Teaching assignments and Workload, including workload equivalencies and related procedures

The Ashtabula Campus Dean and Chief Administrative Officer, in collaboration with the Assistant Dean and in consultation with faculty, is responsible for assigning Ashtabula Campus faculty to courses and determining a faculty’s workload each term. Workloads are communicated to faculty in accordance with guidelines and deadlines established by the faculty CBAs. These workload assignments are made upon consideration of enrollment projections, faculty eligibility to teach, and other University needs.

The faculty member's academic unit has the responsibility to approve faculty to teach particular courses. Requests for additional course approvals should be processed through the Ashtabula Campus Academic Affairs Department.

While faculty are full members of their respective Kent Campus academic units, their tenure and teaching assignments are in the Regional Campus System, which is budgeted separately from the Kent Campus. In accordance with the CBAs, the University has the right to reassign an individual to a different campus from his or her initial appointment. Such decisions are made by the Vice President for System Integration and are governed by considerations of seniority as well as the procedures outlined in the Faculty Collective Bargaining Agreements.

At the direction of the Dean, the Assistant Dean (Ashtabula Campus Academic Affairs Office) collaborates with faculty on the development the Ashtabula Campus Schedule of Classes. The Assistant Dean assigns faculty to course sections, creates faculty workload letters, and manages the overall campus Schedule of Classes which includes but is not limited to class size, modality, class section meeting days and times. Last-minute assignment changes might be unavoidable as a result of higher or lower student demand, faculty illness, and other such exigencies.

Regional Campus faculty have a standard teaching load as follows, although other duties (administrative appointments, program coordination, special assignments, etc.), may and should provide load equivalencies as determined by the Dean.

Tenure, Tenure Track Faculty:

The teaching load for a regular full-time tenured or tenure-track faculty member is 24 hours (or equivalent) per academic year.

Full-Time Non-Tenure-Track Faculty

The teaching load for a FTNTT faculty member is 30 hours (or equivalent) per academic year.

Workloads and Workload equivalencies for Ashtabula Campus faculty are the same regardless of rank or bargaining unit membership.

At the discretion of the Campus Dean, a faculty member who makes special contributions to the Campus in areas other than classroom teaching may receive special assignment hours, equivalent to teaching hours to carry out those contributions. (This provision does not refer to the normal, expected faculty activities considered to be “service.”)

Credit-bearing Courses

The Ashtabula Campus will assign workload for teaching assignments that follows the workload amounts established by the academic units on the Kent Campus include the Regional College. Ashtabula Campus faculty can expect to receive the same workload for the same course taught by a Kent Campus faculty member.

Ashtabula Campus Faculty Council Chair

The FC Chair is given a six hour workload each academic year (three in the fall term and three hours in the spring term) for the duties and responsibilities of the Chair’s position.

Clock Hours to Workload

If the need should arise to convert clock hours to a workload equivalency the Ashtabula campus will use the following a standard formula:  One workload hours is equal to forty-five clock hours (2700 clock minutes)

Overload teaching assignments arise from extraordinary and unforeseen staffing circumstance and should not expected by a faculty member each term as part of their normal teaching assignment. Compensation for teaching overload at Kent State Ashtabula is governed by the policy described in the Collective Bargaining Agreement. In situations where there is a choice between using a temporary faculty member or assigning overload to a full-time faculty member, the decision shall be made by the Dean. Faculty are not required to accept an overload teaching assignment.

Compensation for any overload assignments regardless of the term is paid the faculty member during the spring term each academic year in accordance to practices established by the Regional Campus System.

Summer teaching opportunities may be available for Kent State Ashtabula faculty members, and are contingent upon course demands and enrollment projections. The Dean makes summer teaching assignments. The Regional Campus System follows the rule of equitable distribution of opportunities for summer employment among members of the regular faculty bargaining unit. In actual practice, this principle requires supervision by faculty members and administrators alike, because staffing changes are irregular and positions are often not filled until the last moment, when many faculty are away from their campuses.

Tenured or tenure-track faculty are to receive the first opportunity to teach summer school (including intersession) before any other Kent State faculty member or non-KSU personnel (Collective Bargaining Agreement). When classes are available, summer teaching shall be offered to faculty on this basis:  regular full-time tenure-track, FTNTT, and finally, adjunct. The FTNTT faculty Collective Bargaining Agreement stipulates that, after tenure-track faculty, Kent State Ashtabula FTNTT faculty are to be given “next priority in consideration” for summer teaching.

Should a full-time faculty member desire to teach a summer course on another Regional Campus, he or she must every year and in writing contact the Dean of the campus where teaching is desired to inform the Dean of the interest in a summer teaching assignment. This writing notification is provided to the Dean during the preceding fall term by an established deadline (generally, in November). This notification does not guarantee that a course will be offered, only that the faculty member’s name is added to the list for consideration if resident/tenured faculty at that campus are unavailable to teach the course. There is no reimbursement for travel to and from the campuses where assignments are made.

The normal summer load of 6 hours per term for tenured and tenure-track faculty, referenced in the Collective Bargaining Agreement, shall be understood as embracing the opportunity for compensation of services totaling up to a maximum of 12 hours for all Summer Terms combined, excluding Intersession. The provision that there shall be no additional payment for any overload assignment accepted by a faculty member in excess of these limitations shall be retained.

Intersession Teaching

Opportunities to teach a single course each year during intersession, a three-week period between the end of spring semester and the beginning of summer classes, may be available for Kent State Ashtabula faculty members. Course offerings are approved by the Dean and contingent upon course demand, enrollment projections, and the probability of the successful delivery of the course in the intensive intersession format. An intersession assignment does not count for either summer load or for overload.

Compensation for summer courses may be subject to the University’s Enrollment Contingency policy as described in the CBA, Article IX, Section 4-B-2.