All GPHI employees are provided access to this document to guide them as they plan their career paths in GPHI.
Version 1.1, effective October 31, 2025
1. Introduction
The Goddard Planetary Heliophysics Institute (GPHI) was established as part of a multi-institutional Cooperative Agreement funded by NASA to partner with Goddard Space Flight Center’s Heliophysics Division. GPHI fulfills this responsibility by providing a competitive environment to hire and retain high-quality scientists who are on track to be leaders at NASA, in academia, and/or in industry. Also, in GPHI, early-career researchers and students can build outstanding resumes, preparing them to become the heliophysics science leaders of tomorrow.
While a Cooperative Agreement is often a multi-institutional consortium, GPHI strives to maintain uniformity in all our operations as seamlessly as possible across our member institutions. Thus, the roles, ranks, and promotion process described in this document are designed to ensure fairness across the institutions, while maintaining the highest standards and the important role GPHI plays in the NASA heliophysics enterprise.
2. Roles and Ranks
The following roles and ranks exist within GPHI:
- Assistant Research Scientist/Engineer – This role reflects a rank parallel to Assistant Professor. Incumbents have a doctorate degree and are qualified to direct the work of others, such as postdocs, graduate students, or technicians. While timing will vary, advancement to this rank within GPHI corresponds to a body of accomplishments equivalent to at least two years of productive growth as a scholar beyond that expected for the completion of a PhD.
- Associate Research Scientist/Engineer – This role reflects a rank parallel to Associate Professor. Incumbents have extensive successful scholarly experience, and the ability to propose, develop, and manage small research projects or key parts of large projects. While timing will vary, advancement to this rank within GPHI corresponds to a body of accomplishments equivalent to at least six years of productive growth as a scholar beyond that expected for the completion of a PhD.
- Senior Research Scientist/Engineer – This role reflects a rank parallel to Full Professor. In addition to the qualifications required for Associate Research Scientist/Engineer, incumbents have demonstrated a degree of proficiency sufficient to establish an excellent reputation among regional and national colleagues. They will have demonstrated the ability to contribute to scientific/engineering work through the ability to lead or significantly contribute to the proposal of large projects or many significant complimentary smaller ones. While timing will vary, advancement to this rank within GPHI corresponds to a body of accomplishments equivalent to at least ten years of productive growth as a scholar beyond that expected for the completion of a PhD.
- Research Professor (Assistant/Associate/Full) – To replace the title of Scientist/Engineer with Professor in any of the above roles, the incumbent would have to be affiliated with and teaching in an academic department of their employing University, which may recommend the conferment of the title of Research Assistant Professor, Research Associate Professor, or Research (Full) Professor, as the case may be.
- Visiting Roles – These roles are analogous to the faculty roles above but have shorter-term “visiting” status. Incumbents will sometimes (not always) have primary affiliations with other institutions.
- Postdoctoral Research Associate – This role is intended for early career researchers who have completed a doctorate and who are growing in their independence in preparation for roles such as Assistant Research Scientist/Engineer, Assistant Professor, or similar roles in any sector (academia, government, industry, non-profit).
- Research Associate (I/II/III) – This role is reserved for research faculty who do not currently hold a terminal degree (e.g., PhD) in their field. Incumbents are in potentially permanent roles conducting supervised/unsupervised research and often hold a master’s degree. Depending on their job responsibility and years of experience, incumbents can be promoted through Research Associate I, II, and III.
- Graduate Research Assistant: Postbaccalaureate Research Assistant – Incumbents are in roles meant to last one or two years and are conducting closely mentored research in anticipation of graduate school or some other position which will benefit from this experience as a trainee.
- GPHI Director – This position reports to the UMBC Vice President of the Department of Research & Creative Achievement, serves as the supervisor of the GPHI faculty (analogous to a department chair), serves as the UMBC lead (PI) of the PHaSER Cooperative Agreement, and coordinates with the ESRA Director regarding their management of the business activities of GPHI.
- ESRA – GPHI is supported by UMBC’s Earth & Space Research Administration (ESRA) unit, which manages business activities for GPHI and UMBC’s other NASA-oriented centers. Roles within ESRA include the following: Director (who reports to the UMBC V.P. of the Dept. of Research & Creative Achievement), Assistant Director; Executive Administrative Assistant, HR & Finance Business Managers, Analyst, Business Services Specialist, and Administrative Assistant. Unlike the roles described above, these are all staff roles following UMBC classification and promotion criteria, and not governed by the faculty handbook or this GPHI promotion document.
3. Promotions
3.1 Promotion to Assistant/Associate/Senior Research Scientist/Engineer
3.1.1 General Guidelines
A. All members of the GPHI faculty are encouraged to discuss their professional development in general, including promotion plans, with the GPHI Director at least on an annual basis. In support of these ongoing conversations, as with faculty members at the partner institutions, the GPHI faculty are required to update their records on a yearly basis in the Faculty Annual Report system (i.e., Faculty Success). This annual reporting will be proactively coordinated by a designated GPHI officer and by ESRA.
B. It will usually take four to six years at a given rank before enough accomplishments have been demonstrated to constitute a promotion (except for Postdoctoral Associates, who require a minimum of two years for eligibility to be promoted to Assistant Research Scientist/Engineer if applicable). Accordingly, GPHI faculty may request consideration for a promotion no sooner than three years after their last rank promotion or date of hire (unless they were hired after having served in an equivalent rank). Promotion prospects can be discussed informally with the GPHI Director at any time.
C. Upon the recommendation of the GPHI Director, the final decision to promote an incumbent is made by their employing University’s Provost or President, who draws on input from their respective Vice Presidents for Research or equivalent, the recommendations of the GPHI Promotions Committee, and the source materials (CV, personal statement, letters of support) upon which the Committee based their decision.
