Guidelines on Work Allocation to Academic Staff

2015-16
1. Introduction
These guidelines aim to explain the range of activities allocated to academic staff in the. They
apply to staff on grades 7, 8 or 9. They are informed by, and should be read in conjunction
with, university work allocation guidelines and other Human Resources policies and
documentation available on the HR section of the university website.
2. Principles
In drawing these guidelines, the faculty working group has adhered to the following principles:
Balanced profile
There is a danger of an over-reliance on a purely numerical and mechanistic approach. The
aim of work allocation must be to provide individual lecturers with a balanced profile or
workload, working to their strengths and enabling their professional growth and development
whilst meeting the needs of the area and the strategic plan of the university. The balance also
needs to recognise the importance of the student experience and that academic staff are
professionals, work flexibly and undertake a wide and varied range of activities.
The allocation process uses hours as the unit of measure but does not capture all the tasks,
duties or responsibilities of academics.
Final profiles are expressed in terms of percentages around the key areas of a lecturers
profile:
1. Teaching: Scheduled teaching activity [FST] and associated TRA
2. Servicing: Teaching Related Duties and Academic Management and planning
3. Research and income generation and special projects
Trust, fairness and transparency
This model rests on trust in professional judgement and aims to ensure parity of practice and
transparency across the faculty. For those reasons:
1. The process is anchored around the individual deployment meeting led by the
Principal Lecturer responsible for deployment/Head of School
2. All senior staff in the schools of the faculty responsible for deployment of
academic colleagues adhere to these principles and guidelines
3. A summary of final profiles will be made available to other members of the
academic group
4. It is acknowledged that the faculty operates a diverse curriculum with specific
discipline requirements and trust in colleagues is essential. Profiles from other
groups across the school will be available with a narrative
5. Delivery of teaching needs to reflect published information to students (KIS) and
will be to the MATs.
6. Deployment discussions need to take into account activities which will allow the
faculty to meet its Key Performance Indicators and contribute fully to the
University Strategic Plan. Priorities will be identified on a yearly basis and feed
into deployment of staff as necessary. The faculty objectives for 2015-16 are
stated in the annual submission document available on our University intranet at
7. Profiles are the outcome of a negotiated process; they are also part of an iterative
process as individuals may wish or be required to become involved in different
projects during the academic year which will modify their profile and potentially
those of colleagues in the group/academic area.

Finally as the nature of assessment, teaching and learning continues to change, these
guidelines must be seen as flexible and will be kept under review on an annual basis.
3. indicative workload allowances
3.1 Teaching (50-60% of profile)
Teaching includes both scheduled teaching activities (FST) and TRA and is expected to be 50
60 % of the allocation of a profile, depending on other commitments. A minimum of 50% is
normally expected.
Formal scheduled teaching (FST) is inclusive of all teaching delivery, including formal on line
delivery.
Teaching related activities (TRA) include, for example, marking and assessment of students,
attendance at course meetings, invigilation, internal moderation, preparation for teaching,
preparation of learning materials (including X-Stream). TRA is allocated at the fixed ratio of
1:1 (FST:TRA) for undergraduate teaching and 1:1.3 (FST:TRA) for postgraduate courses.
With regards to delivery overseas please refer to the university guidelines for UK and
international travel.
It is important to acknowledge the overall number of students a member of staff will interact
with, and in particular the associated burden of assessment/marking. Whilst acknowledging
differences resulting from the variety of delivery and assessment methods across the faculty
portfolio, the outcome will always be based on the same practice of an individual discussion
between the academic member of staff and their profiler and the exercise of professional
judgement.

Section 1 Scheduled teaching activity

Activity
Class contact made up of Lectures,
Seminars, Workshops and Studio work
Tutorials and other feedback/support
sessions
PhD/Prof Doc Supervision

Unit
Per timetabled
hour
Per timetabled
hour
Per student

Allocation

Independent study including projects, Major

Projects, MIS, dissertations

Per student

Off site working and Field Course

Including Residentials

No of Field
Courses

37 hours

Distance Learning teaching

Per module

1 hour for each

timetabled hour per
week

Comment
As per MAT
As per MAT

75 hours per full-time

student for the
supervisory team
16 hours per student

Pro-rata for part-time student (normally 37.5 hours for the team)
There is no TRA attached to this activity
Based on a 40 credit module. Factored to reflect credits e.g. 12
hours for a 30 credit module etc.
There is no TRA attached to this activity
Factored by 2 for field course leader/organiser. Based on the
field course being a full working week in duration. Pro-rata for
reduced duration.
There is no TRA attached to this activity
This allowance relates only to modules wholly taught through
distance learning. To be agreed with Head of School

Notes on Section 1:
1. Allowances do not include the 150 hours scholarly and research activity allocated within colleagues contract or the definition of how this is to be deployed
which is discussed as part of the PDR process
2. Allocation calculated directly from the individuals published timetable.
3. Maximum 550 hours allowable in this section.
4. Local specialist allocations may also be defined (e.g. QTS Link Tutoring).
5. Group size/total number of students a member of staff delivers to and related marking load should be taken into account and additional hours can be
allocated in discussion with the Head of School if need be

