The Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering Department Personnel Committee has evaluated the materials that you submitted for promotion to the rank of professor. I regret to inform you that the Committee has decided not to recommend you for promotion at this time. Promotion to professor requires a higher standard of teaching performance than that showed by the record.

The Committee considers your teaching effectiveness to be good. While the numeric scores of your teaching evaluations are, for the most part, below the departmental average, your extensive activity in directing graduate student research and theses tends to make up for the aforementioned deficiencies. The Committee notes that the student evaluations, including verbatim comments, are an intrinsic part of the review. The number of negative remarks entered on the record are recurrent enough to send a clear signal: You need to reexamine your approach to teaching, paying close attention to the students' comments. Our first and foremost responsibility is to the students; therefore, you must improve your evaluation scores in order to merit promotion to the rank of full professor.

The Committee considers your professional growth to be very good to excellent. You have secured a major grant from the California Energy Commission, which should further underpin your research program. You have published four (4) journal papers in the past three (3) years, a exemplary output by most measures. Your work with a host of graduate students is highly commendable. The Committee encourages you to continue to develop your research program along the paths that you have already established.

The Committee considers your service to be very good to excellent. Your chairmanship of the search committee in the current faculty search is amply recognized. Your work as graduate advisor, including the time spent in advising graduate students, is a great service to the department. The Committee encourages you to continue serving the department in various capacities.

You have the right to submit a response or rebuttal in writing to this letter of recommendation. If you choose to submit a written response, it must be delivered to the departmental office by October XX, 2015 using the response/rebuttal form available from the Faculty Affairs website (http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~facaff/newrtp.html)

Sincerely yours,

Victor M. Ponce

Chair, Personnel Committee
Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering Department

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