6 - 02.101

Operational procedures and regulations regarding job communication

  1. Purpose. It is the policy of the university to fill its employment vacancies by selecting from the available labor market those persons best qualified to perform the job related requirements of the employing unit and the university.
  2. Definitions. The following definitions and guidelines will be followed in pursuing these policy objectives:
    1. A "position" is a job that has been approved by the appropriate university administrator.
    2. An "open position" is a vacancy. It is created by:
      1. The transfer, promotion, advancement or loss of an employee, or
      2. The approval by the appropriate administrator for the addition of a position.
    3. A "job opportunity" is a vacancy authorized for filling by:
      1. Promoting or advancing an employee from a lower job title, transfer, by reassignment of duties, or
      2. By a direct hire.
  3. Selection procedure for contract personnel.
    1. Applicants for employment vacancies shall be considered not in the abstract but according to their qualifications to perform the work. Criteria for selecting the best qualified candidate should be related to the expected duties and responsibilities for the position.
    2. All selection specifics, including criteria used, position description, interview procedure, methods used for rating candidates, and method used for final selection are subject to final review by the office of affirmative action. The following steps will be included in the review:
      1. The office of affirmative action shall be notified of intent to fill a position opening and furnished with the following information and documents:
        1. Proposed job announcement for internal publications.
        2. List of additional publications in which advertisement will appear, including media directed to potential minority, female and candidates with disabilities, and a copy of the proposed advertisement.
        3. List of other planned recruitment contacts.
        4. Position description to be used by the search committee or others involved in the selection and hiring process.
        5. List of any criteria or qualifications not included in the position description but which will be used in the judging of individual candidates.
        6. Names of members of the search committee, including identification of minority, female and disabled members, and identification of any additional interview committees.
      2. Persons involved in the selection process shall be advised of their responsibility to implement the university's policy of nondiscrimination and affirmative action and of the employing unit's goals and timetables for the hiring of minorities and women. Such advisement should include a meeting of the search committee with the director of the office of affirmative action or designee.
      3. At the end of the initial recruitment period, the office of affirmative action will be notified as to whether the pool of candidates includes reasonable representation of qualified available minorities and females, in accordance with availability data in the field. If not, nominations from individuals and groups most knowledgeable about the process should be sought, as well as the assistance of the office of affirmative action.
      4. Traditional recruitment and selection methods must be supplemented by the following actions:
        1. Advertising in media directed to potential minority, women and persons with disabilities.
        2. Direct phone or mail contact with departments or other sources of minority, women and disabled persons.
        3. Consideration of current faculty, staff, or graduate students at the university, particularly minority, female, or qualified disabled persons, to fill vacancies.
        4. Assurances that all advertisements announcing employment vacancies carry the statement "Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer," and that no advertisements indicate sex preference either by exclusive use of the male pronoun of by any other use of language.
        5. Assurance that search/interview committees include minority, women, and, when possible, disabled members.
        6. Distribution to all candidates of the "Group Identity Data" form requesting voluntary disclosure of race/ethnic data and sex, which is to be returned to the office of affirmative action to be maintained as part of the applicant flow data.
        7. Instruction of search committees and others involved in the selection process that it is desirable to give preference in hiring to minorities and women when applicants appear equally qualified.
  4. Procedure. In order to appropriately verify that all affirmative action plan guidelines are followed, the following procedure is to be used for the recommendation of appointment for all contract personnel:
    1. Each department wishing to announce a job opportunity in an internal publication must present to the office of affirmative action a request for reinstatement of position form or some other authorization notice signed by the major budget officer of the division.
    2. Upon completion of the search committee/interview procedures, the department head will forward a completed recommendation form and material related to appointment recommendations, and the affirmative action recruitment profile, to the appropriate administrative officer. Academic department appointments will be forwarded to the deans and school directors. Nonacademic departments will forward the forms to the appropriate unit director.
    3. Appointment forms and materials related to appointment recommendations should be carefully reviewed by the appropriate administrator, with the assistance of the divisional affirmative action facilitator, prior to approving them.
    4. These forms and related materials, including the completed recruitment profile, should then be forwarded to the director of the office of affirmative action for approval prior to submission to the appropriate vice president for referral to the president.
  5. Temporary positions.
    1. If a temporary position had been filled after duly required advertising, a reappointment to that temporary position need not be readvertised. Where the initial appointment stipulated temporary for the academic year without the further stipulation of one year only, the person could be reappointed under the same terms and conditions of employment outlined in the advertisement for x number of years in the future. A clarifying statement of possibility of reappointment should be included among the original appointment documents.
    2. Where the advertisement for a temporary position stipulates one year only, that position necessarily must be readvertised should the department wish to fill the position again, or should it wish to transfer the person filling the position from temporary employee status to regular employee status. The sole exception to readvertisement occurs under the special terms providing for internal advancement. (See rule 3342-6-02.102 of the Administrative Code and this register).
  6. Pool concept for part-time and full-time temporary positions. All academic units of the university, Kent campus and regional campuses that use part-time or full-time temporary personnel must use the "pool concept" for selecting and hiring such personnel.
    1. Each academic unit will announce job opportunities for temporary personnel in internal publications and other appropriate publications prior to the beginning of the fall semester each year. All equal opportunity and affirmative action procedures must be followed.
    2. Requests for pool applicants may be advertised at other times during the year if there is a need. Names may be added at any time to the pool during the year.
