UMIACS Organization Plan

1. The Director is the chief administrative officer of the Institute and has those responsibilities and powers assigned by the College and the University. The Director is appointed by the University for a term not to exceed five years. The Director may be renewed for a second consecutive term after a satisfactory review conducted by the dean of the college within which UMIACS resides. The Director may not serve for more than 10 consecutive years. All key units with constituencies in UMIACS will provide input and feedback on the selection of the UMIACS director.
2. If a candidate is not a tenured faculty member of the University in a unit, a recommendation as to tenure by the appropriate academic department faculty also shall be made.

1. The Assembly is the deliberative body of the Institute. It may consider any matter affecting the Institute or its members. It is responsible for its own organization, meetings, and elections.
2. The following are members of the Assembly, each member having one vote:
   1. all professional track and tenure track faculty who have at least a 25% appointment in the Institute; 
   2. the Institute's Director; 
   3. such other persons as the Assembly may admit; 
   4. one representative of the staff elected by the staff. 
3. All new or renewed appointments of tenure-track faculty in the Institute are limited to at most 5 years. Appointments may be renewed.
4. Meetings: The Assembly shall meet no less than once during each semester of the academic year.

5. Standing committees: The standing committees of the Assembly shall include Appointment, Promotion and Tenure (APT), Steering, and Merit Review. The Director, or their designated representative, is an ex-officio voting member of all standing committees. 

   At the beginning of each academic year, the Director shall provide a charge to the standing committees. The charge shall include the expectation that each committee report on their activities to the Assembly during one of the meetings of the assembly and expectations for those reports' content. 

6. Appointment, Promotion, and Tenure (APT) committee The APT committee advises the Director regarding the appointment and reappointment of faculty in the Institute. The APT committee will be elected by the Assembly before the academic year ends. The committee comprises seven tenure-track faculty members and one professional track faculty member (if available). All elected members of the APT committee must be UMIACS faculty with at least a 25% appointment in the Institute. 

   Each member of the Assembly will be given a slate of eligible candidates and asked to vote for up to 14 candidates (twice the number of seats available) that they find acceptable to be members of the APT committee. 

   Four out of the seven tenure-track members of the APT committee will be those who receive the highest number of acceptable votes, distributed as follows: 2 Professor; 1 Associate Professor; 1 Assistant Professor. The professional track faculty member (if available) with the highest number of votes will also be selected. To pick the remaining three candidates, the following procedure is followed. All candidates get pooled in a partially ordered list, sorted descending by votes. Going down the list, pick the first candidates to fill one remaining slot each for Professor, Associate Professor, and Assistant Professor ranks, and ensure that at least three home departments are represented in the full committee. Ties will be broken at the discretion of the Director.

   The chair of the APT committee will be selected by the Director from the members of the committee with the rank of Professor. 

   For appointments to the ranks of Assistant Professor, Assistant Research Scientist, and equivalent research faculty ranks, as well as for Adjunct and Affiliate appointments at all ranks, all members of the committee may discuss and vote. 

   For appointments to the rank of Associate Professor, Associate Research Scientist, and equivalent research faculty ranks, only APT committee members with the rank of Associate Professor, Associate Research Scientist, Professor, Research Scientist, and equivalent research faculty ranks may discuss and vote on cases. For appointments to the rank of Professor, Research Scientist, and equivalent research faculty ranks, only APT committee members with the rank of Professor, Research Scientist, and equivalent research faculty ranks may discuss and vote on cases.

7. Steering committee: The Steering committee advises the Director. The Committee should meet at least once each semester to discuss programmatic issues, recruiting, budgets and other areas of interest. A staff person, appointed by the Director, will be present to take minutes available to all UMIACS faculty. The Steering committee will be elected by the Assembly before the academic year ends. 

   Each member of the Assembly will be given a slate of eligible candidates and asked to vote for up to 12 candidates (twice the number of seats available) that they find acceptable to be members of the Steering committee. 

   The members of the Steering committee will be selected by the Director on the basis of the highest number of votes as acceptable, subject to satisfying the following requirements. The Steering committee comprises six members, at least three at the rank of Professor or equivalent. The members of the committee shall represent faculty with primary appointments in at least two different departments and can include members of the professional track faculty. 

   The chair of the department with the highest representation in the Assembly is an exofficio member of the Steering committee.

8. Merit review committee: A Merit Review committee, consisting of three faculty members, will serve to advise the Director on merit pay distribution. The Committee will be directly elected annually via secret ballot by the tenure-track and tenured faculty. A faculty member may not serve more than two consecutive years on the Committee. 

   Each member of the Assembly will be given a slate of eligible candidates and asked to vote for up to six candidates (twice the number of seats available) that they find acceptable to be members of the Merit Review committee. 

   Insofar as possible, the Merit Review committee composition over a period of years will reflect the diverse composition of the Institute. Each year the Director will review the makeup of the Merit Review Committee over the previous five years to ensure that a reasonable representation of the faculty has been achieved. If necessary, the Director will modify the composition of the committee to rectify the situation subject to the approval of the Steering Committee. The Director should consider how diversity requirements for committee membership can disproportionately burden diverse faculty, who, relative to their colleagues, often face increased service work demands from their department and scholarly community that do not benefit their own careers.

