Faculty load - credit-hour model

[gadfly50]

Does anyone have experience of being your institution issuing full-time faculty contracts based on teaching a certain number of credit hours per year, rather than a certain number of courses? (e.g. 600 credit hours rather than 4-4 load). Insight into how this works (or doesn't) welcomed.

[Sun_Worshiper]

We teach 12-credit hours per year at my place. That could mean four 3-credit hour courses (which is what I typically do), or it could include some 1.5-credit hour courses.

[Hibush]

Does anyone have experience of being your institution issuing full-time faculty contracts based on teaching a certain number of credit hours per year, rather than a certain number of courses? (e.g. 600 credit hours rather than 4-4 load). Insight into how this works (or doesn't) welcomed.

Is this calculation using student credit hours? That is 30 students in a 3-credit course counts for 90 credit hours towards the expected load.

[gadfly50]

We teach 12-credit hours per year at my place. That could mean four 3-credit hour courses (which is what I typically do), or it could include some 1.5-credit hour courses.

I may not have explained myself clearly. At the moment we are on a 12-credit load (i.e. 4 x 3-credit classes a semester) in the way you define your own institution.

What is being proposed is that we teach a "credit sold" model. Each faculty will be allocated a number of student-credits they need to teach. This will be somewhere in the 600 range.

i.e. one student in a class worth 3 credits = 3 credits. You will contracted to teach something like "600 credit hours sold".

This could mean 8 x 3 credit classes, each with 25 students in (25 students, each taking 3 credits, multiplied by 8 gets you to 600). Or it could mean 12 x 3 credit classes each with 19 students. Or it could mean 200 classes, each with 1 student in, or 1 class with 200 students in. Or any permutation of this. In other words, the number of classes becomes fluid, depending on class size. If you don't meet it in a 4-4 load, you have to keep teaching classes till you hit your target.

[gadfly50]

Does anyone have experience of being your institution issuing full-time faculty contracts based on teaching a certain number of credit hours per year, rather than a certain number of courses? (e.g. 600 credit hours rather than 4-4 load). Insight into how this works (or doesn't) welcomed.

Is this calculation using student credit hours? That is 30 students in a 3-credit course counts for 90 credit hours towards the expected load.

Yes, that is correct.

[Hegemony]

We don't have it calculated as minutely as that. However, our departments that teach the huge classes, like 200 students in a room (e.g. usually sciences), have a lower course load than the departments that teach all ten-person classes (e.g. Classics).

[Parasaurolophus]

I may not have explained myself clearly. At the moment we are on a 12-credit load (i.e. 4 x 3-credit classes a semester) in the way you define your own institution.

What is being proposed is that we teach a "credit sold" model. Each faculty will be allocated a number of student-credits they need to teach. This will be somewhere in the 600 range.

i.e. one student in a class worth 3 credits = 3 credits. You will contracted to teach something like "600 credit hours sold".

This could mean 8 x 3 credit classes, each with 25 students in (25 students, each taking 3 credits, multiplied by 8 gets you to 600). Or it could mean 12 x 3 credit classes each with 19 students. Or it could mean 200 classes, each with 1 student in, or 1 class with 200 students in. Or any permutation of this. In other words, the number of classes becomes fluid, depending on class size. If you don't meet it in a 4-4 load, you have to keep teaching classes till you hit your target.

This... sounds like a total scheduling nightmare. It also sounds like a policy that will be used to cut back otherwise full-time positions without actually having to officially cut them.

[gadfly50]

We don't have it calculated as minutely as that. However, our departments that teach the huge classes, like 200 students in a room (e.g. usually sciences), have a lower course load than the departments that teach all ten-person classes (e.g. Classics).

That seems reasonable. It seems like in your institution that the direction of travel is that the standard load has been lowered for the larger classes as recognition of the number of students, not raised for the lower-enrolled ones. i.e. I expect your default is x-x load, with larger classes entitling to course reduction.

In the plan we are being presented with, it seems the starting point is everyone needs large classes.

So in your example. under the plan being proposed the Classics faculty would have to teach the same number of students up to the science faculty.. i.e. if  they 10 per class in their classics classes, they'd have a 20-course load per semester to match the 200  students enrolled in one science class. This is the bit where it seems to go astray.

[gadfly50]

This... sounds like a total scheduling nightmare. It also sounds like a policy that will be used to cut back otherwise full-time positions without actually having to officially cut them.

Yes I have no idea how they are proposing the scheduling. You won't know how many students you have till close to start of semester when registration is confirmed. So what if you don't have enough? Add one, two, three more classes with one week's notice to prep them? Or agree to teach six as a kind of insurance, then pull out when you know you don't need them, leaving the need to find adjuncts with a week's notice? And what if there are simply not enough students for you to teach even if you wanted to? All of these questions are why I am hoping to find an institution that does this to see how it works (or doesn't!)

[Sun_Worshiper]

We teach 12-credit hours per year at my place. That could mean four 3-credit hour courses (which is what I typically do), or it could include some 1.5-credit hour courses.

I may not have explained myself clearly. At the moment we are on a 12-credit load (i.e. 4 x 3-credit classes a semester) in the way you define your own institution.

What is being proposed is that we teach a "credit sold" model. Each faculty will be allocated a number of student-credits they need to teach. This will be somewhere in the 600 range.

i.e. one student in a class worth 3 credits = 3 credits. You will contracted to teach something like "600 credit hours sold".

This could mean 8 x 3 credit classes, each with 25 students in (25 students, each taking 3 credits, multiplied by 8 gets you to 600). Or it could mean 12 x 3 credit classes each with 19 students. Or it could mean 200 classes, each with 1 student in, or 1 class with 200 students in. Or any permutation of this. In other words, the number of classes becomes fluid, depending on class size. If you don't meet it in a 4-4 load, you have to keep teaching classes till you hit your target.