D. A GPHI Promotions Committee will be formed as needed to review promotion requests. The Committee members will be recruited by the GPHI Director. The director selects a Promotion Chair and a minimum of 4 additional faculty members to serve on the committee. Committee members are selected first from GPHI and then from UMBC Departments and/or partner consortium institutions. All committee members must be at or above the rank the candidate is seeking to attain.
3.1.2 Process
1) The applicant for a promotion provides a detailed CV and a draft personal statement to the GPHI Director for initial review.
A. The detailed CV should include:
i. Full educational and professional background.
ii. An exhaustive list of research outputs, including all publications, external presentations, patents, and other scholarly products.
iii. An exhaustive list of projects, hardware, software, and datasets that the candidate developed or played significant roles in their development.
iv. An exhaustive list of administrative roles (e.g., roles supported by NASA tasks; this does not include “professional service,” as described below).
v. An exhaustive list of formal roles in research funding (e.g., as PI, Co-PI, Co-I, or Senior Personnel).
vi. An exhaustive list of supervisory, mentoring, teaching, and outreach activities (e.g., supervising projects at Goddard, serving on PhD committees, etc.).
vii. An exhaustive list of professional service roles that do not fall under the above categories (e.g., serving in a leadership role in a professional society, as a journal editor, organizing a conference).
viii. Any honors (e.g., fellow of a professional society).
ix. Any additional professional accomplishments or products that would provide the committee a more complete picture of the applicant’s readiness for promotion (e.g., non-research activities like writing news releases, outreach activities, etc.).
B. The personal statement is generally 3 – 5 pages long and in narrative form. It should highlight relevant accomplishments since the last promotion or hiring (whichever is the more recent), describing the current state of the applicant’s research portfolio, and the future directions planned. If a significant volume of programmatic duties has limited the applicant’s bandwidth for direct involvement in research, this point should be made explicitly, and these programmatic duties should be described in a commensurate level of detail.
2) The GPHI Director reviews the CV and draft personal statement to ensure compliance with the above specifications and provides feedback as appropriate to the applicant.
3) The applicant provides the GPHI Director with the final detailed CV, personal statement, and contact information for at least 5 references who may or may not be asked to review the dossier. Preferably, all the provided references should be external, from academic institutions and not close collaborators of the applicant. For engineering roles, industry and NASA references are allowable.
4) The GPHI Director provides the applicant’s materials to the Chair of the promotion committee (hereafter referred to as the Committee). The Committee may identify additional external reviewers to constitute a final list of reviewers for the promotion dossier, making sure to have a balance between the names provided by the candidate and those independently identified by the Committee. The total number of reviewers depends on the rank: Assistant (0 – 2), Associate (2 – 4), and Senior (4 – 6). The Committee Chair shares the list with the candidate prior to the reviewers being contacted. The candidate acknowledges in writing that (s)he has seen the list of potential external reviewers compiled by the Committee. The candidate may object to any potential reviewer, but the committee is not required to disqualify a potential reviewer based solely on the candidate’s feedback.
5) The Committee Chair solicits evaluation letters by sending the candidate’s CV and personal statement with a cover letter providing a brief overview of GPHI to the potential reviewers.
6) Upon receipt of a fair number of reviews for the rank under consideration (e.g., 2 or more for Associate, and 4 or more for Senior), the Committee Chair shares them with the committee members and schedules a meeting (virtual or in person) to discuss the overall promotion package, vote, and generate a written report. A secret ballot is taken unless all committee members agree not to vote secretly, typically due to the necessity of meeting via videoconferencing. However, the Committee should strive to meet face-to-face. All committee members must sign a roster at the promotion committee meeting. The roster and the ballots become part of the official promotion request package.
7) The Committee Chair submits the written report summarizing the discussion and vote tally to the GPHI Director. Quotes from the external letters may be used but the names of the reviewers are not included in the report.
8) The GPHI Director provides additional commentary to the Committee’s recommendations either concurring or disagreeing and transmits the full package to the candidate’s employing institution’s Vice President for Research (VPR) or equivalent to complete the promotion process in accordance with institutional promotion guidelines. The entire promotion package is forwarded to the VPR including A) CV; B) Personal Statement; C) Letter to external reviewers; (D) Minimum of 5 external review letters; E) Promotion committee roster; F) Ballots; G) Promotion Committee report from the Promotion Chair; and, H) Director’s recommendation. If recommending promotion, include an effective date and new salary.
9) The VPR or equivalent writes a memo concurring/disagreeing with the Director’s recommendation and forwards the entire promotion package to the Provost’s/President’s Office for a final determination.
10) If a promotion is recommended by the Committee, the Director, and the VPR, and approved by the Provost/President, the home institution issues a new appointment letter with the appropriate title and the new salary.
11) The candidate signs the new appointment letter and celebrates, and the promotion is acknowledged at the next GPHI All-Hands meeting.
12) Should promotion not be recommended at any point, the GPHI Director has the duty of notifying the candidate and explaining the areas where the candidate should focus to significantly improve their probability of success when applying for promotion the next time.
3.1.3 Timeline
Requests for promotion may be submitted at any time. The promotion process (from the GPHI Director receiving the final CV and personal statement to the employing University administration issuing the promotion letter) is expected to take between 4 and 6 months, depending on a variety of factors.
3.2 Promotions in other Categories
- Research Associate I/II/III – Promotions in this category will be handled internally by the GPHI Director with input from other individuals as needed to ensure fairness and equity. To be considered for promotion under this category, the candidate submits a detailed CV and personal statement to the GPHI Director.
- Visiting Roles – No promotions are anticipated under this category, as these are typically short-term positions.
- Graduate Research Assistant: Postbaccalaureate Research Assistant – No promotions are anticipated under this category.