Workload Video

Message from Provost Helms regarding workload study

October 8, 2009

I want to talk about workload. But first I want to talk about work.
 
I hope you know that I know, and that Jim Barker knows, that you have been working very, very hard. You're working harder than ever now, especially with the extra students that we have on campus.
 
We've had a lot going on in the last year and a half, and perhaps we didn't take the time to say thank you.  But I want to start by saying thank you to all of you for the fact that you are the ones who have built this university. You are the ones who have taken us from No. 38 to No. 22. It's your hard work. It's your belief in Clemson University. It's your belief in the Clemson family that has made the difference. Let's not forget that. And please know that we know that.
 
Now let's talk about workload. We are engaged in a workload study. And I want you to know that that's exactly what it is. It's a study. It is not an evaluation. It is not a performance review. It is not filling out FAS for the second or third time. It is simply a study. It is taking a picture of the activity of Clemson University.
 
I wanted your chairs and your deans to engage in that activity so that we could make good decisions as we move forward into the next couple of years.
 
Over the last five years we have said goodbye to many of our faculty. We have brought in over 300 new faculty. We started this year with 450 fewer faculty and staff and we brought in 500 additional students.
 
I need to know what this university looks like. The last time we did this study was 10 years ago and it was a lot different picture than what we have now. We need to know where all the activity is across our campus in order to make decisions about where to put our resources. Where do we have enrollment that is too large? Where do we have classes that need additional faculty? Where can we add graduate programs? Where do we need to make sure that we don't increase enrollment because we're at a point where the faculty are so heavily loaded that there's nothing more we can do? Where do we have strengths in research? Where do we have to put dollars to help increase research?
 
All of those questions are part of a big picture. I need to see the big picture, not just the pieces, not individual by individual or department by department, but the big picture.
 
What am I going to do with this workload study? I'm going to use it to help paint that picture. It's data that I can use to explain why we need to shape a freshman class next year the way we think we need to. It's data that I can use to support why we need tuition increases. It's data we can use when we go to our Legislature to ask for additional resources for this university. We need the whole picture.
 
I don't intend to come back and ask any of you to work any harder or to change what you are doing. That's between you and your department chair and your dean.  That's their job, to adjust the workloads in your departments to make sure your departments are efficient and effective. That is not the purpose of this study.
 
Many of you have asked, why the additional fifth block instead of only four? The fifth block is not an increase of 25 percent in your workload. I added it in simply to give you a chance to let us know that you are doing a lot more than just the four normal blocks. That fifth block is all of the service you do for this university and continue to do year after year.
 
You can think of the four blocks perhaps as those blocks that bring you tenure, promotion, the blocks that bring you your professional development opportunities, and the fifth block as a block that keeps the university alive, keeps your department alive. If you were a part of a family -- and you are, the Clemson family -- I liken it to being able to do the dishes once in a while for the university. That's all that fifth block represented. I was hoping it would give you a chance to tell me that, "Look, I'm doing a lot more than four blocks -- here's what I'm doing for the university in addition to everything else that I do."        
 
That's all this was. It was a study. I want to thank you for participating in it. I apologize for the lack of communication and the fact that perhaps you didn't understand why you were doing this. It was meant as nothing more than help for me, for your deans and for your chairs, to make good decisions as we move forward. Good decisions based on facts, not on hearsay, not on the rumors I hear, not on the people who can get to me to tell me one thing when I don't have the rest of the picture.
 
So thank you very much. Thank you for all you do. Thank you for working so hard. Thank you for your belief in this university. Thank you for being here.
 
Go, Tigers.