Ah, I see. That sounds terrible.

[Parasaurolophus]

Yes I have no idea how they are proposing the scheduling. You won't know how many students you have till close to start of semester when registration is confirmed. So what if you don't have enough? Add one, two, three more classes with one week's notice to prep them? Or agree to teach six as a kind of insurance, then pull out when you know you don't need them, leaving the need to find adjuncts with a week's notice? And what if there are simply not enough students for you to teach even if you wanted to? All of these questions are why I am hoping to find an institution that does this to see how it works (or doesn't!)

We don't do this, but our particular brand of stupid is not that far off in terms of its effects, I think.

We don't have tenure, and are paid by the course (a not unreasonable amount plus benefits, though our "salaries" are the lowest in the country, and we're in the area with the highest cost of living). Our courseloads are not guaranteed. All courses are capped at 35, and start getting cancelled when they fall below 27 (though we can usually lobby to keep them if they're at around 25). A full load here is also 8/year.

What this means, in practice, is that we never really know how much we're teaching, when, or how much we'll be earning until it's all done. We determine our course offerings and divide them up in March or April, then cross our fingers that nothing will need adjusting. Since the cancellation threshold is moronic, however, we always have to adjust. And because of union regs, adjusting means that the senior faculty get topped up to eight at the expense of anyone more junior than them. The juniors are then made whole, if possible, with some combination of teaching in either the first or second summer semester (often both; things are complicated by the fact that any teaching done in July/August only counts for half a class (wtfwtfwtf!?) ). In my four years here, I've worked through two entire summers, worked 10/12 months one year, and had just one year when I had the entire summer off.

But the thing is, we have far too many students because of international recruitment and not enough classroom space or sections for them all. So sections are also constantly being added at the very last minute. So there's really no way to get a good sense of what you're teaching when, whether you will need a second job this year, etc. It feels (and is) very precarious, much more than it needs to be. It sucks.

So, anyway. It sounds to me like what you're describing would end up being like that, but worse. I can't imagine trying to schedule everyone under these circumstances. I'd also want to know what happens when someone ends up having taught more than the necessary number of students. Because if you're at all dinged for being under, then it seems you should be compensated for going over.

[Hegemony]

So in your example. under the plan being proposed the Classics faculty would have to teach the same number of students up to the science faculty.. i.e. if  they 10 per class in their classics classes, they'd have a 20-course load per semester to match the 200  students enrolled in one science class. This is the bit where it seems to go astray.

In practice, the smaller-class departments have one more course per term than the larger-class departments. So someone from Biology would teach 2-2, and someone from Classics 3-3. (The university would like to close down those smaller departments altogether, but every time they try there's an almighty outcry, so so far they have not gone down the WVU path.)

[spork]

The simpler solution is to require a minimum enrollment that leads to equitable workloads. We have departments that outsource their 100-level courses to adjuncts because "only tenured faculty have the expertise to teach the advanced courses that contain less than a dozen students each." So some departments have tenured faculty teaching 150 students per semester while others only teach 20-30.

Irregardless, as my wife and I like to say, the model you describe is "pay per head" piecework, which I fully support. Let market demand decide compensation. If you (the general you) can't earn what you think you deserve, you are welcome to find another job.

[Hibush]

We don't have it calculated as minutely as that. However, our departments that teach the huge classes, like 200 students in a room (e.g. usually sciences), have a lower course load than the departments that teach all ten-person classes (e.g. Classics).

This approach sounds a lot better. Use a minimum enrolment number for each class so that you only get credit for teaching it if the course is popular enough. That helps eliminate courses for which there is no longer demand, which is the management goal.

The proposed model makes it far to easy to game the system in ways that don't meet the management goal. If the number is based on initial enrolment in a course, you could serve cake on the first day and discuss the syllabus on the second leading to most dropping. Students would be happy to participate in that ruse.

If the number is based on completions, then grade inflation will go way up, now at the instructors initiative. Overfill classrooms (or have virtual overflow sessions) to get high numbers but don't worry about learning. 

Departments will have vicious battles over distribution requirements since any courses taken outside the major is a loss to the department.

Other commenters have decribed the scheduling chaos.

[ciao_yall]

We teach 12-credit hours per year at my place. That could mean four 3-credit hour courses (which is what I typically do), or it could include some 1.5-credit hour courses.

I may not have explained myself clearly. At the moment we are on a 12-credit load (i.e. 4 x 3-credit classes a semester) in the way you define your own institution.

What is being proposed is that we teach a "credit sold" model. Each faculty will be allocated a number of student-credits they need to teach. This will be somewhere in the 600 range.

i.e. one student in a class worth 3 credits = 3 credits. You will contracted to teach something like "600 credit hours sold".

This could mean 8 x 3 credit classes, each with 25 students in (25 students, each taking 3 credits, multiplied by 8 gets you to 600). Or it could mean 12 x 3 credit classes each with 19 students. Or it could mean 200 classes, each with 1 student in, or 1 class with 200 students in. Or any permutation of this. In other words, the number of classes becomes fluid, depending on class size. If you don't meet it in a 4-4 load, you have to keep teaching classes till you hit your target.

Yikes. So if a faculty is to earn, say, $60,000 that means each student in a class is worth $100.

Do you get paid extra if you end up teaching 610 credit hours because of high enrollment? That can be some bitter fights among faculty over who gets the extra $1,000. Do they get it paid that semester or can they apply it toward future semesters?

What if someone ends up with only 598 credit hours? Do they owe the college $200?