Assistant professors at the Faculty of Law will be able to follow a fixed path through a talent track to be promoted to associate professor. Employees with the position of lecturer 3 will be promoted to lecturer 1.
The programme lasts for a minimum of six years. Employees will receive a permanent contract, provided their assessment is positive. In the case of the track to associate professor, this evaluation will take place after twelve months, and for the track to lecturer 1, after 2.5 years.
Career prospects
The track is an implementation of the university-wide Erkennen en Waarderen (Recognition & Rewards) programme and aims to provide career prospects for teaching and research staff. Additionally, the trajectory offers uniformity in promotion procedures, according to the dean of Law, Wilbert Kolkman. ‘You can’t have people in one group getting promoted easily while another group has to jump through all sorts of hoops. This track prevents that.’
Kolkman cannot specify how many employees will be able to take part in the talent track yet. ‘But we probably won’t place more than twenty people in the track, since it will also have financial consequences.’
Tenure track
The approach is different from the existing tenure track, which essentially trains people to become professors. ‘If you achieve that position, you get a permanent contract. If you do not become a professor, you still have to leave’, says Kolkman. ‘With the talent track, you don’t advance as quickly. If you do not reach the end goal, you remain in the position you had before.’
The Faculty of Law is not the first faculty to offer a special career track. For example, the Faculty of Economics and Business has had a special career track since 2021, where university lecturers are promoted to associate professors. The Faculty of Science and Engineering and the UMCG also offer special career paths.