Academic Career Pathways General Information

Academic (Teaching & Scholarship) and Academic (Research & Teaching) staff are referred to as T&S and R&T respectively.

1. Guidance on the Academic Career Pathway (ACP) Schemes 

Guidance on each scheme can be found at the links below: 

• ACP R&T 
• ACP T&S 

ACP Briefings

These briefings are provided annually for each scheme before the promotions scheme is launched to inform potential applicants of the scheme.

CV Mentoring Scheme

This scheme is available to all staff who are considering applying for promotion. This Scheme plays an important role in supporting women and academic staff from other underrepresented groups. Mentors are senior academics who have extensive experience with the University's career development schemes and are willing to review the mentee's CV and/or application documentation and provide feedback in a confidential and supportive setting.  Please contact the dedicated email address: ACP_CV@admin.cam.ac.uk for further information. Further information on mentoring is available. 

2. ACP Titles

Titles for R&T staff are set out in the following table for:

1.  established professors at Grade 11 and 12 and
2. established and unestablished roles at Grade 10 and below

Titles for T&S staff for established roles at Grade 9 and above and for unestablished posts (Grades 6 to 12) are set out below. These do not apply to clinical roles.

*Fixed-term academic offices and comparable unestablished posts will be retitled on successful completion of probation, but after the minimum period of service in each case. This means that in cases where the probationary period is less than the minimum period, role holders will retain the existing title and adopt the new title only once they have served that minimum period in that role (which might be following an extension to the period of the original appointment)

3. Generic Role Templates

Generic role templates are available for academic roles under the Grading section of the HR Website

4. Probation

Information about academic probation can be found in the Probation Policy and Probation Procedure for Academic staff. The probation periods for T&S staff are shorter than for R&T staff, as clarified in para 4.2 of the Probation Policy.

5. The Report introducing the ACP T&S Career Pathway

The Report can be found in Reporter.

6. ACP Transfer Process

Details of the ACP transfer process are set out below:

• ACP Transfer Process
• ACP T&S Additional Eligibility Criteria
• ACP Transfer Forms

7. Guidance specifically relating to the Academic Career Pathway (T&S)

Relief from teaching for scholarship purposes

T&S staff will not be granted an automatic right to sabbatical leave to conduct research and scholarship, but they may be eligible – in exceptional circumstances and for very specific purposes – to apply for relief from teaching to undertake a significant body of work, in line with principles agreed at School level.

School Councils will agree principles across their institutions and cognate disciplines for the granting of teaching relief, expectations of the use of time available outside of teaching commitments for scholarship, and teaching load and stint models.

Recruitment onto T&S contracts

It is anticipated that most recruitment into a T&S role will be at Grade 9 or below, including where a vacancy arises from the resignation or retirement of an individual who has been promoted above their underlying Grade; i.e. recruitment would normally be at the level of the underlying or substantive post.

Recruitment to academic T&S posts will be subject to the usual ‘permission to fill’ processes. Newly created positions will require justification as to why a T&S post is required, and Heads of School will need to be assured that creating the new post will not result in moving teaching duties away from academic R&T) staff.

New T&S staff in Grades 6-8 will be unestablished, whilst staff in Grade 9 and above may be either established or unestablished. It is not expected that there will be recruitment to unestablished Professors at Grade 11 or 12.

When recruiting academic T&S staff, institutions should follow:

1. The University Recruitment Guidance for all T&S recruitment, and
2. SPECIAL ORDINANCE C (x): Selection Committees (Special Ordinance under Statute C XIII 2) and the relevant School’s specific guidance when appointing established academic officers.

The process for recruiting unestablished staff in Grades 9 and above should mirror that of an established office, as far as possible.

An appointing body is the collective name for the panel responsible for making selection decisions (including shortlisting) for a post or posts. The Recruitment Guidance states that an appointing body must:

• Always comprise more than one person
• Include people with in-depth knowledge of the different aspects of the role to be performed
• Follow the same procedures as a Selection Committee and to the same standards.

Scholarship

T&S staff are expected to deliver research-informed teaching and thus to engage in scholarship which may include research within the discipline and/or applied research, which may be pedagogic in nature or related to relevant professional practice.

T&S staff are not automatically research-returnable for Research Excellence Framework (REF) purposes, unless their job descriptions include significant responsibility for independent research. However, if any are producing scholarly outputs under the definition of the REF, they may be considered on a case-by-case basis by Unit of Assessment Committees as to their eligibility to be returned.

8. Queries

Any queries about the academic T&S provisions, please email hrteachingandscholarship@admin.cam.ac.uk

Any queries about the Academic Career Pathways (R&T and T&S) schemes please email acp@admin.cam.ac.uk