MSI Research Faculty

This version is approved during the 375th MSI Senior Staff meeting (15 July 2019).

Background

The Research Faculty positions at the UP Marine Science Institute originated as the conversion of REPS items into Faculty Items. This was approved during the 1144th BOR Meeting last August 31, 2000. The guidelines for conversion from REPS to Research Faculty are in pages 21-22 of the 2003 UPD Faculty Manual. However, upon checking with HRDO, the REPS items were converted to regular faculty items and the Research Faculty became a designation rather than an actual item. As such, the designation became transferable to the different faculty items of the UP Marine Science Institute.

The main purpose of a Research Faculty designation is to allow the faculty to spend more time doing research by decreasing the teaching load to only 3 units per sem and increasing the research load to 9 units. It is therefore expected that a research faculty member will also be able to produce more research outputs (mainly scientific publications) compared to regular faculty members with more than 3 units of teaching load. Some faculty members handle 3 or more projects but present guidelines can only credit 6 units (from 2 funded projects) of research load. The Research Faculty designation can be used to address this shortcoming, and the best approach is to award the Research Faculty designation to deserving faculty. However, since not all can be research faculty because of the Institute’s teaching function, the designation can be assigned on a competitive basis. The guidelines for application and awarding of the Research Faculty designation are described below.

Application

Application for a Research Faculty designation requires submitting a letter of application to the MSI Director. The application is discussed during the Senior Staff meeting and recommendations for awarding Research Faculty designation forwarded to the HRDO. Together with the application, the applicant must include the following:

• Endorsement of academic group including measures to be taken to offset the 3 unit per sem teaching load reduction of the applicant
• More than 2 funded marine-related research projects as Project Leader for the last 3 years prior to application
• Will qualify for 9 units RLC (Research Load Credit) during the time of application
• Publication requirement of at least 1 paper per year in the last 3 years prior to application
• Must have graduated at least 1 MSc student in the last 3 years prior to application

Criteria for Retention

The Research Faculty designation is for a period of three years. If after three years, the research faculty desires to keep the designation, the 2 most important requirements for retaining the designation is a 9-unit research load credit for every semester and at least 6 publications during the 3 year period. At least 1 MSc or PhD advisee graduated within the 3 year period.