Both the candidate and the department will generate lists of potential external reviewers. Candidates should NOT contact potential external reviewers themselves to inquire about their willingness to write a letter.
External reviews are from nationally or internationally respected and recognized leaders in the discipline who are therefore qualified to speak with authority about the candidate’s accomplishments, future trajectory, and impact to the field. At Texas A&M University, external reviewers are expected to be from peer or aspirational top universities. Examples of peers and aspirational peers include members of the Association of American Universities (AAU) and leading international institutions.
Colleges/schools can request approval to add universities that are peers or aspirational peers within their disciplines, but are not included in the AAU list, to the list for their college/school recruitment of external reviewers. External letters should be from scholars at or above the rank being sought by the candidate. If the application is for tenure and promotion to associate professor, and if a letter(s) is requested from an associate professor, the majority of the letters should be from full professors. Letters from associate professors should only be used when that person is the leading expert in a particular area, and no full professors are available with related expertise.
In addition to the above rank requirement, the following track requirements apply:
- External reviewers who are tenured faculty can review all promotion dossiers for tenure-track, and academic professional track.
- External reviewers who are academic professional track can only review promotion dossiers for academic professional track candidates.
- If an external reviewer, who is an academic professional track faculty member, were to review a tenure track dossier, the letter from the reviewer would not be counted as one of the five required arm’s length letters.
Letters may also be sought from scholars at top academic programs from other institutions, and from preeminent experts from non-academic institutions, although a justification in the form of program ranking and expertise credentials must be included in these cases. The unit should strive to request a balanced number of letters from peer or aspirational programs/universities and other eminent programs and scholars.
External reviewers must be arm’s length and not have a vested interest (professional, personal or financial) in the outcome of the decision. Their selection must, therefore, be limited to those whose professional and personal relationship with the candidate can provide an objective and unbiased review. Letters should come from distinguished scholars who are not:
- The candidate’s thesis advisor (MS or PhD) or postdoctoral advisor
- Collaborated with candidate in last 5 years
- A coworker of the candidate in the last 5 years
- A business or professional partner
- Any family relation such as spouse, sibling, parent or relative.
In some fields or for some candidates, it may be difficult to find appropriate reviewers who have not collaborated in some way with the candidate. In such a case, the department head must send a memo request to the dean with a justification, and the pdf of this approved memo must be included in the dossier.
The candidate provides a list of names of possible reviewers and, if desired, a “do not contact” list. With the list of possible reviewers, the candidate must also provide a signed Candidate's External/Internal Reviewers checklist attesting to the qualification of the external reviewers as “arm’s length”, appropriate rank and track, and from appropriate institutions.
The unit (e.g., department head, P&T committee) also provides a list of possible reviewers. For funded joint appointments, both units should collaborate on the selection of external reviewers. The unit will verify that the external reviewers meet requirements using the Reviewers Chart.