Historical Context and Additional Information on Faculty Load Review Group/Policy Initiative Team Project and Recommendations to Chancellor May

This post has been co-authored by Carlos Martinez and Matt Hinckley, with additional edits by Matt Henry. It is designed to provide additional context, and to answer additional questions, that have arisen since this Advance Blog post was made on Jan. 19, 2020, regarding the years-long project to bring equity to the calculation of faculty load.

WHAT IS THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT? WHY IS THIS BEING DISCUSSED NOW?

First, this is a brief narrative on the historical context of the project. You may find additional detail by clicking the Load label on the Advance Blog, in order to read previous posts on these issues.

In 2015 or 2016, the DCCCD Human Resources Operational Guidelines (HROGs) were de-published by District Human Resources, in the hopes of incentivizing innovation. Unfortunately, this had the opposite effect, as departments, divisions, faculty, coordinators, and deans, wrestled with conflicting interpretations that often were informed by different iterations and generations of previous HROG documents that existed electronically or even on paper in various offices throughout the District. (For additional documentation of some of the concerns, please visit the Advance Blog to read posts labeled under HR or Talent Central.)

In Spring 2016, the then-Chief Talent Officer, Susan Hall, attempted to convene three compression planning sessions that were believed to be an effort to reduce extra service teaching limits throughout all terms. This prompted the Faculty Council to intervene directly to Chancellor May, to convene a more representative group to study inequities, inconsistencies, and interpretative concerns in how faculty load was being calculated across the District. In Fall 2016, at the request of the DCCFA Faculty Council, the chancellor commissioned the Faculty Load Review Group (FLRG). At the request of the then-Council, Council president Matt Hinckley served as one of three tri-chairs of FLRG, along with Ken Alfers (MVC History faculty) and Zarina Blankenbaker (RLC VPAASS). Upon convening, FLRG organized itself into three sub groups to investigate the three areas in which faculty and deans both reported the greatest inequities in faculty load calculation and compensation. These areas were lab/lecture inequity, class size inequity, and coordination compensation inequity. The FLRG report was delivered to Chancellor May in Spring 2017.

It was clear that, if implemented in full, the FLRG recommendations would require significant additional resources to be invested into instruction. Consequently, in Fall 2017, Chancellor May asked the DCCCD Board of Trustees to approve a contract with Boston Consulting Group (BCG), to review the FLRG recommendations (as well as other areas of concern), and to provide an outside perspective. The contract was executed in January 2018, and BCG met with the Faculty Council once, in Spring 2018, before its first report was delivered to the Board of Trustees in June 2018.

While BCG endorsed adoption of many of the FLRG recommendations (including lab/lecture equity, class size consistency, and coordination compensation equity), there were other areas of concern that clearly had not first emerged from FLRG. Most concerning was the fact that it was apparent that numerous assumptions in that BCG report were the result of apparently incorrect or possibly misleading input from the then-Chief Talent Officer. Faculty input broadly at all seven colleges objecting to the errors, and the sustained efforts of the 2018-2019 Faculty Council, prevailed upon Chancellor May and BCG to begin a process both to re-review the initial incorrect assumptions, as well as develop plans to implement the FLRG recommendations that BCG independently endorsed. This effort was known as the Policy Initiative Team (PIT).

The Policy Initiative Team (PIT) was convened in Summer 2019, with four task forces to develop recommendations in four related areas: Faculty Contracts, Compensation Practices, Master Course Table, and Institutional Service and Reassigned Time. Faculty with extensive experience in the issues were encouraged to apply to co-chair one of the four task forces. These four PIT task forces solicited faculty input throughout Fall 2019 to develop recommendations that were also vetted by a Steering Team. Reports from the task forces were shared on the Policy Initiative Share Point Site, and eventually were coordinated and combined into a set of recommendations delivered to Chancellor May and his Leadership Team on Jan. 29, 2020.

In summation, FLRG in 2016-2017 identified the inequities and recommended broad solutions. The Chancellor in 2017 agreed to further study of the FLRG findings. BCG in 2018 endorsed the FLRG findings and made some recommendations on how to implement them in 2019. And finally, the PIT process begun in 2019 delivered recommendations in January 2020 how to implement the needed changes.

It is important to note that, as of Feb. 14, 2020, no decisions have been made, but the decision to implement any/all of these recommendations rests solely with Chancellor May.

WHAT ARE ACH/ADJUSTED CONTACT HOURS?

