Faculty Workload (Policy FP-11)

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Effective Date

Fall 2013

Last Revision Date

June 2025

Responsible Party

The Divisional Dean/ Chief Nursing Administrator of the School of Nursing/, receives the Chief Nursing Administrator receives and submits the recommendations. The final approval is from the Dean of the College of Health Sciences.

Scope and Audience

This policy applies to all full-time faculty, including tenure, tenure-track, clinical track, and lecturers in both the graduate and/or undergraduate programs in the School of Nursing at Boise State University

Additional Authority

N/A

1. Policy Purpose

The policy establishes the School of Nursing procedures governing the assignment of faculty workload.

2. Definitions

Teaching

Teaching is the preparation, development, and delivery of academic courses via distance or face-to-face delivery. This includes the application of assessments related to student performance and other administrative and pedagogic activities associated with the successful delivery and sustainability of a given academic course, internship, or clinical practicum. Teaching requires currency in clinical practice* through knowledge of current professional practice standards. Teaching also includes mentorship of students in areas such as professional development**, research, presentations, or preparation of theses or scholarly projects.

*Clinical Practice

Faculty practice is described by the School of Nursing as practice that simultaneously meets the needs of organizations or patients/populations, while contributing to faculty development. The roles of clinician, educator, researcher, consultant, and/or administrator are visible during faculty practice through compensated and uncompensated models. Nursing faculty are encouraged to maintain faculty practice as it helps ensure faculty stay current and maintain expertise in clinical areas, provides opportunities for scholarship, and significantly augments their mentoring skills for students. Per BSU Policy 1110 (Conflict of Interest and Commitment)

Full-time faculty members may engage in Outside Employment activities for one day per week during their contract period and without restriction during recognized university holidays, spring break, winter break, and during any non-appointment time. It is expected that these days will be spread more-or-less uniformly across the year so as to minimize the impact on the university duties of the faculty member. The fact that these limitations are met will not be considered a defense for the actual impairment of a faculty member’s performance of their contracted university duties during their university contract period.

**Professional Development

Professional development is the acquisition of new skills and/or updating old skills within the specific health-related discipline.

Scholarship

Scholarship is defined as those activities that systematically advance the teaching, research, and practice of nursing through rigorous inquiry that (a) requires a high level of discipline expertise (b) breaks new ground/innovative, (c) can be replicated or elaborated, (d) work and results are documented, (e) work and results are peer-reviewed, and (f) has significance/impact to the profession (in nursing, involves translation into practice) (Diamond & Adam, 1993) Additionally, per the Boyer Model, the work should include clear goals, adequate preparation, appropriate methods, significant results, effective presentation, reflective critique, public dissemination, and peer review.

Scholarship for Tenure/Tenure Track Faculty

It is expected that at a minimum, tenure/tenure track faculty:

publish an average of one peer-reviewed manuscript annually over a five-year period (School of Nursing FP-10 Promotion and Tenure Policy)

Additional peer-reviewed scholarship may include:

invited presentations to regional/national/ international conferences
podium presentations to regional/national/ international conferences
fundable score for external grants
research poster presented at regional/national/international conference

Other scholarship that may add to the body of work may include:

book chapters
non-research-based posters
internally funded grants
podium presentations at local conferences

Tenured faculty who don’t meet research expectations may be assigned a higher teaching workload.

Scholarship/Professional Development for Clinical Track Faculty

While publications, presentations, and grants are not an expectation of clinical track faculty performance, clinical track faculty are encouraged to participate in scholarship that supports teaching and practice. Workload for these activities will be determined on a case-by-case basis. Activities include:

Technical, procedural or practical innovations made clinically or professionally
Educational research projects resulting in findings disseminated at professional conferences and/or in peer-reviewed publications
Grant applications and extramural funding for innovative teaching methods, to support instructional activities.
Direction of graduate and undergraduate student research.
Development, revision, and assessment of curriculum.
Development of visual and other teaching materials (including edited anthologies, textbooks, and software) implemented in the classroom or disseminated through publications, papers, or non-print form, including the production of videos for instruction

Professional development is the acquisition of new skills and/or updating old skills within the specific health-related discipline, and may include:

Specialty certifications (for example, CNE, Palliative Care, CHSE, RNCOB, C-EFM, Advanced Nurse Executive)
Participating in teaching and/or clinical practice conferences/workshops
Development of technology/pedagogical skills pertinent to teaching
Visits to comparable institutions (eg, site visits for benchmarking, participation on accreditation teams, etc.)
Earning additional clinical credentials/certifications/degrees and/or taking applicable coursework
Specialty certifications (for example, CNE, Palliative Care, CHSE, RNCOB, C-EFM, Advanced Nurse Executive)

Service

Service is defined as activities in which faculty members offer professional knowledge, skills, and advice to their university, profession, and/or public communities. Service activities, whether compensated or not, draw on professional expertise, related to the teaching and research missions of the University and imply a connection to the University.

