Information for Merit Committees

As in the past, merit committees set their own procedures and criteria and are free to employ rubrics or other tools of their choosing to help them arrive at decisions. These rubrics do not have to be included with the recommendations and brief rationales that go to the Dean.

If a committee decides to employ rubrics it should be kept in mind that according to Appendix H of the Full-time Collective Agreement, a merit increment is a recognition of outstanding or superior performance in up to two categories. While satisfactory performance in the remaining category or categories must be maintained in order to receive a merit increment, evaluation of the remaining category or categories should only be used to determine whether performance was satisfactory or not rather than being included in any overall score used to arrive at a decision regarding the category or categories in which performance was outstanding or superior.

New to merit procedures this year is the addition of a “brief supporting rationale for each reviewed member” as outlined in Point 9 of Appendix H. These brief rationales are sent only to the Dean, for their use in addressing questions about Merit.

The rationales that accompany the recommendations are meant to be brief and not onerous to
complete. One suggestion for a way to do this is as follows.

Rationale Suggestions

1. For those who are recommended for merit the rationale could briefly list outstanding accomplishments in the category or categories for which the member is being recommended, as was the practice in the past.

2. For those who are not recommended for merit, the rationales could be as follows:

• The member met the criteria for merit but did not receive a recommendation due to the limited number of merit increments and the relative accomplishments of other members in the group.
• The member’s performance was considered outstanding in one or more categories but was not considered satisfactory in one or more of the remaining categories.
• The member’s performance was not considered outstanding in any category.
• Not enough information was provided for the committee to assess.