Committee Membership

  • For each annual ACP 10-12 exercise, Faculty Boards will review and nominate the membership of their FC and seek approval from the relevant Council of the School. The FC Chair will be nominated from among those members. 
  • Each School has a SC, the membership of which will be approved by the relevant Council of the School and will include the Head of School. The Council of each School will also nominate a Chair from an institution independent of that School and a member external to the University, who will be a distinguished academic, for appointment by the GB.  
  • The membership of both the FCs and SCs should comprise:
    • a minimum of five members and normally not more than nine members, who will be chosen to cover the range of disciplines covered by the committee; and 
    • a professorial member of staff in an appropriate subject area who is independent of the institutions covered by that committee.
  • An additional member from the University of Cambridge Professional and Continuing Education (PACE) may be invited to join the Faculty or School Committee, where deemed relevant by a school.
  • The FC may also decide that, in the interest of fairness, additional senior academic(s) with appropriate specialised knowledge are invited as consultant(s) to attend the meeting of the committee for the consideration of multidisciplinary applications. 
  • Committees are required to include at least one representative with specific expertise in teaching focused academic practice.
  • Committee members must be (Teaching/Research) Professors at Grade 12 or of professorial standing*. 
  • Members of the FC and SC will normally serve for a three-year term and no member may serve for more than two consecutive terms of three years (i.e. members may serve on a committee for a maximum of six years). An exception can be made when a Head of School’s tenure exceeds six years.  In such cases, the Head of School can continue to serve on the School Committee for the duration of their Headship.
  • The full membership of the committees will be published in the Reporter in the Michaelmas Term.
  • VCC membership comprises: The Vice-Chancellor (Chair), the Chair and external member of each SC and the Pro-Vice-Chancellor with responsibility for staff.  Other attendees at the meeting include the Director of Human Resources (Secretary) and the Academic Secretary (Secretary of the GB).
  • The membership of each committee should have as fair a representation across gender and ethnicity as reasonably possible. The Secretary of each School Committee should check with each external member how they wish their gender and ethnicity to be described. The representation across committees will be monitored. 
  • University members of committees are expected to undertake relevant training in equality and diversity matters as specified by the Human Resources Division on behalf of the General Board, namely the Equality and Diversity Essentials and the Understanding Unconscious/Implicit Bias online training modules. 
  • University members of committees are expected to undertake training on Freedom of Speech, including reading the Freedom of Speech guidance, resources and training information on the Governance and Compliance Division website, reviewing the “Introducing free speech” factsheet, and watching the video and reviewing the guidance on the Office for Students website.
  • All committee members are responsible for ensuring that the assessment of applications is conducted fairly and transparently and complies with the scheme’s Key Principles. Any member can challenge the process at any time if they consider that this is not the case by raising this with Chair of the relevant committee.
  • Meetings should be arranged so that, if possible, all members can attend. The quorum for all committees is two-thirds of the membership, subject to a minimum of four members. Decisions should be made with the concurrence of the majority of members attending the meeting.
  • Meetings may be held in person or virtually.
  • Depending on the number of applications, committees may wish to consider scheduling their meetings to allow for a day’s break to be taken between the discussion of applications made under the different pathways.
  • All members should be aware that:
    • a systematic approach in forming a view of an application is desirable;
    • the process of evaluation is a collective activity with all decisions made collectively;
    • if a member is unable to be present at the meeting, they may provide a written statement of their assessment of the applications. However, as written views cannot be challenged by other members, they should be accorded less weight than those openly discussed in the meeting; and
    • if all members agree immediately on the same overall assessment, this can be accepted without discussion. Differences in individual members’ evaluations should be discussed and a consensus reached.
  • Members who are on sabbatical leave must seek permission to attend meetings held during their period of leave through the Lead HR Business Partner.
  • There should be no overlap in the membership of the committees in any annual exercise, with the exception of an individual being a member of more than one FC.  While someone could sit on multiple FCs, it is not permissible to sit on a FC and a SC in the same exercise. Similarly, it is not permissible for someone to be a member of more than one SC in the same exercise. Therefore, it is recommended that the SC membership is determined before that of the FC. 

 

*Exceptionally, permission may be given in certain circumstances for non-professorial members to be appointed.  If this is considered necessary, advice should be sought from the relevant HR Business Partnering Team.