An Analysis of the Proposed Changes to the IEEE Fellow Elevation Process (Invited Paper)

Abstract

The grade of Fellow is conferred by the IEEE Board of Directors upon an IEEE member with an extraordinary record of accomplishments in any of the IEEE fields of interest. The Fellow grade recognizes extraordinary individual technical or educational accomplishments, in line with the IEEE Certificate of Incorporation that states that the purposes and objects of the Corporation are “to engage exclusively in scientific and educational activities.” An effort to review the Fellow elevation process was started by the IEEE Board of Directors back in 2020, culminating today in a proposal that drastically changes many aspects of the elevation process. Several concerning issues with this proposal were identified by multiple stakeholders, such as the 2021 Fellow Strategic Planning Subcommittee (FSPS) and several Societies and Technical Councils who expressed their strong objections to the proposal. This article provides an in-depth analysis of the proposal and concludes that the proposed changes derive from a misunderstanding of the current Fellow processes and are based on a misidentification of the root causes of the perceived shortcomings in the current practice. Furthermore, the proposed changes lack an evidence-based rationale for justifying making such drastic changes while the available evidence points to their ineffectiveness at addressing the stated goals. The objective of this article is to help IEEE members and decision makers better understand what is at stake and make informed decisions on a difficult and complex topic.