USFA members continue to identify workload as a bargaining issue. Various factors including increasing student numbers, and a decreased faculty complement are resulting in greater workloads for faculty. Several provisions in the 2023-2027 Collective Agreement are intended to be some measures to address this issue.  

Guidelines for the Assignment of Duties
Several new provisions are connected to Guidelines for the Assignment of Duties. For example, units are required to identify normal teaching loads for each rank in their Guidelines.  

Guidelines must now also take into consideration the employee’s rank and designation of appointment, and they must include adjustments to teaching and service to support employees who are appointed while in the process of completing a terminal degree. This is in addition to existing provisions requiring Guidelines to take into consideration the range of work required for renewal of probation, tenure and promotion, and the changing distribution of workload over the careers of employees.  

Additional items that fall under the full range of demands associated with teaching that must be considered in a unit’s Guidelines now include:

• class size;
• methods of instruction to be considered now include multi-access (in-person, online, or remote) delivery, community-engaged teaching, cross-listed courses, availability of technical support, course administration, and grading;
• mentoring now explicitly includes mentoring of instructors or faculty members in addition to students;
• that Guidelines must take into consideration course design and preparation, course development, and course coordination is now explicit, as is consideration of the supervision of laboratory assistants and of internships and practicums.

Supervisory work to be considered in the Guidelines now explicitly includes clinical supervision, course level and its enrollment, and supervision of graduate and undergraduate research theses or projects, participation in thesis advisory committees, and supervision of students’ creation and performance of artistic works. 

Guidelines must also consider clinical work where applicable, which may include clinical instruction, clinical service, on-site practicum supervision, and/or professional practice.  

Outreach activities to be considered in the Guidelines explicitly include Indigenous advocacy and community engagement, Indigenization and reconciliation work, and fostering respectful relationships with Indigenous communities. 

Assignment of Duties
The new Agreement contains language clarification so that the assignment of duties follows individual consultation and discussion with the faculty member and after the overall details for assignments of duties within the unit has been shared and discussed at a the departmental/college faculty meeting. 

Changes to Assigned Teaching
An e-Letter regarding the Association’s approach to this new provision was recently circulated to USFA members. Changes to assigned teaching after the annual assignment of duties has been approved requires consultation between the Department Head or Dean and the employee. In addition, changes to teaching assignments that happen within 6 weeks prior to the start date of the assigned teaching or after the assigned teaching has commenced are subject to overload remuneration or an equivalent reduction in assigned teaching before the end of the following academic year. “Overload” means that the change results in greater workload.  

Scheduled Teaching and Instruction for Instructors, Lecturers and Professors of Teaching
Another new provision is that, except in the case of condensed programs, Instructors, Lecturers, and Professors of Teaching are not required to deliver lectures in excess of 6 hours/day.