Term contracts at Seattle Pacific University are issued to faculty members on either of two bases:

1. They are given to part-time per-course (adjunct) faculty members, and are limited to the term of employment outlined in the contract. Term contracts are not tenure track and do not confer upon a faculty member any entitlement to continued employment after the expiration of the term specified in the contract.
2. They may be used with full-time and pro-rata faculty as follows:
   1. Summer session contracts,
   2. Replacements for faculty on leave or, in some cases, sabbaticals,
   3. Short-term curricular needs,
   4. Persons contracted under provisions of externally funded grants.

With approval of the Vice President for Academic Affairs, after consultation with the dean, term contracts may be counted toward tenure should that person be appointed to a tenure-track position.

Faculty contracted under provisions of externally funded grants shall be notified of employment status for the following contract term within 15 business days of the university's receiving grant award notification, or no later than March 1 (for faculty in their first year of full-time employment), or December 15 (for faculty in their second or subsequent consecutive year of full-time employment), whichever is later. Such term contracts will include notation that the employment is subject to grant support, the source of external funding, and the anticipated grant renewal date(s) (Section 1.8.3).

Non-tenured full-time faculty receive notice contracts.

Renewal of appointment shall include review of data deemed appropriate by the school dean and the Vice President for Academic Affairs. Notification of non-reappointment shall be made by the University no later than March 1 of the first year of employment, and thereafter no later than December 15 of the terminal year. The Faculty Status Committee will be informed of discontinuation decisions for non-tenure faculty who are on tenuretrack.

Instructors (Section 1.4.1) may be continued indefinitely without tenure (Section 1.7). Otherwise, instructors shall have all the rights and responsibilities of other ranked faculty. Persons with such appointments may, under appropriate circumstances, progress to assistant professor rank and beyond. When an instructor is appointed to assistant professor rank, the position shall become tenure-track unless otherwise specified in the original position announcement. The fourth consecutive contract/letter of appointment to a full-time instructor shall be preceded by a conference of the faculty member and the dean in which individual and institutional expectations regarding short-term or long-term service are clarified. There are no guarantees of long-term service beyond the contract term. A report of this conference and a forecast of institutional expectations shall be filed in the individual's personnel file in the dean's office, and the instructor shall receive a copy of the report.

Faculty positions above the rank of instructor shall be tenure-track unless otherwise specified in the original position announcement.

Continuous contract rights at Seattle Pacific University are granted to ranked faculty members who have attained tenured status as provided for in Section 7 of this Handbook. Faculty members employed under continuous contract/letter of appointment are entitled to annual renewal and shall be subject to the terms and conditions of employment that exist at the time of each annual renewal by Seattle Pacific University unless separated pursuant to the provisions of Section 8 of this Handbook.

All faculty appointments to notice or continuous contracts have as the locus of their appointment the school and discipline stated in their annual contract/letter of appointment. In the rare instance when an individual is appointed in multiple disciplines, the Vice President for Academic Affairs and the respective dean(s) will assign the faculty member to one school and discipline as the individual's locus of appointment for purposes of evaluation, promotion and tenure decisions. Evaluations of individuals in such appointments shall be structured to include information from all disciplines involved.

All contracts (non-tenured faculty) or letters of appointment (tenured faculty) for full-time and pro-rata part-time faculty for any academic year shall be issued no later than April 1. Contracts shall be returned no later than April 15, or the first working day thereafter. If the contract offer is not accepted on or before the specified date, or special arrangement made with the Academic Affairs’ office, the offer will automatically expire.

Term contracts are issued on an individual basis as necessity arises.