Tenure track
Aalto University’s tenure track career system offers a well-supported and clear career path for professor-level academics towards a permanent professorship.
In the evaluation processes, we always follow the principles of responsible evaluation, learn more here.
Recruitments and tenure and advancement reviews are always based on holistic peer evaluation, in which the evaluation criteria include the quality of research/artistic work, teaching, and impact/service. The weight of different criteria may vary at different career levels. The same criteria are used for both recruitment and advancement reviews at all levels.
Tenure track evaluation takes place through the following dimensions:
The criteria are described in more detail in the Aalto Tenure Track Policies and Procedures -document.
Candidates recruited or advancing to the level of associate or full professor must have high academic merits, be of first rank among distinguished members of their discipline, and must show a continued contribution to academic research.
According to the Aalto tenure track policy, the minimum requirements for reaching tenure are:
If a professor has a doctoral degree from Aalto University or its predecessor, the tenured position usually requires that the professor has worked at another university or research institute for at least one year after the doctoral degree or has otherwise acquired similar experience.
The following criteria are considered key criteria when reviewing a candidate for tenure and determining excellence in either research/artistic work and/or teaching:
When recruiting or reviewing a candidate for advancing to full professor level, in addition to the key criteria mentioned above, the following factors are also considered::
In general, candidates for full professor are expected to have increasing contributions to impact and service, for example, including the following activities:
For candidates in the tenure track, both tenure and advancement reviews focus mainly on merits achieved since the previous review.
For more detailed descriptions of evaluation processes and criteria, see the Aalto Tenure Track Policies and Procedures document.
The candidate’s teaching competence is assessed in academic recruitments as well as in advancement reviews. The assessments are carried out by the teaching competence assessment committee of each school. The committee follows these guidelines (including an assessment matrix) in their assessments.
Please note that the teaching assessment is a holistic process that evaluates the teaching ability, maturity, and potential as a teacher and teaching and learning developer. Please note that competence can be demonstrated in many ways. Therefore, numerous examples are presented in the matrix, so that we can better understand the many possible ways to demonstrate competence
In the section Guidelines for a candidate you can find help to write or update your teaching portfolio.
Candidates are required to be fluent in English in order to perform their duties. A foreign citizen may be appointed to a research or teaching position without demonstrating proficiency in the Finnish or Swedish languages.
In addition to the Aalto wide criteria described above, each school may have additional field specific tenure track criteria:
Aalto University’s tenure track career system offers a well-supported and clear career path for professor-level academics towards a permanent professorship.
Contact details to Human Resources (HR) services for Joint University services as well as for HR units at Schools and Departments.