Proposed Release Time Changes Will Become Policy

By Catherine Collins

The adjustments to release time for professors recently drafted by Dr. Katherine Conway-Turner, provost and vice-president for academic affairs, will go into effect at the beginning of fall 2012.

The changes involve either a decrease in release time for certain departments or the exchange of release time for the opportunity for a stipend.

Release time refers to the reduction in teaching load that is given to a professor holding a leadership position, such as chair of a department or director of a graduate program.

The stated goal by the provost of the new changes is to make the release time system more fair and equitable, since some departments, being larger and more complex than others, require more time for professors to fulfill a leadership position.

In an Oct. 24 document that lays out the new policy for next year, it is stated that “In some cases, the amount of time required or the complexity of the leadership role goes beyond what is deemed normal ‘in load’ service. In these cases, the provost will compensate the leadership role by providing a stipend or release from a portion of the faculty member’s normal teaching load.”

Under the new policy, departments that used to receive two course releases per year, such as the foreign language, math and political science departments, will now receive one.

This means that the professors serving as chair of those departments will be teaching one more course each year than they have in the past.

Larger departments that previously received more than two course releases for their chairs, such as the English, biology and education departments, will now receive two per year.

Professors that hold positions such as director of a program within a department (for example, the director of the communication arts program, which falls under the English department) that used to receive one course release per year, will now be eligible for a stipend between $1,000 and $2,000.

Additionally, the stipend given to shared positions like co-chairs or co-directors will now be divided between the two professors holding the positions.

Compensation for summer work will also change under the provost’s adjustments.

The provost’s report states that the “complexity” of the work will control how much compensation is given. It reads, “Significant work must be accomplished during the summer months resulting in the completion of specific department/program/College goals” and “Significant recruitment or orientation activities are eligible for consideration for a stipend.”

All the work that professors do during the summer months is voluntary. An example of summer work is the reading of placement tests by professors in a department.

Last summer, four English professors read approximately 250 placement tests for incoming freshmen, and each professor was paid $250.

The details of these changes’ potential consequences on academics and faculty salaries were explained in a previous article entitled “Provost Drafts Adjustments to Release Time,” available in the Oct. 27 print edition, or on our Facebook page, The Blue and Grey.