9. The Director and/or Assembly may assign duties other than the above to any of the standing committees and may create ad hoc committees other than the standing committees.

As an Institute, UMIACS does not grant tenure. In the case of joint appointments of tenure-track faculty with the Institute, decisions related to academic promotion and tenure are the responsibility of the tenure home department. In such cases, the Director shall provide the tenure home with a letter providing a recommendation regarding the promotion based on the faculty member's contribution to the Institute, a letter that shall be added to the promotion dossier.

A request for appointment in the Institute must include, in writing, the following documents:

• An approximately one-page statement justifying the request, highlighting the proposed contributions of the faculty member to the Institute’s mission (as specified where);
• A support letter from the chair of the tenure home department; 
• A signed and dated CV (preferably in the official University of Maryland format) or a signed certification that the information available in the Faculty Success system is up to date. For new university hires, the statement justifying the request should preferably be written by the appointee, but it need not be (for example, a justification accurately reflecting the candidate’s intent that is written by the Director of UMIACS or by the chair of the tenure home department); and the CV from the appointee’s application packet, formatted as-is, is acceptable. 

In case the Director determines that the appointment is in the best interest of the Institute, and financial resources are available to support the joint appointment, the Director shall ask the APT committee to review the request in accordance with the UMIACS criteria for appointment and promotion. 

The APT committee vote is advisory to the Director. In case the Director makes a decision contrary to the vote of the committee, the Director shall inform the committee members and provide a justification. 

The Director formally presents the final decision to the faculty member and to the chair of the tenure home department. The APT committee’s vote count is not made available to either the faculty member or tenure home chair.

A faculty member seeking appointment in the Institute must submit, in writing, the following documents: 

• A one-page statement justifying the request, highlighting the proposed contributions of the faculty member to the Institute’s mission; 
• A signed and dated CV in the University of Maryland Format, or a signed certification that the information available in the Faculty Success system is up to date.

In case the Director considers that the appointment is in the best interest of the Institute, the Director shall ask the APT committee to review the request in accordance with the UMIACS criteria for appointment and promotion. 

The APT committee vote is advisory to the Director. In case the Director makes a decision contrary to the vote of the committee, the Director shall inform the committee members and provide a justification. 

The Director formally presents the final decision to the faculty member. The APT committee’s vote count is not made available to the faculty member.

During the final year of appointment of a joint faculty member, the UMIACS director shall inform the chair of the tenure home department and request a reappointment package containing the following documents: 

• A one-page statement justifying the request, highlighting the proposed contributions of the faculty member to the Institute’s mission; 
• A one-page statement describing the faculty member’s contributions to the Institute during the prior period of appointment.
• A support letter from the chair of the tenure home department; 
• A signed and dated CV in the University of Maryland format, or a signed certification that the information available in the Faculty Success system is up to date. 

In case the Director determines that the appointment is in the best interest of the Institute, and financial resources are available to support the joint appointment, the Director shall ask the APT committee to review the request in accordance with the UMIACS criteria for appointment and promotion. 

The APT committee vote is advisory to the Director. In case the Director makes a decision contrary to the vote of the committee, the Director shall inform the committee members and provide a justification. The Director formally presents the final decision to the faculty member and to the chair of the tenure home department. The APT committee’s vote count is not made available to either the faculty member or tenure home chair.

UMIACS will notify affiliate and adjunct faculty members whose appointments are ending with sufficient lead time for them to be reappointed without a gap. A faculty member seeking re-appointment in the Institute must submit, in writing, the following documents: 

• A one-page statement justifying the request, highlighting the proposed contributions of the faculty member to the Institute’s mission;
• A one-page statement describing the faculty member’s contributions to the Institute during the prior period of appointment.
• A signed and dated CV in the University of Maryland Format, or a signed certification that the information available in the Faculty Success system is up to date. 

In case the Director considers that the appointment is in the best interest of the Institute, the Director shall ask the APT committee to review the request in accordance with the UMIACS criteria for appointment and promotion. 

The APT committee vote is advisory to the Director. In case the Director makes a decision contrary to the vote of the committee, the Director shall inform the committee members and provide a justification. 

The Director formally presents the final decision to the faculty member. The APT committee’s vote count is not made available to the faculty member.

The appointment of visiting faculty is at the discretion of the Director. Such appointments are made for one year and may be renewed in exceptional circumstances for an additional year. After an initial visiting appointment, faculty seeking a longer-term appointment in the Institute must apply for a joint, affiliate, or adjunct appointment.

If the Director desires to make appointments in the Institute that deviate from the UMIACS criteria for appointment and promotion and/or from the procedures outlined above, a special meeting of the APT committee can be scheduled.

The Institute’s procedures and criteria for assigning merit pay are detailed in the Merit Pay Distribution Plan for UMIACS faculty. This plan shall be reviewed by an ad hoc committee no less frequently than once every 5 years. Any proposed changes to the plan must be approved by a vote of the Institute’s Assembly.

The Director will schedule monthly meetings of the Assembly during the academic year.

Members of standing committees will be elected before the end of each academic year effective at the start of the following academic year.