One of the principal recommendations to emerge, as a means to equalize lecture and lab, class sizes, and coordination, was to denominate faculty load in a single currency known as Adjusted Contact Hours (ACH). Most simply, ACH is based on the catalog/WECM/ACGM defined contact hours for a course. The current working definition of ACH is:

“Hours faculty is required to spend delivering instruction associated with a course. Used as the unit of measure for determining faculty load and corresponding compensation. In most circumstances, 1 ACH equals 1 contact hour (exceptions will be determined for areas such as clinicals). Typically, adjusted contact hours represent the time a faculty member spends in instruction.”

Using ACH as the single currency of load allows:

• Lecture and lab instruction to be treated as equal*
• Load to be calculated down to the contact hour, rather than in blocks of 20% or 13%;
• Reassigned time to be calculated precisely, rather than in blocks of 20% or 13%;
• Extra service contracts to be paid on the basis of the exact number of ACH one is teaching/working over the 240 per traditional semester (240 = 15 hours/week * 16 weeks) or 480 per academic year;
• Setting standard class sizes, regardless of modality, for each course in the DCCCD catalog, using a Master Course Table;
• Faculty to be compensated equitably for teaching additional students in their face-to-face classes even if the room cannot accommodate a “double LGI” section, again calculating compensation down to the contact hour, rather than in blocks of 20% or 13%;
• Optionally, calculate over-enrollment compensation in terms of ACH.

*Note that for many decades lab has been discounted compared to lecture by one-third. In practice this meant that, within the 30 hour work week, a faculty member teaching lab courses in their regular load would have to spend more than 15 hours teaching each week. This meant that those faculty members teaching labs had less time for students outside of the classroom, for institutional service, and for grading and class preparation. Under the new system, every faculty member’s teaching load is met by teaching an average of 15 hours per week over the 16 week semester, with one lab contact hour equaling one lecture contact hour, for a total of 240 ACH over one semester, or 480 ACH across the fall and spring semester.

HOW ARE ACH PROPOSED TO BE CALCULATED?

Beyond the Master Course Table that is being developed, the “assumptions” that are built into the Beta ACH Excel Calculator can be found by clicking the “Policy Levers” tab in the Excel Workbook. Please note that these are simply assumptions designed to demonstrate how the calculator works. Some “assumptions” are based on current Board Policy. Others are based on recommendations. The inclusion of a given assumption is not an indication or prediction of what the chancellor will choose to implement.

If you wish to test the Beta ACH Excel Calculator, please DOWNLOAD the Excel file to your local computer, and SAVE it under a custom file name, BEFORE you begin entering courses and enrollments.

If you are interested in comparing your current extra service earnings to hypothetical values on the Beta ACH Excel Calculator, one way to do so is to find copies of your extra service contracts from the Fall 2019 semester, and/or use the eConnect “My Payroll Information” tool (click “Special Pay & Deduction Details” at the bottom of your monthly summary).

WHAT SHOULD WE KEEP IN MIND RIGHT NOW?

Please note that this Beta ACH Excel calculator is not final. Another version will be produced in the coming days that will include Premium Pay. Draft versions of the ACH calculator are purposely being shared to help stakeholders become more familiar with how the new proposed load calculation guidelines fit together into a coherent whole.

In addition, please note that the Beta ACH Excel calculator demonstrates the “portfolio” model for over-enrollment compensation. The “section” model is still under consideration, but as it would just be an adaptation of the existing DL grid, there was no need to demonstrate it. For more information on the differences between the “portfolio” and “section” models, please see the set of recommendations delivered to Chancellor May and his Leadership Team on Jan. 29, 2020.

Also, please note that the intent is for any faculty member who reaches 240 contact hours through the sections they teach regardless of enrollment in those sections, will have “made load.” Likewise, please note that the 86-page PDF document from Jan. 29 represents a broad summary of recommendations to the chancellor, and in some cases there are multiple options for him to consider. If/when he makes his decisions, hundreds of pages of new guidelines will need to be written, as those guidelines will be replacing the 1200+ pages of HROGs that were de-published in 2015. All that to say, the absence of a specific provision in these recommendations does not mean that such a provision has been rejected or ignored. That said, Page 33 of the PDF document, on Under-Enrolled Compensation Practices, recommends,

“(A)n “under enrolled section” will be compensated as if it were a “full” section, whether as a full portion of load (equal to the adjusted contact hours of course), or as a full extra service contract.”

The idea is that if an instructor’s sections make – even if they are not full and even if one or more of them has fewer students than the recommended minimum – then they make for a full portion of load for each of those sections. That language does not appear within the Beta ACH Excel calculator, to be sure, but the final version of the new HROGs should stipulate that no faculty member whose sections are not full, would ever have to teach extra sections just to make their load.

