Attachment D

Feedback from Open Forum (February 24, 2006)

 

Workload Policy as it was presented at Open Forum

Determination of full-time equivalency will be based on a minimum of 12 contact hours and a maximum of 15 contact hours per semester.  Generally, a full-time load will include no more than 4 different course preparations in a single semester and generally no more than 6 different course preparations in an academic year.  A contact hour is defined as an hour of classroom or lab instruction.  A full-time equivalency can be 15 classroom/lab contact hours.  If the contact hour load exceeds the maximum of 15 hours, an overload will be paid.  Criteria that should be considered in setting the 15 contact hour workload equivalency are the following:  service commitments, advising, professional development, graduate instruction, laboratory preparation, distance learning, thesis supervision, class size, writing content, supervision of individual student work (e.g., student teachers, teaching assistants, undergraduate research, independent study, etc.).  Department bylaws may need to be changed to reflect the above workload policy.  Individual workload determinations will involve a recommendation from the chair (in collaboration with the IAS member) approved by the college dean and the provost. 

 

Questions raised during the Open Forum

 

  1. How do you count existing years of service?
    1. Do years of service already count in the future?
    2. If you were once tenure track and switched, do you start over?
    3. What is “other appropriate experience”?

 

  1. What benefits are attached to title change?
    1. Money?
    2. Contract length/type?

 

  1. Per credit, per course $ vs FTE appointment
    1. Example:  in CLS, English Dept hires IAS for ENG 110 at a per course rate.  $1100 per unit so their semester salary is $13,200.
    2. Would cost a lot of money if they were all brought up.

 

  1. What about reduction of hours?
    1. What counts and for how much?
    2. If I were set at 15 and reduced by 3 for extra stuff (advising etc) down to 12, and then asked to teach another 3 hours, would I then be paid overload?
    3. If the basis is 15, what happens at 12? 

 

  1. What about the density of credit hours?  Class size?

 

  1. How many faculty are actually at 12?

 

  1. Do “contact” heavy sciences win out in the credit hour vs contact hour concept?

 

  1. What assurances do we have that the “other pieces” come into place?  (contract language,$$$ etc)

 

  1. How do we determine health benefits?  What is a 50% appt?

 

  1. Wording needs to reflect the DEPT describing limits.

 

  1. Quality of instruction/reputation we enjoy here will suffer if we go to 15.

 

Written Comments from Open Forum

 

·        Suggest that you add the following language to the work load section:

            “The operative unit in determining workload equivalencies shall be departments and programs. “

 

·        Why did UW-L choose to eliminate all rolling-horizon contracts?  (Especially when other campuses didn’t)

 

·        Good idea to have 2 titling series.  I like the career progression ideas.  A question:  Is there going to be put into place a salary “step” program?  IAS do not make enough money to be performing additional tasks on top of teaching.  How can we ask them to do more without additional pay?

 

·        Good idea to have 2 series of titles

 

·        Above all, thank you for all of your hard work this year.  It has really meant a lot to me.  I’ve been following your work very closely (Dr. Socha is my chair).   Thank you for resisting pressure from administration to automatically crank all workloads up to 15 credits.  Suggested next areas to work on:  salary and length of contract, steps to move through progression.  Thank you for being aware of the need for an appeals process.