Midcareer Professor Hiring Initiative, 2016-17 Call for Nominations

Dear colleagues:

UCI is engaged in ambitious strategic expansion. We continue to build on the existing strengths of our faculty campuswide, fortify our commitment to diversity, and develop our community of interdisciplinary, transdisciplinary and convergent science scholars. Begun last year, the Midcareer Professor Hiring Initiative seeks to hire advanced assistant professors and tenured associate to early full professors with distinguished publication or creative endeavor records and upward trajectories in their research profiles. To date, the MPHI has leveraged our resources to select 18 nominees from the first pool of candidates; eight faculty have accepted UCI’s offer (six nominees and two career partners) and another three are still in recruitment.

I am pleased to invite the second round of MPHI nominations. We are searching for extraordinary midcareer scholars who are already distinguished, whose research/creative endeavor profiles are on an upswing, and who will consider moving to UCI.

These nominees must meet important additional criteria. They must:

  • Tie into a school’s strategic plan
  • Address workload needs, including increasing Ph.D. enrollment
  • Advance the inclusive excellence of faculty and/or graduate students

Candidates considered will work within and across disciplines, particularly those participating in convergent disciplines in their areas of study. Deans are encouraged to consult with their equity advisers, identify the most highly successful midlevel (advanced assistant, associate or beginning full professor) candidates and have them apply to the MPHI through AP Recruit between Sept. 23, when the official posting opens, and Dec. 9, 2016, when the posting will close.

Schools will be given access to the pool of applicants for their units. After interviews and voting by the hiring department, schools may nominate up to two candidates to be hired through this initiative. Nominations should be ranked and sent to me via acadplan@uci.edu before 10AM on Jan. 20, 2017. Shortly thereafter, I will award FTEs based on these nominees. If FTEs remain, I will consider candidates on a rolling basis thereafter.

Nominations must come from schools and should include:

  • Applicant’s CV
  • Applicant’s diversity statement
  • A nomination letter (two-page maximum) including:
    • Level of support in the hiring department
    • A description of the candidate’s extraordinary record and trajectory
    • How the candidate fits into the school’s strategic plan
    • An account of the candidate’s participation, if any, in cross-disciplinary studies or convergent science
    • How hiring the candidate will address the school’s workload issues, including increasing Ph.D. enrollment
    • How the candidate will contribute to the inclusive excellence of faculty and/or graduate students in the school
    • Information on the candidate’s level of interest in coming to UCI
    • An informed estimate of the salary and startup package that would be necessary to secure the hire
    • What the school would be willing to contribute to the hiring package

Note that after I have awarded FTEs to schools, faculty appointments still need to undergo formal review. School staff will prepare a full appointment file, which should contain all the standard documentation for a faculty appointment. Files will be forwarded for formal review in accordance with normal academic personnel procedures, including Council on Academic Personnel review and my approval.

In the event I do not accept a nomination, a dean may choose to request approval to fund (at the school level) a candidate’s hire without re-posting the search. The dean would need to write a request memo to Vice Provost Stepan-Norris addressing the same criteria required for a nomination, as outlined above, and affirming that the specific hiring process for the MPHI will be followed.

Any questions about this process should be directed to Judith Stepan-Norris, vice provost for academic planning, at jstepann@uci.edu.
Thank you in advance for your assistance in helping us identify and recruit this new group of outstanding faculty leaders.

Sincerely,

Enrique Lavernia
Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor
Distinguished Professor of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science