    3. It must be recognized that certain courses cannot be filled on the basis of "pool concept." For example, highly specialized upper division or graduate courses which are suddenly vacated by the death or sudden illness of a faculty member cannot ordinarily be filled from a specialized generalized pool which is intended mainly for the lower division general pool. For this reason, the academic dean may request a modification in the procedure for such specialized cases. Approval or disapproval will be given by the office of the vice president for human resources.
    4. Applicants who are selected by the academic unit will become part of the general pool for that year. Obviously, there will be different pools for different types of positions. For example, the department of biological sciences might need one pool of persons to teach overflow sections of general biology, and another pool of persons qualified to teach overflow sections of local flora.
    5. Each academic unit must clearly define the qualifications and other criteria for admission to the pool, for continuance in the pool, and for rank ordering within the pool.
    6. Appointees will be selected from the pool of accepted candidates in a rotation scheme which is clearly defined prior to an internal announcement. The rotation scheme used may be either of two types:
      1. Semester rotation, with the most qualified applicant being selected each term.
      2. Yearly rotation in which the entire group of pool members will be eligible for selection in order during the year according to need.
    7. The departmental chairperson must obtain approval from the dean and the vice president for human resources or designee for the rotation scheme that will be used.
    8. The pool should reflect a proper distribution of women and minorities, and should include when possible, persons with disabilities. It is necessary to be able to demonstrate that the pattern of employment is unrelated to the sex or marital status of appointees.
  7. Tentative-position advertising.
    1. Vacancies which are sent to the office of affirmative action without request for reinstatement of position forms will be returned to the appropriate unit for proper authorization. Tentative or possible positions will be presented to the appropriate office for the vice president's official verification of authorization prior to their being announced internally.
    2. When the tentative or possible position is deemed an approved position, the appropriate copy should be sent to the office of affirmative action for filing with the other material of record.
  8. Deadline. The deadline for submission of copy-ready material to be included in the latest job opportunity publication will be three p.m. on the Wednesday preceding the Friday printing date. All material submitted after three p.m. on the Wednesday preceding the printing date shall be included in the next following appropriate publication.
  9. Classified civil service job communication. The deadline for submitting all personnel job listings to the office of affirmative action for publication is the same as that for contract personnel. In addition, nonacademic personnel must refrain from posting any position if the posting date and publication date do not coincide or closely approximate one another.
  10. Summary. It is the policy of the university that all job opportunities be filled within a reasonable period of time with the qualified personnel in accordance with the university's policy on equal employment opportunity. All job vacancies in the university's system shall be communicated internally as well as to the widest relevant recruitment area.
  11. Job Opportunities. Job opportunities in the classified civil service shall be filled in so far as practicable by promotions according to civil service laws and applicable employee union agreements. Therefore, when the university determines a vacancy exists and it is not filled by transfer or lateral shift, a notice of the vacancy, including job details, shall be advertised and posted according to the job opportunity communication policy.
  12. Notice. Contract job opportunities shall be circulated throughout the relevant recruitment area and internally through the job opportunities communication system. All job opportunities shall be posted within the organizational unit in which they occur.
  13. All job opportunity descriptions not exempt from this rule will be disseminated in accordance with the following procedures:
    1. Classified maintenance and service group vacancies covered under university union agreements will be listed for one printing after the five calendar days posting required by the agreement when the vacancy is not filled by paragraph (1)(B)(2)(a) of this rule. Applicants shall have five working days from the date of publication to apply for the position before the vacancy may be filled by the department from among all qualified applicants.
    2. For all other civil service positions, job opportunities shall be posted for five working days in conspicuous places accessible to employees. If it is not determined that the position will be filled by the transfer, promotion or referral from a bona fide eligibility list, the job opportunity will be listed for at least one printing of an internal publication after the five-day posting period. Applicants shall have ten working days from the date of publication to apply for the job opportunity before it may be filled by the department from among all qualified applicants.
    3. All contract job opportunities shall be announced in an internal publication when accompanied by the required authorization from the major budget officer. If it is not determined that the position will be filled by paragraph (1)(B)(2)(a) of this rule, the job opportunity shall be listed for at least one printing. Applicants shall have a minimum of ten working days from the date of the publication to apply for the job opportunity before it may be filled by the department from among all qualified applicants according to interview/search committee practices.
    4. Job opportunity advertisements shall include the job title, qualifications, responsibilities, application deadline, and person to contact, unless there are extenuating circumstances which have been discussed with and received approval from the office of affirmative action prior to advertisement.
  14. All solicitations or advertisements for employees by, or on behalf of, the university will state that the university is "An Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer."
  15. Employee referral source should include sources that can be expected to contact minority, persons with disabilities, women, veterans with disabilities and Vietnam war era veteran candidates.
  16. Individual short notices and temporary vacancies not to exceed one hundred twenty calendar days in duration, shall be exempt from publication requirements. However, departments that anticipate making such appointments shall follow the "pool concept" policy for communications of such job opportunities. Deviation from use of the pool requires approval from the major budget officer and the endorsement of the office of affirmative action.
  17. This communication rule applies to all positions in the university system except those student employment opportunities coordinated by student financial aid.
  18. Positions established through grants shall be exempt from this communication policy if the names of individuals to fill the proposed positions have been submitted as part of the grant proposal. All other grant positions which become job opportunities shall be subject to this communication rule.
Policy Effective Date:
Mar 01, 2015
Policy Prior Effective Dates: 
11/4/1977, 10/26/1979, 5/7/1982, 5/8/1984, 5/18/1984, 11/22/1985, 4/21/2003, 12/20/2004, 6/1/2007