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[conjugate]

Thanks. I like the idea of faculty being allowed to give up the pretense of doing research in exchange for a higher teaching load. The problem with the reduction-based approach some of you mentioned is that it is too easy to game and it inherently favors fields which require lots of money/students.

I applied to a school that looked at my (rather slight) publication record and warned me that if I didn't keep up a certain rate of productivity I might be given a higher teaching load.  I said I understood.  I didn't get the job, because they hired someone with (presumably) a more substantial publication record.  I'd have been happy doing almost no research, teaching 9 contact hours/semester, and working there, earning more than at many of the other schools I did get jobs at.  However, in the end, research pays and teaching doesn't. 

Are we talking about faculty who already have tenure or are we talking about faculty who are tenure-track?  If the latter, I'm sure that low publication rates will take care of themselves; they'll be denied tenure and you'll try again with people who know that "publish or perish" is the rule.

[daniel_von_flanagan]

Are we talking about faculty who already have tenure or are we talking about faculty who are tenure-track?  If the latter, I'm sure that low publication rates will take care of themselves; they'll be denied tenure and you'll try again with people who know that "publish or perish" is the rule.

While the problem is somewhat moot for attheuc - who is changing institutions - her department was an active research department, where a common problem is that some faculty hired mainly on their research credentials stop publishing some time (usually many years) after tenure. While the department is seeking a way to make effective use of the faculty member to offset the reduced research output, they would not be interested in hiring someone who is research-inactive from day one.

For a department with a graduate program, research faculty contribute more to the department than the obvious things of adding to the prestige and grant income.  They also teach graduate courses, supervise grad students, participate in  research seminars and attract visitors.  These all contribute to providing a fertile environment for graduate education.  Teaching-only faculty do not contribute in this way, and the growing trend in state flagships of hiring such faculty to cover the introductory courses can have a tangible negative impact on the graduate program, especially in smaller departments. - DvF

[larryc]

To avoid the inevitable fallout from your proposals, you might want to simply pass along to your Chair what peer schools do.  That way, like your Chair, you are simply passing established information from another source.  Pass the hot potato out of your hands.

+1! Since there seems to be such variation on this matter maybe you should pick ten schools off the list of comparable schools that your institution may already have, give each committee member 2 or 3 of them, and make some phone calls and emails to find out what each does.

[daniel_von_flanagan]

In fact, this is coming up right now at several institutions - mine, attheuc's, and a couple we have telephoned.  When this kind of synchronicity happens, it is usually because of some national meeting of chief operating officers or chief academic officers
happens.  The usual ways for faculty to monitor emergent administrative initiatives like this are (a) to have a friend in administration who reports on national meetings, or (b) to phone colleagues elsewhere.  I wonder, though, if there are some good online resources, eg places where national administrative meeting schedules are posted.  I know NASH and the APLU; are there others one can/should monitor? - DvF

[helpful]

At our place there is a contract which specifies teaching load. Thus individual loads cannot be changed without negotiating with the employee concerned. If someone is tenured, there is some leverage in terms of rewarding those with research with a reduced load, but it is difficult to penalize people without research.