Office of the Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs

As Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs, Robert Granfield is the senior executive officer responsible to the Provost for all matters pertaining to UB’s faculty. He and his staff help facilitate a culture of faculty excellence at the university in the areas of research, teaching, and service.  The primary duties of the Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs include coordinating the university’s promotion and tenure process; welcoming and orienting new faculty to UB; assisting deans, department chairs, and faculty with issues associated with hiring and retention; building programs to orient new department chairs and improve their management skills; facilitating the nomination process for national, internal, and SUNY awards; and partnering with the Vice Provost for Equity and Inclusion to develop proactive strategies for enhancing faculty diversity.

Thursday, April 15, 2021 - 8:30 - 9:30 a.m. (via Zoom)

Please register in advance for this meeting   

Vice Provost Bob Granfield would like to invite you and other first year faculty to join him and his staff for an informal opportunity to connect with other colleagues across departments and units: Share information, experiences and successes, pick up ideas, build community and engage in a safe environment where all subject matters are welcome. While there is no formal agenda, following introductions the vice provost will also bring a different topic each time we meet to kick off the conversation for a while. For April 15th, Neil Mcgillicuddy from the Employee Assistance Program has agreed to join us in the conversation, and we would like to hear your perspective on the following topic:

• Stressors in the unique environment of the pandemic - Ways to cope and avoid burnout.

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

Thursday May 6, 2021:  Understanding your Climate: Facilitating a High Functioning Department 

This session will review the departmental climate data and explore opportunities and challenges to enhancing department performance.  Additionally, participants will review UB data pertaining to faculty mentoring and explore methods to get the most out of faculty mentoring practices.

·       Best practices in faculty mentoring

·       Implementing and assessing faculty mentoring

·       Engaging the faculty in mentoring

·       Explore aspects of highly functioning department

A multidisciplinary team of UB researchers has received a nearly $184,000 grant from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism to develop a reliable measure of recovery capital, a potentially powerful instrument that could drastically change how clinicians and other health and human service providers treat people recovering from alcohol addiction.

Recovery capital is a broad-based, person-centered approach for treating addiction to alcohol and other drugs (AOD) that considers each person’s social, human, physical and cultural resources.

UB faculty member Peter F. Biehl has been selected as a fellow of the American Council on Education (ACE), an initiative that identifies and prepares faculty, staff and administrators for senior positions in college and university leadership.

Biehl, a professor of anthropology who just completed a term as associate dean for international education and enrollment in the College of Arts and Sciences, is among the fellows selected for 2020-21. The fellowship program combines retreats, interactive learning opportunities, visits to campuses and other higher education-related organizations, and a placement at another higher education institution to condense years of on-the-job experience and skills development into a single year.

Message from President Tripathi and Provost Weber