UO Elements

Background

An initial process of consultation with deans, department heads, and other campus partners in the late 2010s led to the creation of a full, formal Request for Proposals process. Hundreds of listening hours from across campus informed the development of the RFP documentation including feature prioritization and system requirements. There was a budgetary pause on the project approved by the Office of the Provost and UO's University Senate.

After COVID, an advisory committee of 70+ faculty, staff, and academic administrators revisited the RFP documentation and made updates based on UO needs. This advisory group aimed to find a vendor who could offer a system that was built around reducing staff and faculty time, creating accessible and equitable processes for reviews, compliance with laws and policies, flexibility to incorporate CBA changes, streamlined digital dossiers, and customizability to attend to unit/school and college/research and academic specifications. A core evaluation committee was created to vet the vendor submissions and host Zoom demos open to the public using outlined Purchasing and Contract Services processes. 

Data Science’s Symplectic Elements was selected in late 2023, with a contract being created and approved in Spring 2024. The Office of the Provost has worked for 16+ months to develop the structure and content of Elements with an Academic Advisory Group consisting of deans, associate deans of faculty, research leaders, and academic support staff. This group continues to meet and provide feedback during implementation. Similarly, OtP has partnered with Information Services, OVPRI, HR, Institutional Research, and Libraries to develop and manage data feeds in Elements. This work is ongoing and requires coordinated collaboration during implementation. OtP and Information Services provide continuous management support.

Implementation

Beginning 2025-2026, the Office of the Provost will be using a software platform, Elements, to manage faculty reviews. This system will track faculty achievement and activity (in the usual scholarship, teaching, and service categories) and will manage the various review and promotion workflows as outlined in the faculty CBA and unit policies. Faculty performing reviews are asked to use the system to look at dossiers and complete their assigned work in Elements. There is a continued implementation effort to transcribe faculty CV content over the course of AY25-26 in order to lighten the manual entry burden on faculty. By January 2026, faculty will be notified by OtP to review and revise their profile and activity content. 

Service Equity

In response to the University Senate's resolution on service equity (see US21/22-23), OtP will structure and support the use of Elements to track, review, and assign faculty service assignments. OtP is coordinating with the Senate as well as the Academic Advisory Group in AY25-26 to achieve this goal.

Oregon Rising

In alignment with Oregon Rising, OtP aims to streamline commons processes and practices used by faculty, staff, and administrators for faculty personnel actions (e.g., major reviews). The use of a digital system also promotes the recruitment and retention of excellent faculty and support staff.

The Office of the Provost is providing management and support of the Elements system. Information Services is providing technical support to faculty, staff, and administrators.