Creative professional activity

Creative Professional Activity

What Documentation - Where and When

Resources

The University Policy (Staff Policy Number 3.01.05, paragraph 11a) recognizes creative professional activity (CPA) as scholarly activities to be considered in promotion decisions (Hollenberg Report).
The successful candidate for promotion will be expected to have established a wide reputation in his or her field of interest, to be deeply engaged in scholarly work, and to show himself or herself to be an effective teacher.

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Hollenberg Report - Definition of Creative Professional Activity

Promotion to associate professor and professor on the basis of Creative Professional Activity recognizes that clinicians and other academics may carry on a number of time and energy consuming duties essential to the role of the University in relation to health professionals and the community. These activities contribute to the candidate’s function as a role model to other members of the profession and the public and as a recognized expert for students.

Creative Professional Activity (CPA) can be recognized under ONE of the following broad categories.

Promotion on the basis of CPA requires:

• a body of work described thematically
• level of impact achieved (national and/or international) described and
• objective evidence for the above using precise, refined documentation

Performance in ONE of the above three broad categories is required. 

You MUST resist describing your CPA under all three categories as it is rarely the common case for most promotion applicants; in doing so, you run the risk of producing a “fragmented” overview of your scholarship that is difficult to assess.

You should remember that in addition to Achievement/Impact in CPA, there must be effective teaching. 

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Further Delineation:

The Department of Medicine CPA Working Group was formed to help develop a better framework  in support of the overall object of describing and documenting CPA for the purpose of enhancing the assessment and evaluation process for promotion.

Creative Professional Activity Report:  Introduction

The purpose of the 2 page (maximum) introduction is to give the reader a clear and concise view of your accomplishments, the impact on some aspect of medicine, and the evidence of this impact. We suggest using a template called, “Getting Started – A Template for Doing the Analysis of Your CPA and its Impact” before you write this introduction.
The introduction should include:

1. A clear and concise description of what you have accomplished since your last promotion (if there is more than one accomplishment that has had a major impact, please describe each one separately). It may be necessary for you to provide a bit of background so a reader who is not in your field of investigation understands the context in which your accomplishments can best be understood. When you describe your accomplishments, please consider whether it is professional innovation, exemplary professional practice that others have copied, or a contribution to the development of professional practice (Hollenberg report definition of creative professional activity). Please do NOT describe an accomplishment under more than one of these categories.
2. Describe clearly your role in this development.
3. What was the impact?  Patient, provider and system level; local, national, international; others have used my patient program, patients have gotten better, health care system saved money, health policy was changed, etc.
4. A brief reflection on how this accomplishment was either professional innovation, exemplary professional practice, or a contribution of the development of professional practice (as per Hollenberg Report).
5. What is the proof?   Presentations, peer-reviewed publications, website, workshops, uptake of your program, new collaborations, etc.
6. For promotion to Associate Professor,  a national reputation is required. For promotion to Full Professor,  an international reputation is required.

CPA Introduction - (Example Text)

Example Text for the CPA Introduction (First section of Creative Professional Activity Report)

Introduction:

This dossier has been developed to support my promotion on the basis of CPA and/or teach/research…. with emphasis on (Example:  professional innovation, or exemplary professional practice, or contributions to the development of professional practice).

I completed my training in…. and was appointed Asst/Assoc professor of medicine in (date).  I am a clinician-teacher/clinician investigator in ……During the early years of my appointment, my interests were in ….. and my goal was to ………
This goal developed out of my awareness of a gap in clinical care/teaching/research that I identified.  Describe the problem and current practice.  Indicate your objectives and what plan you put in place to achieve them. (example below)

Chronic medical conditions consume a large portion of health care resources. Chronic disease management is difficult because of lack of an integration of services and providers.  This results in disorganized and inefficient care, high cost and suboptimal patient outcomes.  My goal was to establish a virtual integrated CDM system linking primary care, hospital care, and specialty care using the following steps:

Getting Started – A Template for Doing the Analysis of Your CPA and its Impact

WHAT WAS YOUR OVERARCHING GOAL IN YOUR PROFESSIONAL LIFE SINCE YOUR LAST PROMOTION?

CPA DOSSIER: APPENDICES

REFERENCE THE DOCUMENTATION IN THE SAME ORDER AS YOUR CPA INTRODUCTION.

CPA DOSSIER  = 1" TO 2" BINDER - ONE VOLUME (MAX)

Suggested potential evidence for impact of your work: 

• List of scholarly peer reviewed publications – 1st page of journal article ONLY
• List of Non-peer reviewed and lay publications - 1st page of article ONLY
• List of Books, chapters, website urls, videos – front screen print, front cover/table of contents ISBN number
• Monographs - front cover/table of contents
• List of invitations to scholarly meetings, workshops - Letters of invitation
• Documentation (1st page/front cover as a rule) of invited speaking engagements organized into National and International categories
• List of lay meetings or talks with media and lay publications - Letters of invitation (1st page/front cover as a rule) of invited speaking engagements
• List of guideline consensus conference proceedings – front page/table of contents
• List of presentations to regulatory bodies, government etc. – front page/table of contents
• List of roles in professional organizations (there must be documentation of the creative contributions to the professional organization provided in the CPA Introduction)
• List of memberships on editorial boards
• List of awards of recognition - Award Announcement

Centre for Faculty Development Workshops on CPA

Workshops through the Centre for Faculty Development are available to guide you in preparing your CPA documentation for your promotion.