NOTE/UPDATE AS OF THURSDAY, FEB. 20: In response to concerns raised by faculty who teach in disciplines with lab courses, the next iteration of the Beta ACH Excel calculator is expected to include the functionality to enter lecture and lab ACH separately. This may require additional updates to the Master Course Table, to have separate line items (and student maximums and minimums) for the lecture and lab portions of each course. Since these are fundamentally pedagogical issues, it is important that faculty in the discipline/program have robust discussions among themselves about the practice of separating lecture and lab (specifically if different instructors should be permitted to teach the lecture and lab portions of a given course), and convey their recommendations to their respective faculty association president, and/or a member of the PIT steering team. 

WHAT ABOUT EXTRA SERVICE TEACHING LIMITS?

That said, one of the issues that has been most hotly debated is the issue of extra service teaching limits. First, faculty are most familiar with “14.7” as the abbreviation for extra service limits. In a model where all load and extra service is denominated in ACH, the ACH equivalent to 14.7 is 235.2 ACH, (14.7 is 98% of 15; 235.2 is 98% of 240), as was most recently also explained in this Advance Blog post.

It is important to note that changes to extra service limitations in Fall, Spring, Summer 1, and Summer 2, are not being proposed or discussed. What is under discussion is extra service teaching limits during May Term and Winter Term only. One option presented to the chancellor is to leave May Term and Winter Term extra service teaching limits as is, at 235.2 ACH. Another option presented to the chancellor is to reduce May Term and Winter Term extra service teaching limits to 117.6 ACH (one half of 235.2). Here are some relevant facts:

For the past nine mini terms (Winter Terms and May Terms), between 13% and 15% of faculty who were teaching during those terms, actually exceeded 117.6 ACH. This represents between 4.3% and 7.6% of all 950 full time DCCCD faculty. By term:

• In Winter Term 2016, 41 exceeded 117.6 ACH;
• In May Term 2016, 63 exceeded 117.6 ACH;
• In Winter Term 2017, 46 exceeded 117.6 ACH;
• In May Term 2017, 59 exceeded 117.6 ACH;
• In Winter Term 2018, 49 exceeded 117.6 ACH;
• In May Term 2018, 72 exceeded 117.6 ACH;
• In Winter Term 2019, 49 exceeded 117.6 ACH;
• In May Term 2019, 70 exceeded 117.6 ACH;
• In Winter Term 2020, 47 exceeded 117.6 ACH;

In addition, in any given May Term or Winter Term, between 454 (47.7%) and 630 (66.3%) of the 950 full time DCCCD faculty were not teaching any sections.

Moreover, the practice of teaching extra service above 117.6 ACH in May Terms and Winter Terms is not equitably distributed across the DCCCD campuses. For instance, the smallest campus in the District by enrollment, Cedar Valley, regularly accounts for 18-29% of those who are teaching more than 50% load in a May Term or Winter Term, likely due in large measure to the CVC Vet Tech program's routine practice of teaching high contact-hour courses over 12 week summer terms, which stretch across May Term, Summer 1, and Summer 2. The practice of teaching high contact hour courses that stretch across multiple summer terms would continue to be permitted under the PIT recommendations before the Chancellor, provided that the summer maximum of 588 ACH (117.6 for May Term, plus 235.2 for Summer 1, plus 235.2 for Summer 2) not be exceeded.
The practice of teaching more than 117.6 ACH in Winter Terms or May Terms also appears to be more common in certain disciplines or discipline clusters at some campuses. For instance, during the most recent Winter Term, the practice seemed most common in the Math departments at Cedar Valley and Eastfield, the Social Sciences at Brookhaven and Eastfield, and the Sciences at Mountain View and North Lake. Further study will be needed as the seven DCCCD colleges consolidate into One College, to determine the extent to which individual campuses may need more faculty in certain disciplines. Put another way:

• In any given May Term, the number of faculty who get no sections to teach is six times larger than the number of faculty who take more than 117.6 ACH;
• In any given Winter Tem, the number of faculty who get no sections to teach is 15 times larger than the number of faculty who take more than 117.6 ACH.

HOW WOULD THE PROPOSED NEW LIMITS AFFECT MY EXTRA SERVICE EARNING POTENTIAL?

