UNM faculty information and opportunities guide
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For information on UNM resources for faculty, visit our Faculty Resources Guide.
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To support your students, visit our Faculty Guide to Student Resources.
- If you are a new faculty member, visit our new faculty page.
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To stay informed about research opportunities, be sure you’re subscribed to the PI listserve.
Current semester information
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Dr. Pamela Cheek, UNM’s associate provost for student success, has compiled sample syllabus language for faculty on important topics for this semester. See her suggestions.
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Wondering what role Artificial Intelligence will play at UNM in the classroom, in research and beyond? Check out this new resource to keep up to date on the university’s efforts in this area.
Policies for UNM faculty
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Faculty at UNM have flexibility in how they choose to discuss COVID-19 impacts on their progress in annual reviews. This memo remains in effect and applies to this year’s annual review process. Some of the options include discussing the impact of COVID-19 in research, teaching, and service statements, adding an overall impact statement as a supplementary document, or using a checklist. See an example here, which includes referencing lists of potential impacts; or not discussing it.
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The UNM administration and UA-UNM faculty union have been addressing the impact of COVID-19 on faculty through a variety of policy and process changes. Read our summary of important changes here. You can also read the Provost’s Promotion’s Tenure Guidelines.
One important change is that there is a new template for letters going to external referees. This template is the result of a discussion with main campus chairs last fall, recommendations from studies of the pandemic impact, and from our evaluation of UNM’s parental leave policy. The template does the following:
— Reminds referees about the pandemic (this will be more important in the coming years)
— States that referees should consider that the candidate is coming up at the right time for our institution and not pay attention to time since degree or time in rank (this addresses issues related to any sort of tenure extension and variations in time for promotion)
— Does not ask that candidates be compared to other scholars of similar experience (particularly important in the light of differential pandemic impacts)
The Provost has stated that faculty have flexibility in addressing (or not) the impact of COVID-19 in annual and milestone reviews. Some of the options include discussing the impact of COVID-19 in research, teaching, and service statements; adding an overall impact statement as a supplementary document; using a checklist (see an example); referencing lists of potential impacts; or not discussing it. -
A 2020 policy at UNM allows an extension of the tenure clock to acknowledge the significant impact of COVID on research and scholarship. See this document for the policy and frequently asked questions.
OPPORTUNITIES FOR FACULTY
Find a variety of faculty development opportunities on our events calendar.
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The 2024–25 Fostering Research Expansion in Social Sciences and Humanities (FRESSH) Program establishes one cohort with two tracks: one focused on the Social Sciences and one focused on the Arts and Humanities.
In-person sessions will take place approximately monthly on Friday mornings throughout the academic year and will last 90 minutes. At least one additional virtual enrichment session will take place monthly on a different Friday. The cohort will develop research concepts and proposals suitable for funding opportunities from federal agencies or major foundations.
The FRESSH program will focus on awareness and utilization of internal resources, targeted training for opportunity scoping, concept and proposal development, and building community around Social Sciences, Humanities, and Arts research. There will be a kickoff event in early Fall 2024 for selected participants. Learn more.
Join an information session on Zoom May 3: https://unm.zoom.us/j/91381980941
Find more details in the InfoReady Review Portal.
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The Subcommittee on Learning Studios is requesting submission of proposals to teach in a Technology Enhanced Learning Studios (TELS) for Fall of 2024.
The TELS are classrooms with additional technologies to facilitate collaborative learning. These studios are equipped with multiple projection screens, white boards, one or more overhead projectors, and round tables that seat nine. The best consideration date for proposals is Friday, March 15th with proposal submissions being discontinued after March 29. (The committee is aware that this is a quick deadline and will be understanding if there are incomplete portions to the proposal.) All interested instructors, especially first-time users, are encouraged to apply.
Learn more on the Center for Teaching and Learning website.
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Applications for the SEP: Student Experience Project are due March 31.
Learn how to help your students develop a sense of belonging in your classes (and at UNM!) through high-impact, low-effort techniques that have been shown to work here. Join colleagues from across campus in the next SEP cohort.
Email StudentExperienceUNM@unm.edu for more information on the Zoom information sessions on March 27 and 28, and the application link.
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The Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) program has moved to the Office of Research Integrity and Compliance (ORIC) at UNM. This is partly in response to new NSF regulatory guidance, and partly to enable better tracking of compliance with training requirements for federal sponsors.The first UNM RCR Symposium will be held Oct. 19 in the Physics & Astronomy Interdisciplinary Science (PAIS) building. The RCR Symposium brings together faculty, staff, and students from various disciplines to learn and discuss topics related to the responsible and ethical conduct of research. This training meets RCR certification requirements for all federal entities (NIH, NSF, USDA, etc.)
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Faculty can now apply for funding for software they would like to incorporate into their research. A software licensing pilot program, called Scholarly Advancement Via Enterprise Research Software (SAVERS), supports the acquisition of shared enterprise software licenses to enable discovery, creativity, and innovation across campus. Specifically, the program’s goal is to be responsive to the needs of UNM researchers by acquiring software licenses for use by researchers across multiple departments, colleges, or other academic units.Learn more about the program and read the call. The deadline to submit a proposal is Aug. 30, 2023.
