tenure and promotion"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Last Friday, the American Sociological Association released a subcommittee report entitled <a href=\"http:\/\/www.asanet.org\/sites\/default\/files\/tf_report_what_counts_evaluating_public_communication_in_tenure_and_promotion_final_august_2016.pdf\">What counts? Evaluating public communication in tenure and promotion<\/a>. It suggests that public communication of research can be assessed along three axes:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Type of content<\/em>: explanatory journalism, opinion, application of research to a practical issue<\/li>\n<li><em>Rigor and quality of the communication<\/em>: peer-reviewed, edited, non-edited, effectiveness of communication for the intended audience<\/li>\n<li><em>Public impact<\/em>: number of readers, breadth of influence on policy or practice<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Amy Schalet, Director of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.umass.edu\/pep\/\">Public Engagement Project<\/a> at UMass Amherst, argues that public communication should be included in faculty evaluations, because when we include it, &#8220;we encourage [faculty] to share their knowledge with the members of society who could most benefit from it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>I agree, but as always, the devil is in the details. Among the questions I wrestle with are:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>To what extent is public communication of scholarly work an aspect of scholarly achievement?<\/li>\n<li>Should public communication be regarded primarily as service in the tenure triad of teaching, research, and service?<\/li>\n<li>Is public communication worthwhile only if it leads to changes in public policy or professional practice? Is it worthwhile if it leads &#8220;only&#8221; to greater aesthetic appreciation of the human or natural world?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The University of Connecticut has been recognized as a &#8220;Community Engaged&#8221; campus by the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.carnegiefoundation.org\/newsroom\/news-releases\/carnegie-selects-colleges-universities-2015-community-engagement-classification\/\">Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching<\/a> since 2010 (<a href=\"http:\/\/nerche.org\/images\/stories\/projects\/Carnegie\/2015\/2010_and_2015_CE_Classified_Institutions_revised_8_10_16.pdf\">ref<\/a>). These are clearly among the questions that we need to answer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last Friday, the American Sociological Association released a subcommittee report entitled What counts? Evaluating public communication in tenure and promotion. It suggests that public communication of research can be assessed&#8230; <a class=\"read-more-button\" href=\"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/blog\/2016\/08\/24\/what-counts-evaluating-public-communication-in-tenure-and-promotion\/\">Read more &gt;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-60","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-academics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/darwin.eeb.uconn.edu\/uncommon-ground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}