Announcement of Strategic Faculty Hiring Initiative

January 29, 2019


Dear Colleagues,

Since I joined UTSA last June, I am reminded every day of what truly talented and dedicated faculty we have in every discipline across the university. UTSA's faculty are central in our ability to reach the destinations laid out in President Taylor Eighmy’s Vision for UTSA: to be a model for student success; to be a great public research university; and to be an exemplar for strategic growth and innovative excellence.

To support and accelerate our progress toward those destinations, I am excited today to announce the Strategic Faculty Hiring Initiative for 2020. This initiative is composed of five complementary programs:

Clustered and Connected Hiring Program (CCP)

This program is designed to better align our capabilities with federal, foundation and industry research opportunities, and to enable collaboration among faculty to address society’s grand challenges. Although UTSA has initiated several cluster hires in recent years, to recruit researchers in targeted areas, the new Clustered and Connected Hiring Program (CCP) calls for engagement of our current UTSA faculty to propose concepts for the concurrent hiring of multiple positions across colleges to form transdisciplinary teams of leading or promising scholars to augment existing expertise. Full details on this call for proposals, which are due March 8, 2019, can be found on the Strategic Hiring Initiative website.

Advancing Academic Excellence through Accelerating Faculty Diversity Hiring Program (FDP)

Innovation, critical thinking, and problem-solving are greatly enhanced in a diverse and inclusive academic community that supports the participation and success of all its varied members. To advance institutional excellence and student success, the FDP is designed to promote a diverse and inclusive faculty by supporting flexible recruiting and hiring procedures to hire additional faculty who are under-utilized in the academy and reflect the diversity of our student body and communities. A complement to ongoing efforts to increase the diversity of UTSA faculty hired through traditional search processes,  this program will utilize the more flexible Special Opportunity Hiring mechanism to enable additional hiring of diverse tenured/tenure-track faculty who will advance academic excellence.

Dual Career Academic Partners Hiring Program (DCP)

To aid in faculty recruitment and retention at UTSA, the Dual Career Academic Partners Hiring Program (DCP) creates a more transparent framework to assist highly qualified partners of tenure-stream faculty in identifying and pursuing employment opportunities both at UTSA and in the San Antonio academic community. The DCP is intended to simplify partner hiring for our deans and departments chairs and make UTSA an attractive destination for dual-career academic couples.

Advancing Academic Excellence through Accelerated Hiring of Nationally Recognized Faculty Program (NRP)

Similar to the FDP, the Advancing Academic Excellence through Accelerated Hiring of Nationally Recognized Faculty Program (NRP) will complement traditional search processes by utilizing the Special Opportunity Hiring mechanism to enable additional hiring of highly accomplished faculty that address specific needs. Prospective candidates will be evaluated on their ability to enhance national/international pre-eminence in a priority area, to increase sponsored, foundation and/or industry funding to meet institutional goals, and to promote disciplinary collaboration across departments and colleges to advance academic excellence at UTSA.

Voluntary Separation Incentive Program (VSIP)

UTSA is fortunate to have many tenured faculty with long-standing service to the university. The Voluntary Separation Incentive Program (VSIP) is intended to support eligible tenured faculty who may be interested in making a career or life change by removing common barriers that can prevent taking the next step in life and pursuing new opportunities in career transition. Faculty who are eligible to participate in the current program are being notified this week and will have the opportunity to attend information sessions to learn more about the program.

Combined, these programs within the Strategic Faculty Hiring Initiative for 2020 will serve to further elevate UTSA’s intellectual community of scholars. I invite you to learn more about the entire initiative, and specifically to consider submitting a proposal for the Clustered and Connected Hiring Program.


With warm regards,

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Kimberly Andrews Espy, Ph.D.
Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs 
Peter T. Flawn Distinguished Professor