If Winter Term and May Term extra service teaching limits were reduced to 117.6 ACH (resulting in an maximum limit of 1,176 ACH across all terms of an academic year), and the portfolio model for over-enrollment compensation were adopted, the following assumptions can be made regarding extra service income potential, according to the Beta ACH Excel calculator:

At the current adjunct/extra service rate of $48.42 ($2324 for a regular 3-hour course), one could earn a maximum of $56,941.92 in extra service teaching income in an academic year. (1,176 x $48.42 = $56,941.92)

At the proposed adjunct/extra service rate of $62.50 ($3000 for a regular 3-hour course), one could earn a maximum of $73,500 in extra service teaching income in an academic year. (1,176 x $62.50 = $73,500)

Note that these estimates do not include Premium Pay. Subsequent iterations of the Beta ACH Excel Calculator will include Premium Pay, which is payable at $81.25 per ACH for up to 96 ACH. Moreover, the PIT recommendations even include a proposal to allow Premium Pay to be earned during the Fall and Spring semester under certain limited circumstances, such as instances where enrollment demands are high in Fall or Spring, but insufficient enrollment in the Winter or Summer Terms to allow Premium Pay presently to be earned. There is no proposal to limit or reduce Premium Pay, or to make it unavailable in May Term or Winter Term.

WHAT ABOUT STAKEHOLDER INPUT?

Some faculty have understandably asked about stakeholder input.

There was robust stakeholder input throughout the FLRG process. All three sub groups - Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie - vetted their findings and recommendations through the Faculty Council, and faculty were able to share their feedback both through the Council and with the sub groups.

Some among the BCG “Student Centric Transformation” set of recommendations initially suffered for a lack of stakeholder input on some provisions, even as it also endorsed many of the FLRG recommendations (lab/lecture equity, class size consistency and compensation for over-enrollment regardless of morality, equity in coordination compensation). Indeed, BCG had falsely been led to believe that sufficient stakeholder input and/or DCCFA Faculty Council input had taken place. When this lack of stakeholder input became apparent, the Council prevailed upon District leadership and BCG to conduct the various town hall meetings during the Spring 2019 semester.

Throughout Fall 2019, the four PIT task forces solicited and received robust stakeholder input. With regards to compensation practices specifically, the task force intentionally expanded its membership to ensure that there was faculty representation from each campus. The master course table task force worked directly with the faculty program/discipline chairs to ensure the recommendations were based on pedagogical considerations. The reassigned time and institutional service task force accepted robust input and made its recommendations based on best practices from around the District. And the faculty contracts task force has incorporated years of faculty concerns into improving both the full-time and adjunct/extra service teaching contract documents.

WHAT IS THE BIG PICTURE?

While individual faculty and even some individual campus disciplines or discipline clusters object to some of the specific recommendations to emerge within the overall FLRG/PIT project, largely on the basis of a perceived/predicted negative effect on their individual earning potential, taken as a whole, the FLRG/PIT recommendations - if implemented - will result in significantly more resources being devoted to instruction. Specifically:

·       More full time faculty will need to be hired;

·       Previously uncompensated work finally will be compensated;

·       More faculty – full time faculty and adjunct faculty – will see their earnings increase.

All of these are big wins for the faculty of the DCCCD broadly. And most importantly, these are big wins for the students we serve, who would be the ones to benefit from faculty who are not trying to take on as much extra work as possible and thus are able to devote more time to individual students.

To delay the implementation of the FLRG/PIT recommendations would only perpetuate the inequities that have plagued us for decades, and commit those hundreds of DCCCD faculty – who teach labs for reduced compensation, who teach extra students without compensation, who coordinate without compensation – to another year (or more) of the indignity of being compensated inequitably or even to be forced to perform uncompensated work, like more hours in the lab at reduced compensation, or teaching extra students in larger classrooms without compensation, or performing coordination work without compensation.

Instead of passing resolutions objecting to, or seeking delay of implementation of, FLRG/PIT recommendations – before the chancellor has even decided – faculty can and should use this time to study the recommendations learn how they work together using the ACH Beta Excel calculator. Having the recommendations and calculator freely available for all faculty to try has specifically been done further to gather stakeholder input.

In addition, once the chancellor makes his decisions, guidelines will need to be written. There will then be further opportunity for stakeholder input to ensure the guideline language does not result in unintended consequences.

In the interest of the greater good of faculty broadly, and in the interest of solidarity with those faculty who have labored for inequitable compensation for decades, the Council strongly urges all its members to support the FLRG/PIT recommendations.

WHAT IF I HAVE FURTHER QUESTIONS AND CONCERNS?

The time is now for all stakeholders, including faculty, to review all of the recommendations in context, and to share their concerns with their respective faculty association president.