Faculty Activity Database

NEWS & UPDATES

BIENNIAL REVIEW materials - July 2015

Schedule Teaching table in Biennial Review - the number of pages generated for Schedule Teaching DO NOT COUNT towards your total number of pages limit. Also, you can choose to edit the information, especially if you have many Lab sections [you are the teacher of record]. This is stated in the October 2014 Faculty Senate document: "

This report shall not exceed three (3) pages (min. 10 pt. font) exclusive of their teaching and advising data collected in the Faculty Activities Database." In addition, please remember: A maximum of 6 pages of attachments may be submitted in total. Those 'attachments' will be anything you have linked via the Store File option in the FAD - OR- during your final edit of the Biennial Review document, you may choose to manually add details. Your reviewers are not obligated to view anything past the 9-page total. Academic Affairs wants you to take full advantage of the ability to add documentation to the FAD by means of the Stored Files upload. In order to minimize the number of Stored File hyperlinks in the Biennial Review report, you may choose to delete some of those hyperlinks during your edit before you upload your final draft into the FAD's Workflow. It is up to the Reviewers to decide how many Stored File hyperlinks they will choose to open.

RESEARCH IN PROGRESS main menu option- do not use for Biennial Review: instead create/use Summary Statement: Research and/or enter text directly onto your final draft before saving and uploading into WORKFLOW [added Aug. 27]

WHICH FAD CATEGORIES WILL TAKE THE LONGEST TO ENTER/UPDATE?

  • Scheduled Teaching: annotate each course; upload syllabus, student evaluations, etc. - figure out what to do with identical course entries/documentation.
  • Intellectual Contributions: are you going to use the FAD to keep track of the status of your publications; e.g, from 'in progress' thru 'published'?
  • Contracts, Fellowships, Grants, Sponsored Research: no importing of data; all manual entry

WHAT DECISIONS DO DEPARTMENTS, COLLEGES & CO-AUTHORS NEED TO MAKE

The big question: do you want to make the FAD part of the College Annual Review and Promotion process? Be sure to work thru your governance structure. You will need to request that a College-level template be created. This will take time and needs to be completed during a Spring semester in order for it to be used for the following academic year.

Co-authoring among ISU co-authors: decide which author will input the entry; suggestion: primary author. All authors will see entry in their own FADs; only entry author can edit.

Optional fields: the standard FAD entry screen has a number of fields that could be made mandatory or optional at either the Department or College level. Decide what fields should be which level and have guidelines where necessary on what to enter, and when.

WHAT IS FILE UPLOAD LIMIT?

50MB limit for Store File fields

ANNUAL COMMITTEE START/END DATES: : For consistency, suggest start month is August; End month is May but Colleges/Departments can establish their own consistent guide. At least make sure everyone on committee posts same months. Faculty Senate: Start month is August; End Month is July.

OCTOBER 1, 2014:

  • Added to Faculty Development Activities: Webinar
  • Added to Intellectual Contributions: Blog post

SEPTEMBER 16, 2014:

  • Added to Vita Template: Artistic & Performance category, after Teaching/before Research
  • Added to Faculty Development Activities: Attach Files option
  • Added to Personal & Contact Information: Teaching Philosophy File Attachment [specific]; Attach Files option

SEPTEMBER 5, 2014:

  • 2014-2015 Yearly Data imported.

SEPTEMBER 3, 2014   

Summer 2014 Teaching Schedules and Academic Advising data have been imported. Login and REVIEW your summer course data. UPLOAD your syllabi and student evaluations; ANNOTATE course information.

JULY-AUGUST

  • Training sessions for Administrative Assistants

JUNE 9, 2014

  • Added to Awards & Honors: Link to Sycamore Scholars

May 28, 2014

Spring 2014 Teaching Schedules and Academic Advising data were imported. Please login and REVIEW your spring data. UPLOAD your syllabi and student evaluations; ANNOTATE course information. This is official data loaded from Banner. If there is an academic advising discrepancy, contact your department chair. Also, remember that faculty are responsible for information from 2012 forward, so UPDATE the other semesters you will find in your FAD.

APRIL - SEPT

Access to FAD by Academic Department Administrative Assistants established so they can create reports, manage data, etc.

MARCH 3, 2014

As of March 3, 2014 the Faculty Activity Database (FAD) is available to all faculty via MyISU. The primary goal is to have a continuous, up-to-date database of faculty activities that colleges, departments, and the university can use to generate reports on an as-needed basis. Faculty are encouraged to enter activities, such as scholarship and service activities or awards, as they occur throughout the semester, rather than a one-time load or update at the end of each academic year.

For annual reporting purposes, the Provost has requested that faculty input scholarship and service activities starting from the 2013/14 academic year onward. Additionally, while scheduled teaching will be automatically loaded, you will also have the opportunity to upload associated teaching documents and other related teaching activities.

Specific colleges or departments may have a need or requirement for their faculty to enter activities prior to this date. In Fall 2015, faculty biennial reviews will be conducted via data entered into the FAD.

ACCESS THE FACULTY ACTIVITY DATABASE

First-time users: Login to the Portal, click on “MyISU Apps” and select the Faculty Activity Database badge (shown on right). This will automatically log you into the software.

Non-Faculty: Only faculty will be able to see the badge in MyISU Portal. All administrative accounts (non-faculty): access the FAD via the direct url login. If you need administrative access (primarily academic department administrative assistants or others as designated by department chair or Dean), have your administrator contact the ePortfolio Faculty Fellow, Marsha Miller, at marsha.miller@indstate.edu with your [in this order: Last Name, First Name, ISU Email, Address, Department name, College name, Portal ID & 991 Number].

WORKSHOPS: Many workshops were offered in 2014 after the FAD went live. At this time [Fall 2015 forward], there are no plans to schedule workshops. 

Arrangements for college-specific workshops or individual briefings can be made by contacting your College Associate Dean FAD-point person. In addition, Marsha Miller, FAD Fellow thru June, 2015, can be consulted by individuals or departments via marsha.miller@indstate.edu.

UPDATING YOUR FAD INFORMATION - A YEAR-ROUND COMMITMENT

It is crucial for faculty and deans to keep activities in FAD so that up-to-date reports can be generated throughout the semester on an as-needed basis. Academic Affairs will send emails throughout the year, suggesting activities to enter into FAD. The emails will be strategically scheduled for when common activities take place or when data is loaded into the system. Associate Deans will also be emailed reminding them of any upcoming reports that will need to be generated via FAD.

Take a look at the schedule below to help prioritize your data entry.

Suggested FAD Categories to Update or Check (pdf)