A simple way to do so is to add up the standard workload of tenured and tenure-track faculty, then subtract funded releases. The resulting “theoretical course capacity” is the maximum number of courses the unit can schedule without hiring adjuncts.
Full Answer
Faculty loads are defined in terms of Equated Load Units (ELUs) which are the "units" faculty earn for teaching courses and for performing non-instructional activities such as department chair and research. Faculty loads can consist of instructional assignments, non-instructional assignments or a combination of both.
With this load assignment comes the expectation for evidence of scholarly productivity. For non-tenured faculty members, load credit (first course buy-out) may be obtained with externally-funded salary support at the rate of 12.5% for the academic year.
Teaching load expectations may be altered according to other load responsibilities, e.g., research, service, advising, outreach, or other pre-approved assignments. The minimal teaching load is one unit, that is, at least one course a year.
Faculty teaching below load may be spending more time on research or service, where wide variation in research productivity and heavily skewed service obligations ( which often fall disproportionately on women and minority faculty) result in inequitable workload allocations and lower overall productivity.
Faculty workload is calculated by assigning values to lectures and labs separately. Values are also assigned to courses based on the number of students enrolled. FTE is based on credit contact hours taught, (L or B), or number of students enrolled, (N, S, A, or R).
Faculty loads are defined in terms of Equated Load Units (ELUs) which are the "units" faculty earn for teaching courses and for performing non-instructional activities such as department chair and research. Faculty loads can consist of instructional assignments, non-instructional assignments or a combination of both.
A 3:3 load with two preps means that you teach 3 sections per semester but two sections are of the same course. For example, you might teach two sections of Calculus I and one section of ordinary differential equations for a 3 course load with two preps.
4-4. This is typically the highest teaching load you will find at a college or university. While many community college instructors will teach a higher 5-5 load, a 4-4 is the highest you tend to find in a four-year institution.
Dec 6. When I was at Yale and friends were on the job market, every single person I knew considered a 4/4 teaching load—that is, four classes per semester, for a total of eight per academic year—to be a fate worse than death.
So, what did the 5/5 class-load mean for me? Depending on the school, class sizes tend to be capped somewhere between 25–35 students, so I taught roughly 150–175 students per semester at the low end. These five courses will typically be sections of two to four different classes.
The 2/2 load is an incentive for professors who are pursuing a rigorous research agenda which helps to raise the college's and the university's reputation through research. The 2/2 load should be viewed as an incentive for faculty to begin or maintain a high level of research productivity.
The minimal teaching load is one unit, that is, at least one course a year.
A full load is calculated at eight units which are generally distributed as one unit credits although credit of .5 units may be considered for certain assignments.
Load credit may be earned for assignments that bridge two or more areas of research, teaching, and/or service (e.g. Professional Development School assignments). With these assignments comes an expectation for evidence of scholarship. These load assignments must be pre-approved at the department level.
Advising credit can only be earned for students currently enrolled in course work or actively preparing thesis or dissertation. Each department will submit the criteria that will be used to assign one unit of advising load credit (to be added to this document).
The Faculty Load System provides the ability to analyze and report faculty loads against contract requirements. Faculty loads are defined in terms of Equated Load Units (ELUs) which are the "units" faculty earn for teaching courses and for performing non-instructional activities such as department chair and research.
The key report, the Faculty Load Analysis Report, is comprised of a set of complementary reports, any combination of which can be selected and produced for an academic year at the university, college, department or individual level. This document has three major sections:
ELU Overrides. ELUs generally default to the course credit hours except for labs and studios which default to 2/3 the course credit hours. When they differ, or a course may be offered to students as a range of credit hours, departments must provide an ELU override value.
An ELU value is assigned to each assignment as well as a code designating the type of assignment and the term (s) for which the assignment is effective. Term-to-term assignments may occasionally be entered with ELU credit for one-time activities such as course preparation.
Workload contract rules define the total load requirements for a contract type for a contract year. They are defined with an effective term, and, as long as they don't change, no new records are necessary. NOTE: The credit hours and contact hours fields are not used.
Assignments in the out-lying term are not considered part of the contract by default. A program that is part of the nightly faculty data maintenance job automatically copies contract term rules records forward from the current contract year to the next contract year.
Default course loads may be permanently overridden in unusual situations, such as lab/lecture combinations and habitually large enrollments. Permanent overrides should be at the minimum value that will ever be used. Minimum enrollments may also be increased when permanently overriding loads.
“Faculty Workload” refers to all faculty activities that contribute to the accomplishment of unit-related activities and responsibilities : research/creative activity, teaching, service, outreach, and extension (where appropriate). As such, “Faculty Workload” may be conceptualized at both the individual level and the unit level.
Guideline 7: Typically, extension faculty have 3-5 program goals on which they work at any one time and the goals vary in complexity. The objectives of some goals can be achieved in two or three years while others require career long efforts. These educational program goals typically address critical issues impacting individuals, families, communities and businesses. Apportionment is negotiated with the Cooperative Extension Division.
Guideline 3: Research, scholarship, and creative activity will have a focus within the Unit, Department, or College mission and that this body of work is recognized by professional peers.
First, it provides guidance to the faculty, Chairs and the Dean in making assignments of workload to faculty. Second, it assists in an effort to equitably distribute faculty responsibilities across faculty in the College over time. It is acknowledged that there is rich diversity across units and individual faculty members in the College, and that simplistic approaches to equity in workload will not work.
If it turns out your students will need 10 hours to prepare a high-quality research presentation, but they could learn the public speaking skills you really care about by spending two hours preparing and presenting four, one-minute stand and deliver presentations, changing your assignment may be your best option.
A commonly shared rule of thumb is that you should expect your students to take three times longer than you on assignments and exams. It is impossible to estimate how long students will take to complete an assignment (whether it involves reading, writing, or studying) without getting into the details of the assignment.
What we know from the research: The optimal reading rate of the skilled adult reader (including college students) is around 300 words per minute.
Students will take much longer to complete a task than you will take to complete the same task. This is obvious upon reflection (after all, you are the expert and they are the novice), but you'd be surprised how often it is ignored in practice.