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Faculty can now apply for Fall 2023 Provost Professional Conference Support funds. The goal of the program is to provide support after all other sources of conference travel funding have been exhausted. There will be three rounds of funding review, with deadlines for submission of Aug. 4, Sept. 18, and Oct. 16, 2023.
Learn more about the program.
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UNM data show that during the pandemic, many faculty members spent less time on research and scholarship and related professional development as they revised their teaching and dealt with new and different demands in their home lives. As we transition out of the pandemic, the WeR1 Faculty Success Program seeks to support UNM faculty in new and creative ways.
The overarching goals of the WeR1 program are to:
— Modify institutional policies and processes to support faculty retention and advancement, increase transparency, decrease administrative burden, and work towards balanced service and teaching loads;
— Create structures that acknowledge and address the impact of the pandemic, which may last well into the next decade;
— Provide resources that allow faculty to transition, rebuild, recover, and/or refocus their research, scholarship, and creative work, through support that encompasses both small steps and expansive interdisciplinary initiatives;
— Develop new mechanisms for recognizing faculty success in all areas of the university’s mission;
— Build communication, collaboration, cooperation, and community across all UNM campuses.
Explore currently available opportunities below and visit the UNM Research page to see others.
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ECURE is an NSF-funded grant designed to leverage UNM’s research mission to enrich undergraduate education in STEM general education and portal courses. It is led and supported by Academic Affairs, the Office of the Vice President for Research, the Division of Equity and Inclusion, and the Office of Student Affairs. ECURE is based on the following key concepts:
— Engaging students in undergraduate research (UGR) experiences will positively impact their science literacy, science identity, and research self-efficacy, as well as their likelihood to persist and graduate at UNM.
— Engaging students in UGR in general education and portal courses will allow us to serve more students than co-curricular programming alone, and will help students connect course content to professional, community and research applications.
— Engagement in undergraduate research can be offered at varying levels of research immersion. These levels range from students learning about research without actually conducting research to students implementing all stages of their own authentic research projects (see descriptions of the levels below). All levels of early research immersion are useful to achieving desired student outcomes described above, and to creating more effective and diverse pathways to more advanced co-curricular research engagements within their majors.
To this end, ECURE supports instructors in incorporating undergraduate research components into their general education and portal sections, and studies the impact of these enriched engagements on student perceptions and behaviors.
Learn more.
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The Office of the Vice President for Research (OVPR) is pleased to announce that the application window for the 2025 Spring Faculty Scholarship Time (FaST) competition is now open in InfoReady Review. Learn more or read the RFP.
The FaST program provides faculty with a reduced teaching load during the Spring 2025 semester to focus on the research, scholarship, and creative work interrupted by the pandemic. This program provides funding for faculty to receive either a one-semester, one-course reduction in their teaching load or support for a graduate project assistant (PA) to assist with course-related duties (grading, office hours, preparation of course materials, etc.). Main campus, tenured and tenure-track faculty in all disciplines are eligible to apply.
Important Dates for Spring 2025 FaST:
- Beginning April 19, 2024: Application opens (UNM InfoReady)
- May 20, 2024: Proposals due
- June 2024: Award decisions and notifications
Learn more about this and other initiatives under the WeR1 Program for Faculty Research Success.
Contact frdo@unm.edu with any questions.
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Faculty interested in developing curriculum with Open Educational Resources are invited to submit proposals to receive stipends and other support.
The UNM Libraries is piloting a program that would start in Spring 2024. Faculty need to submit grant applications by Oct. 1, 2023.
The program aims to foster the development of alternatives to high-cost textbooks through the adoption, adaptation, or creation of OERs. Learn more here.
Support resources for faculty
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CARS offers a wide variety of services to assist faculty, staff, their significant others at UNM including counseling on a wide range of issues such as anxiety, depression, relationship difficulties, stress, job burnout, coworker conflict, eldercare, parenting, alcohol and drug use, grief and loss, managaing change and preparing for retirement. CARS provides other services, such as workshops and training, supervisor and manager workplace consultations, critical incident debriefing and grief intervention and referrals for services within the UNM Community and in the larger communities the client resides in, according to their website.
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Find mental health resources for faculty, staff and students at UNM.
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Ombuds Services is a “no-barrier, first-stop for UNM employees, their co-workers, and graduate students seeking guidance, information, and insight from a trusted, skilled neutral in a setting that is confidential, independent, and informal.”
RESOURCES ON COVID AND OTHER PUBLIC HEALTH TOPICS
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The New Mexico Department of Health has a new website for scheduling vaccines.
For information and research on vaccines, the CDC is maintaining its COVID vaccine page.
In July 2023, federal regulators approved a shot that protects against RSV for infants. Read this opinion piece on why an RSV vaccine is so important for older adults too.