Service consists of professional activities other than teaching and scholarly activity, and may be divided into three areas:

Institutional service to the University, the College of Health Sciences, or the School of Nursing and may include:

Number of advisees and descriptions of service to advisees
Advisor to student organization
Chair/participation in university, college, or school committees whose work makes a significant contribution toward improving quality
Leadership of substantive contributions toward special projects or activities of the university, college, or school
Holding administrative responsibilities in the university, college, or school
Evidence of service to students outside of class (advising/mentoring)
Supervising service learning projects
Publication of clinical handbooks, textbooks, or chapters in clinical textbooks
Production of videos or other multimedia materials on clinical instruction

Professional service to academic and professional organizations, which have direct ties to a faculty member’s areas of interest and may include:

Holding office in a national, regional, or local academic or professional organization
Organizing an academic or professional conference
Reviewing books for publishers
Serving as an editor or as a referee for an academic journal
Maintaining clinical practice in healthcare and community organizations
Awards and honors from professional organizations

Public or Community service, which involves professional service (including paid or unpaid consulting) as a representative of Boise State University to local, regional, or national organizations, public or private. Faculty members use their professional abilities to make a significant contribution to the well-being of the larger community, and may include:

Delivering speeches or serving on community panels/boards
Representing the university in community organizations, forums or external roles
Organizing workshops, seminars, or meetings in areas of professional competency
International nursing service (online or in other countries)
Community presentations/trainings

3. Policy Statement

General Distribution Requirements

Workload Units by Contract length

Faculty workload units are assigned based on the length of contract as follows:

9 month = 30 workload units
10 month = 33 workload units
11 month = 36 workload units
12 month = 39 workload units

Faculty workload consists of a distribution of teaching, scholarship and service.

Standard Workload Distributions:

Tenure/Tenure Track Faculty
- 60% – Teaching (9 credit equivalents) per semester
- 20% – Scholarship
- 20% – Service
Clinical Track Faculty & Lecturers
- 80% – Teaching (12 credit equivalents) per semester
- 0%- Scholarship
- 20% – Service
All faculty are expected to participate in professional development. Workload for professional development is determined on a case-by-case basis.

Exceptions to Standard Workload

Faculty teaching in the nurse practitioner program: Per the National Task Force Standards (6^th ed., 2022), Criterion I.G, 1.H, and II.C., institutional polices should support faculty practice to maintain clinical expertise, which includes a ‘reasonable portion of the workload effort’. Accordingly:
- AANP renewal requirements (every 5 years): includes 1,000 clinical practice hours and 100 contact hours of advanced pharmacology CE
- ANCC renewal requirements (every 5 years): includes 1,000 clinical practice hours
- AANPCB renewal requirements (every 5 years): includes 1,000 clinical practice hours
- Formula: 1,000 clinical hours / 5 years = 200 hours / 52 weeks = 3.84 hours per week or 10% of workload

Tenure/tenure-track faculty: To accommodate workload related to high-caliber scholarship, including external grant funding, career development awards, and the dissemination of such work, a reduced teaching load will be considered on a case-by-case basis with the program director and Divisional Deans.
- A redistributed workload of 40% teaching, 40% scholarship, and 20% service carries expectations of research productivity outputs
- Outputs should include a minimum of two peer-reviewed products per year from journals with moderate impact factors, and submission of external, high-dollar grant proposals or career development awards that involve time-intensive efforts

Faculty teaching in undergraduate programs: based on program needs, WLU may be assigned by the program director (and approved by the Divisional Deans). For example, lead faculty may be assigned to oversee multiple adjunct faculty in clinical or online courses as part of their teaching assignment.

Administrative Assignments

Examples: Divisional Dean, Associate Divisional Dean, Program Director, Simulation Director.

Process for Determining Workload:

Faculty discuss workload issues and requests for the next academic year during their annual evaluation with their supervisor.
Final Workload is negotiated between individual program directors and faculty.
Final faculty assignments are determined by the Chief Nursing Administrator and are based on the needs of the School of Nursing and faculty expertise. Individual program directors will sign off on individual workloads and forward to the Chief Nursing Administrator/School of Nursing Divisional Dean to approve, and the Dean will have final approval of the School of Nursing workload assignments in its entirety.
Any subsequent or proposed adjustments to a faculty member’s workload are made in conjunction with faculty and approved by the program director and Chief Nursing Administrator.
Administrative guidelines for documenting faculty workload apply (see workload policy BSU #4560 and #4490).

Forms

N/A

Last Review Date