University Catalog 2023-2024

1.3 Graduate Faculty

Faculty participation in graduate education is a critical element of university life. The engagement with students as advisors and mentors plays a critical role in developing future researchers and instilling in them the qualities required for degree completion. Membership in the graduate faculty is a privilege.

A. Graduate Faculty

  • All full-time tenured and tenure-earning faculty will be granted Graduate Faculty status based on a majority vote of a department’s graduate faculty at the time of hire. Emeritus faculty and those on phased retirement retain their Graduate Faculty status.
  • Full-time faculty in non-tenure positions (e.g., clinical, extension, practicum, research, teaching, professor of practice, and federal contractual employees, such as USDA, DOI, U.S. Forest Service) may be granted Graduate Faculty status upon a majority vote of the graduate faculty in the department/program in which they are employed.
  • Graduate faculty at another university who are in a joint department/program with one at NC State are considered graduate faculty at NC State.
  • If a chair of an advisory committee leaves NC State for another position, s/he may continue as chair for one more year. After that period, s/he can only co-chair with another member of the Graduate Faculty.

B. Affiliate Graduate Faculty

  • All non-tenure-line faculty who are on temporary appointments or are not paid by the university and who are expected to serve on master’s or doctoral advisory committees and/or teach graduate courses will be granted Affiliate Graduate Faculty status by departmental vote (see Section E). Such faculty include those who are adjunct, visiting, and interinstitutional (Duke and UNC-Chapel Hill). Faculty at other universities or others seeking Affiliate Graduate Faculty status require a majority vote of approval by the graduate faculty in the department/program they are to be affiliated with.

C. External Members and Technical Consultants

  • Affiliate Graduate Faculty status is not required for the participation of external members of committees and technical consultants (see 3.2 Advisory Committees for definitions and credentials of these roles).

D. Responsibilities of Graduate Faculty

The responsibilities associated with membership in the Graduate Faculty include:

  • teaching courses at the graduate level (i.e., courses at the 500-900 levels)
  • participating as a chair, co-chair, or member of master’s and doctoral advisory committees
  • serving as Graduate School Representative when requested by the Graduate School

The roles associated with membership in the Graduate Affiliate Faculty include:

  • teaching courses at the graduate level (i.e., courses at the 500-900 levels)
  • participating as a member of advisory committees and co-chairing committees where the co-chair is a full member of the Graduate Faculty

E. Application for Graduate Faculty and Affiliate Graduate Faculty Status

  • Because new tenured or tenure-track faculty become members of the graduate faculty at the time of hire, there is no separate application process for membership in the Graduate Faculty. To ensure that Graduate Faculty status is granted, the Graduate Faculty Nomination form must be submitted to the Graduate School for processing.
  • Before members of the Graduate Faculty can serve in another department/program, however, their membership generally should be voted on by the Graduate Faculty in that department/program. It may be approved by the given program’s DGP in consultation with the program’s faculty.
  • For non-tenure-line faculty seeking Affiliate Graduate Faculty status, the department head or DGP forwards the Graduate Nomination Form along with a current CV to the Graduate School. As part of that process, members of the Graduate Faculty of the appropriate department/program vote and those results must be included on the Affiliate Graduate Faculty Nomination Form.

F. Requirements to Teach Graduate Courses at NC State

The Request to Teach Graduate Courses form should be completed and submitted to the Graduate School for instructors who are not members of the Graduate Faculty. For instructors who do not have a terminal degree in the discipline in which they will be teaching, a thorough justification outlining their alternative credentials is required for approval by the Graduate School.

G. Removal of Graduate Faculty/Affiliate Graduate Faculty Members

  • Members of the Graduate Faculty of a specific department or program may initiate removal of a current Graduate Faculty member based on the failure to carry out the responsibilities (see Section D) or for other good cause. The department must vote on this recommendation and consult with the college dean, and if it is decided that a faculty member should be removed from the Graduate Faculty, the head or DGP (in the case of non-departmental programs) makes this recommendation in the form of a memo to the Dean of the Graduate School. The memo should include the vote of the members of the department’s/program’s Graduate Faculty. The dean of the Graduate School is then authorized to remove the person from the Graduate Faculty.
  • If the member has Graduate Faculty status in more than one department/program, the status would be maintained unless all relevant entities voted to remove the member.