In September, the CDC recommended an updated COVID shot for nearly all Americans. Read more.
In October, the Your Local Epidemiologist blog published this chart on where things stand with fall vaccines.
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The CDC offers information on COVID symptoms, isolation recommendations, treatment options and more.
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There is a lot to consider in terms of how the end of public health emergency will impact your access to COVID vaccines, testing and treatment. Read this roundup from the Washington Post.
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The New Mexico Department of Health is maintaining its COVID cases tracker. It also keeps track of flu activity.
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You’ve probably noticed that headlines related to COVID-19 today are more likely to focus on long COVID than the crisis created by the global pandemic of the past few years.
That’s because long COVID is significantly affecting millions of people as well as our economy and workplaces. And we all have a lot to keep learning about it in terms of who gets it, what the symptoms are and how we can support colleagues with the disease. See our mini course on long COVID to get started.
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This frequently updated website contains information on COVID, long COVID and respiratory viruses from epidemiologist Katelyn Jetelina. Some free articles, and some by subscription only.
IMPACT OF THE PANDEMIC ON SCHOLARSHIP AT UNM
The pandemic has dramatically changed how all of us work. Faculty who are juggling teaching, research and more face new challenges, including those that stem from time lost during the height of the pandemic. We know from our Pandemic Impact Report that many of these issues including feelings of burnout and barriers to scholarship still linger and will require ongoing attention. Read our report and see the coverage of it in the Chronicle of Higher Education.
UNM RESEARCH ON COVID and PANDEMICS
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UNM Professor of Medicine Michelle Harkins, MD, testified in January 2024 before the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee. The hearing was on “Addressing Long COVID: Advancing Research and Improving Patient Care.“
The hearing provided a crucial platform for experts like Harkins to contribute insights into the challenges posed by long COVID and discuss potential avenues for advancing research and enhancing patient care, according to the UNM Newsroom.
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A research project involving three collaborative research centers at UNM Health Sciences aims to learn the systematic, social, and cultural factors that have led to the inequities in the response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The team for the project, known as Wide Engagement for Accessing COVID-19 Vaccine Equity (WEAVE NM), includes UNM’s Transdisciplinary Research, Equity and Engagement Center (TREE Center), Center for Participatory Research (CPR), and the Center for Native American Health (CNAH). It is funded by the National Institute of Health’s Community Engagement Alliance (NIH CEAL).
According to the project, “data shows huge disparities, like Latinx and Native communities composing over 60% of COVID-19 related deaths, while the white population only formed 1% of deaths in New Mexico. A similar pattern is reflected in the COVID-19 infection and hospitalization rates of our state. With no immediate end in sight to the COVID-19 pandemic, it is vital to identify systematic, social, and cultural norms that are leading to COVID-19 vaccine inequities and clinical trial participation in our BIPOC communities. Working together with those directly affected will be key to the goal of addressing these life-threatening issues and developing a more equitable health structure in New Mexico.” The project includes community-based participatory research, a community survey and narratives from community members. See the stories and learn more on the project’s website.
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Researchers at UNM, Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico State University, University of Kansas, Gorgas Memorial Institute in Panama, and the Center for Research on Health in Latin America are developing a new model for predicting pandemics as part of a $1 million NSF planning grant. Read more in the UNM Newsroom or see the project’s website.
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Monica Rosas Lemus, an assistant professor in the Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology is looking at the molecular makeup of COVID-19 in the hopes of finding targets for vaccines. Read more in the UNM Health Sciences Newsroom.
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UNM researchers were part of team that published a new study in JAMA detailing the failure of two investigational drugs to treat lung injury resulting from the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Read the story.
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See our story from 2020 about Women in STEM at UNM who were working to combat COVID during early parts of the pandemic.
NATIONAL RESEARCH ON FACULTY AND COVID
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This 2022 news report explores how educators are affected by long COVID.
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This 2021 research from the University College Utrecht looks at some ways to continue supporting faculty.
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This 2021 report by Northwestern University considered immediate and predictable long-term disruptions in faculty productivity.
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This 2020 report by the Chronicle of Higher Ed looks at the impact of the pandemic on faculty, looks at how faculty are responding to the early challenges for faculty well being.
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This 2022 data infographic contains stats from a student survey of how faculty are responding to the pandemic.
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This 2021 survey at the University of Michigan looked at career trajectory, postponement of tenure review, commitment to academia, and ways to mitigate impacts.
OTHER COVID RESEARCH
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This review of literature looks at key findings including the overlap between COVID and other conditions, the variable onset of symptoms, long COVID in children, and the impact of vaccinations.
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This YouTube video series explores a wide variety of COVID research.
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This news article looks at how researchers are starting to look more closely at how the disease affects the brain and nervous system.
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This in-depth reporting series by Axios News looks at several aspects of long COVID.
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This news story looks at how employers are rethinking workforce accommodations amid the presence of long COVID.
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The authors of this piece urge that more needs to be done for students with long COVID.