Faculty Load Guidelines

Background and Context:

Faculty overload guidelines are designed to create a reasonable balance between teaching, service, and scholarship, maximize workload equity, and promote healthy and high-quality teaching and learning environments for students.  Faculty underload guidelines ensure that the needs of the college are met through responsible use of our resources, while maximizing work load equity.

Currently, inconsistent practices exist among academic units and individual faculty.  Overload should be an exception rather than a rule, and yet there are cases where faculty regularly teach significant overloads.  In addition, faculty workloads have not always been coordinated, which poses a particular problem when individuals are teaching across academic units.

Guidelines:

• The standard teaching load for full-time faculty is 24 credits per year, plus 6 credits allotted for scholarship/service for a total of a 30-credit load for the academic year.
• A full- or part-time faculty member may carry the equivalent of one 3-4 credit overload each semester.  Overloads that exceed this general practice require the approval of the Dean of the School in consultation with the VPAA.
• Overload is typically pad out at the rate of $750 per credit.
• For full-time faculty, overloads will be paid one time/year in the spring semester, rather than during each semester/session/term.  This practice mitigates underload situations. 
• For part-time faculty, overloads will be paid each semester.
• Load planning will happen by each academic unit on an annual cycle; it is the responsibility of the dean of the school to ensure this is occurring, with support from the Academic Dean’s Office.
• Teaching load data (overload and underload) will be regularly examined by the Academic Dean’s Office and communicated to the Deans’ Council and chairs/directors.
• If cancelling a low-enrolled course results in a full-time faculty member falling below the standard 12-credit load for a semester, please refer to the Faculty Workload Guidelines for Course Enrollment.
• Over/underload situations are the exception rather than the rule.  Chronic over/under load patterns will be examined and underlying issues addressed.

Exceptions:

• Exceptions to the guidelines will be considered in cases of critical departmental, program, or school needs.
• Exceptions will be considered only where the faculty member has a demonstrated record of successful teaching at Edgewood.
• Scheduling of accelerated and summer terms/sessions results in compacted contact hours with a particularly demanding workload for faculty.  Thus, session/term duration are relevant considerations for overload decisions.
• Exceptions are endorsed by the appropriate dean and approved by the VPAA.  In cases where faculty teach across schools, both deans must agree to endorse an exception.