By Uche Oyenbadi
THIS is a personal story. As I write, I am going through something known as the ‘tenure and promotion’ process in the lexicon of the US university system.

It is an academic initiation rite for every university teacher. Once you are employed, you are given the guidelines for tenure and advised to take them seriously. The consequence of a misadventure is always unpalatable.

In ordinary parlance, tenure is a vetting process to judge one’s suitability to earn promotion, and to continue teaching at the university. Each university has its criteria for tenure. But, it is generally based on three categories:  (a) Teaching: How effective you are as a teacher? Among other things, this comprises students’ evaluation of your teaching; peer evaluation, which means how your colleagues evaluate your teaching; and other things you do to enhance the quality of your teaching.

(b) Research. This, essentially, is your level of research productivity. Each university has a requirement on the number of published articles in reputable peer-reviewed journals. Your conference paper presentations also count. This, perhaps, is the toughest aspect of tenure in a research institution. Professors involved in ‘production’ work are judged differently but on no less stringent criteria.

(c) Service to Community: This is based on non-strictly academic contributions to your department, college, university and the community where your school is located. It also incorporates service to your discipline outside your university e.g. helping to review conference and journal papers.

For tenure, I had to prepare a dossier that incorporates all activities in the three areas identified above. A committee of academic seniors (professors in my case) in my department has been set up to examine my file. Before then, some external reviewers had been contacted to evaluate my research. This department committee can vote for or against me.Then, my dossier will go to my head of department who will write his evaluation, independent of the committee’s decision.

Next, my file will proceed to the college (or faculty in Nigeria) committee which again reviews it and votes in favour or against tenure. The dean, like my head of department, is mandated to write her report in support or against the process. And, from there, the file goes to the office of the university provost where the final decision on tenure and promotion is made. In all, this process takes about eight to ten months.

As I write, I recall that none of my teachers at the Universities of Benin and Lagos had to walk through this academic minefield. Once employed, a university ‘don’ as they were called in those days, and even now, had guaranteed employment until retirement, all things being equal.

Teaching and service credentials

As far as we knew, nobody asked for their research, teaching and service credentials. But, there were some outstanding teachers with very credible intellectual accomplishments and we knew them. As students, it would have been suicidal to evaluate our teachers. But, we knew those of them who were academically worthy of their titles. As far as we knew, there was nothing to compel our teachers to ‘sit up and do your work’ as they used to counsel us. Salaries were guaranteed. Tenure was an alien word. Once employed as a university ‘don’, the good Lord has answered your prayer for permanent employment.

Now, here is my fate. Should my tenure process go awry, my employment will be terminated. That is the rule. But, I will be given just one more academic year to ease myself out of the system and look for a job elsewhere, which might not be easy, given the fact that I failed to make it past tenure in my current school. That ugly reputation of not making tenure will become a component of my academic DNA.

Here is my concern: In how many universities in our continent do we have such rigorous tenure and promotion process? Every new entrant into the university teaching fraternity in the US knows that tenure is the compulsory rite of passage to academic adulthood. I wonder if I would have had to pass through this proverbial eye of the needle if circumstance had placed me in a university somewhere in the motherland.