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[morefromles]

I'm a relatively new chair, and my college is in the process of negotiating a formula for chair duties across the campus; I work at a community college in the U.S., and I chair the English department.  The formula that's being proposed takes into account the number of sections, the number of full-and part-time faculty members, and other factors.  Factors that are not typical duties shared by every chair (such as working with outside agencies) are assigned points in the new formula.  The problem is that if we go with this new formula, over a  third of the current chairs will lose reassigned time, including me.  I tried to argue as to why the current formular was unfair and did not account for the things that really take up my time, but everything I said was countered with "That's a duty we all share.  We all hire part-time faculty, coordinate with other areas, etc."  I'm extremely frustrated at this point, as the job I'm doing is already too time-consuming for the reassigned time I get.  Part of the problem is that I took over during a huge cultural shift in power away from an entrenched elite of tenured faculty with an overwhelming sense of entitlement toward a more dynamic group of part-timers with no job security, but a fabulous work ethic.  So for the first time in twenty years, we have a chance of achieving some kind of coherence and consistency in terms of our writing program.  Add that to the fact that we're working on aligning curriculum with the basic skills writing courses that are housed in a different department (yes, it makes no sense to me either, but that's how it is), plus working on other curricular innovations, trying to keep up with scheduling and evaluating, while still teaching 30 students per course, and, well, you see where I'm going with this. 

I'm hoping that some of you can suggest ways to describe what an English chair does that might carry some clout or be able to be factored into the formula as an atypical duty for points.  Or if you think I'm just whining, tell me to suck it up and take my cuts like everybody else.

[dellaroux]

I assume you have applications in the works to get out of there, right?

[morefromles]

I had actually considered it, but given that my state is in a huge budget crisis and the current formula is being proposed in order to right some inequities that have existed for quite some time (people getting back room deals for more reassigned time), I can see why they're trying it.  It's actually overall a fabulous culture with very sweet students and dedicated faculty--and an administration that's come mostly from the ranks of full-time faculty and is fairly collaborative and responsive to innovation.  So I like the place, just not this new formula.  But I don't want to rock the boat so much that I look like a whiner.  Nobody's completely happy with the formula, but at least it puts it out there on the table in a transparent way, which was the goal.

[zharkov]

Even though I'm a quant guy, I'm against this formulaic approach for leadership.  What's wrong with a scheme where chairs get a half reduction in course load and the same stipend across the board?  (For example.)

[dellaroux]

As a friend in a totally different field once observed: "Once they start trying to get you to keep a journal and estimate your time budget, you can guess that downsizing or added work or both are looming in the future. Get out while you can."

[morefromles]

Yes, this is what's happening.  Admin is trying to keep the chair compensation pie the same size it is now, and proposed a really crazy formula for how to divide up the pie.  The half course release time works for me, but we have so many different areas and coordinators and career tech and GE areas that the perception has been that we need a different approach that more accurately reflects what people really do.

The point is that the union, MY UNION, the one that's supposed to be representing me, is selling out my department so that other areas can get more release time.  "Not everybody's going to be happy with this," the union guy told me.  So even if I left, which isn't feasible for too many reasons to explain here, the next chair of my area will be screwed, and I don't want to see that.

So I'm trying to get the union people to meet with me.  If they blow me off, what should I do--go to my allies in admin in tell them not to accept the union's formula?  That sounds extreme to me of course.  Another option would be to write an open letter to all of the chairs and let them know how unacceptable this is.  One of the union negotiators is from my area and has hopes of being chair sometime, though he hasn't been involv ed in the chair formula calculations, so I plan to talk to him.  That may be my best bet.

[octoprof]

Even though I'm a quant guy, I'm against this formulaic approach for leadership.  What's wrong with a scheme where chairs get a half reduction in course load and the same stipend across the board?  (For example.)

Because you'll never get the chair of accounting to go for that stipend the chair of English is willing to go for.

[ursula]

Even though I'm a quant guy, I'm against this formulaic approach for leadership.  What's wrong with a scheme where chairs get a half reduction in course load and the same stipend across the board?  (For example.)

Because you'll never get the chair of accounting to go for that stipend the chair of English is willing to go for.

And yet, here, they get exactly the same:  all chairs get a 50% reduction in teaching load, and the same stipend, no matter what department or Faculty.


This is because we have an excellent union.

[fourhats]

We have no union, but have the same deal.  Otherwise they'd never get anyone to agree to chair.