Faculty Workload

Graduate Center faculty members, including all Executive Officers, are expected to fulfill a minimum annual assignment of six units. Distinguished Professors throughout the University receive a one-course reduction in assignment each semester, resulting in a minimum annual Graduate Center assignment of four units annually.

Each Graduate Center faculty member must submit (with the approval of the Executive Officer) a Faculty Workload Report each semester to the Provost's Office. All CUNY colleges, including the Graduate Center, are required to submit faculty workload data each semester to CUNY's central administration. A unit is defined in several ways:

A course taught anywhere within The City University of New York: A course taught by a Graduate Center faculty member anywhere in the University is a unit, and all courses are equated without reference to the credit hours involved. To count as a unit, a course must have a course number; a student must be able to register in it and have it appear on the transcript. A course taught by a single instructor (apart from U900 and independent study) must have a minimum enrollment of five students. Non-matriculants are counted in the total, but auditors are not. A team-taught course requires a minimum of twelve students.

Five or more students enrolled in independent study or U900: Enrollment in independent doctoral study and U900 is counted as 0.2 units; 5 or more enrollments make a complete unit. Independent study or dissertation enrollments never add up to more than one unit at the GC, just as courses do not vary in unit terms depending on enrollment.

No individual student may be counted as workload in Dissertation Supervision 90000 for more than six semesters, or the equivalent of three years.

Provost-approved administrative assignments: Throughout the University, administrative assignments require explicit authorization from the college provost. For example, the Graduate Center Provost obtains individual approval from the provost of the college involved for every assignment of a college faculty member as a deputy executive officer or a center director. Likewise, the Provost must give approval for all such assignments for Graduate Center appointments prior to the semester for which they are planned. Requests for administrative assignments should be submitted in advance to the Provost's Office by the Executive Officer of the faculty member's program. Submission of the request is understood to be an endorsement of the request by the Executive Officer.

Sponsored research that involves released time for the faculty member: Depending on the percentage of released time involved, one or more units may be "released." Throughout the University, sponsored research is considered part of an individual's assignment only if the grant or contract involves a budget for released time for the individual. Alternative arrangements require explicit college approval for a portion of the individual's assignment to be calculated in the cost of the sponsored project as University cost-share.

Updated 18 May 2015