/Institutions/MGH-Institute-of-Health-Professions/json/Current/Faculty-Handbook-local.json

/Institutions/MGH-Institute-of-Health-Professions/json/Current/Faculty-Handbook.json

Faculty Handbook 2024-2025 > III. Evaluation and Work Plan > c. General Guidelines for Assigning Work Plan Credit

c. General Guidelines for Assigning Work Plan Credit

There are three main categories of faculty effort, which include teaching, scholarship, and service. A limited number of faculty leaders (e.g., department chairs, deans, directors) entrusted with administrative responsibilities that do not fall into one of the prior three categories may also be assigned administration effort that is contingent upon their continued service within those administrative leadership roles.  Administration effort is not intended for individuals engaged in activities that are related to teaching (e.g., clerkship/internship coordinator) or service (e.g., admissions committee member). 

To support academic unit leaders in the development, assignment, and oversight of faculty work plans, these guidelines have been established. The guidelines provide a common framework for all programs where reasonable but also acknowledge expected variation in how work plans are managed due to varying curriculum configurations and accreditation requirements that exist across the institution’s academic programs. Because there is no “one size fits all” approach, each academic unit will establish internally consistent guidelines that support transparency, equity, and responsiveness to individual faculty productivity profiles, while balancing overall work plan across faculty. Academic unit leaders have the primary responsibility, under the direction of school deans, for determining individual faculty workload assignments. If the needs/priorities of the academic unit change during the year, it is reasonable and acceptable for the academic unit leader to modify an individual faculty work plan.

Teaching assignments must be made according to institutional, academic unit, and curricular needs and priorities as well as discipline-specific norms and expectations. In determining individual faulty teaching assignments, academic unit leaders are expected to exercise professional judgment in establishing minimum enrollment criteria for courses given competing goals, such as differences in the structure and delivery of the course, historical and projected course enrollments, level of instruction (e.g., undergraduate, graduate or doctorate), and other pedagogical considerations.

The guidelines also serve to support unit leaders in achieving important goals of the institution related to faculty work:

• Ensure that students receive a high-quality, student-centered education;

• Align faculty workloads with individual faculty career goals and the needs/priorities of the academic unit;

• Implement equitable practices that support the productivity of faculty with highly active research programs and/or exceptional service responsibilities through appropriateadjustments to teaching assignments; 

• Ensure fairness and accountability in faculty workload assignments by evaluating individual scholarly productivity and/or service contributions when individualizing a work plan

For faculty of color, the institution encourages academic unit leaders to consider the potential impact of invisible labor when developing a work plan. The institution first approved guidelines for acknowledging and managing invisible labor in 2021. These guidelines do not represent institutional policy or entitle all faculty of color to reduced teaching assignments compared to peers; however, the guidelines serve as a guide to academic unit leaders in examining and working together with individual faculty of color to manage unaccounted-for responsibilities that might disproportionately impact the faculty member. The institution recommends academic unit leaders to utilize this resource to help shape equitable faculty workload assignments.

Teaching

Given the diversity of academic programs and instructional models at the MGH Institute, academic units may approach the determination of teaching assignments in different ways. Academic units should apply transparent and internally consistent methods to assign faculty teaching loads.  The teaching load for a full-time, regular faculty is generally 50 to 60% of a 1.0 FTE work plan (or 18 to 24 credits). The percentage of teaching effort will depend on a variety of factors, including the faculty member's other responsibilities. The expected work plan is adjusted for faculty members who have less than 1.0 FTE or who have portions of their FTE allotted to other activities (e.g., extramurally funded research, administration).

Credit hour versus contact hour calculations. While many academic programs assign teaching workload based on a credit hour basis, the nature and structure of a course or program may require a contact hour-based assignment. Contact hours may be factored into the teaching work plan when the credit assignment does not adequately or accurately reflect the number of hours spent in class.

Multiple factors considered. Course enrollment, structure of the teaching activity (e.g., lecture-based instruction, laboratory experience, clerkship/rotation, dissertation or thesis related course), the specific role of the faculty (e.g., course director, co-teacher, course coordinator), the level of experience of the faculty (e.g., novice teacher), the provision of a teaching assistant, and other pedagogical factors will be considered in conjunction with the needs/priorities of the academic unit and accreditation requirements in these determinations.

Guest lecturing. Many faculty members provide guest lectures in courses taught by other faculty at the Institute or peer programs (e.g., Mass General residency programs, the MD program at Harvard Medical School). These are not counted in the teaching work plan but may be considered as service.

Illustrative examples of modified teaching workload assignments. An academic unit leader may provide additional effort for a first-time teacher or for a faculty member who is asked to create and teach a brand-new course.  Additional effort may be awarded to a faculty member who is teaching a course with very high enrollment to account for increased time for student advising and adapting the course to meet students’ learning needs. Under-enrolled courses should be infrequently offered, but a lower effort may be assigned for an under-enrolled course. In a course with high enrollment, the academic unit leader may alternatively assign a co-instructor or teaching assistant to help cover instructional or advisement responsibilities, rather than adjust the faculty member’s teaching effort. For online courses, enrollment ≥ 25 to 30 students should prompt the assignment of a co-instructor or teaching assistant. Supervision of a capstone project (e.g. thesis, dissertation, or advanced doctoral experience) will generally be given one credit for the primary reader per student for individual projects for the entire experience. Work plan credit for the primary reader for group thesis or capstone projects is negotiated with the academic unit leader based on expected responsibilities on the project. Work plan credit for other thesis committee members is negotiated with the program director or academic unit leader based on expected responsibilities on the project.

Scholarship and Service

Service and scholarship account for the remaining work plan for faculty, except for a limited number of faculty leaders with administration effort.

The typical work plan associated with scholarship for a full-time, regular faculty member represents between 20 to 30% of total effort, but this level should be adjusted to reflect individual faculty career goals, duties and responsibilities, and level of scholarly productivity. If a faculty member does not demonstrate sufficient scholarly output to justify the assigned effort, the scholarship effort should be reduced with additional teaching and/or service assignments made. If an individual faculty obtains research funding to protect time, any grant-funded effort should first be applied toward existing scholarship effort before teaching or service assignments are reduced. 

All faculty members are expected to act as good citizens of the Institute, which includes contributions of service to the institution, school, and/or academic unit. The extent of service responsibilities should be negotiated with the academic unit leader each year.  Service effort in the form of patient care/clinical services is considered part of the faculty member’s work plan if that effort is funded (e.g., the Institute receives payment for the faculty member’s effort). Additionally, student advising is generally recognized as a service activity.

Additional Effort

At times, a faculty member may be asked and agree to perform work outside of their work plan. In these cases, extra service pay should be considered for any assigned work that exceeds FTE expectations. Extra service does not qualify as merit and it is subject to approval by the Office of the Provost. A separate agreement that describes the scope of additional duties and responsibilities, the duration of extra service, and remuneration will be executed with the individual faculty member. In general, when a faculty member takes on additional teaching assignments, the preferred and typical action is to reduce other responsibilities to account for the new assignment, versus using extra service pay.

Clinical practice or consulting positions outside the framework of a faculty work plan are not counted towards the faculty FTE or considered as part of the individual faculty work plan. Full-time regular faculty members may engage in outside activities with approval and by meeting the parameters defined in the Faculty Handbook (Outside Professional Activities). However, the faculty are still responsible for full teaching, scholarship, and service responsibilities delineated in their work plan.