3.2 Servicing: Teaching related duties and academic management (30-40% of profile)
It is recognised that staff also take on a range of other roles within the group, faculty and
university, commensurate with their grade. These may include, for example, personal tutoring,
research ethics, research mentoring, partnerships, course and level leadership etc. These will
normally be acknowledged by an additional allocation depending on the actual demands of
the role.
This section relates to the main activities applicable to all staff across the faculty. Due to the
wide spectrum of disciplines across the faculty, some activities are school specific and will be
recorded as such.
Academic management responsibilities will be allocated within course teams and will vary
with the size of the course. The total number of hours available to course teams will depend
on student numbers. On larger courses, where a course leader receives formal support from
colleagues as level leaders for example the allocation needs to be calculated accordingly.
Similarly, there must be scope for individual negotiations based on distinctive characteristics
of a course, in particular at post-graduate level.

Activity
Personal tutorship

Unit
Per student

Course Leader

Mixed(1)

Year Tutor/Level Leader (where

applicable)

Mixed

Module Leader

Per module

Distance Learning Module Leader

On-line material development

Per module
Per module

Open Day Attendance

Number of
events
Per student per
year

Work placements
CDC
Local Research Ethics Co-ordinator
Academic Integrity Officer
Mitigation officer
Research Mentor
Research Mentee
New staff/new role mentor
Peer Observation
Specific management and
administration duties allocated by
Head of School
Link tutor for franchised delivery
overseas
D/L Academic authoring

Per mentee
Per year
Per staff
Per mentee
Per hour
Per hour
Per hour

Allocation
1.5 hours per Yr 1
student(U/G or P/G)
1 hour per student for all
others
100 hrs basic per course
+ 2hrs per FTE student
averaged across levels
100 hrs basic + 1hr per
FTE student in the level
10 hrs basic + 5 hrs per 30
FTE students
Same as above
Allocation agreed by Head
of School
7.5 hours per full day event
6 hours

Comment
Typically, some element of the role will be carried out through the
delivery of specific modules. Teaching on those modules attracts
separate and specific FST hours Rates per year
As in previous years
Additional allowance to be considered for courses with Professional
Body requirements (QTS)
As in previous years
Additional allowance to be considered for courses with Professional
Body requirements (QTS)
As in previous years

As agreed with HoS. Factored for less than full day.

May be increased/decreased by negotiation depending on distance
travelled for visits
To be agreed with the HoS will vary as provision lessens

60 hours
60 hours
60 hours
3 hours
3 hours
10 hours
3 hours
Allocation agreed by Head
of School

This may include local arrangements for specific roles as well as

allocated managerial responsibilities

Allocation agreed by Head

of School
Allocation agreed by Head

Applicable to brand new modules where content was never taught

Faculty or institutional representative

Course Development including
Periodic Review
Faculty or School approved
Committee chair
Faculty or School approved
Committee member
Union or other remission
Induction/Graduation
External representation

Per appointment
Hours
Hours
Hours

of School
18 hours
By negotiation
By negotiation to a
maximum of 74 hours
12 hours per committee
As agreed
12 hours
Maximum 20 hours

Notes on Section 2:
(1) Mixed allowances include a base rate plus an allowance per student.
(2) Additional allowances for interviewing applicants will be applied locally.
(3) Further allowances can be made here for staff teaching overseas.

before
Library, Equality and Diversity or Health and Safety reps
Includes programme development and agreed by HoS with Dean
(maximum 300 hours to be shared within team.)
Includes Chairs of Faculty Research Ethics Committee, REF Coordinator, Healthy and Safety etc
As agreed with HoS
As advised by HR
To be agreed with HoS.

4. Research and Income generation and special projects (10-30% of profile)

Research should be understood in its broad HEFCE definition and in line with the University
Strategy as encompassing Enterprise activities. These will vary from individual to individual
and should be recorded following negotiations in the deployment discussions.
All academic staff are allocated 150 hours of RSA time as a contractual agreement. This
represents the 10 per cent minimum time allocated for research. PhD supervision comes
under section 1 (FST) and is in addition to the 10-30%. Additional hours will be allocated for
conference presentation and other research and enterprise activities as agreed through the
PDR process. Please use the university work allocation model and its metrics for reference.
Administrative research (LREC, preparation for committees etc) come under Services, see
above.
Once external funding is brought into the faculty through enterprise activities, staff have the
option to use part of this funding to buy out time from their existing profile, once they have
reached the 50:60 per cent teaching boundary line, in order to pursue these activities. This
should be in negotiation with their line manager and in line with agreed faculty parameters.
5. Conclusion
These guidelines should be read in conjunction with documentation from Human Resources
relating to the procedures and guidance concerned with the allocation of lecturers duties.
These guidelines aim to provide the flexibility needed to ensure that each member of staff has
a balanced profile taking into account the variety of provision in the portfolio, whilst ensuring
parity of treatment and transparency.
Finally these guidelines must be seen as flexible and will be kept under review on a yearly
basis.