Senate

Subject: Study Leave (Ordinance XV)

Origin: Minutes taken from Senate on 7 March 2007

This is a modest proposal to consider amending our study leave arrangements to make them more flexible, more attuned to our institutional research needs, and possibly, better labelled. It is intended to extend existing arrangements rather than replace them.

The current study leave regulations have two faults:

1. The name. The term ‘leave’ is misleading and sends false signals both internally and externally. It is a period designed to allow staff to apply themselves intensively to research while relieved of most administrative and teaching duties. There is no expectation that the rate and volume of work are reduced, and it is quite unlike, say, annual leave or sick leave, being analogous to neither. Occasional informal descriptions construing study leave as a period to ‘recharge batteries’ or simply take a well earned break are likely to lead to misunderstandings among both our colleagues and public.

2. We are wedded to a medieval legacy of sabbaticals – i.e. allocating the right to apply for study leave literally every seventh semester or year. This creates an inflexibility, in that the study leave period may or may not coincide with the optimal time for research activity. The chances are against this, and such periods, while in the overwhelming majority of cases used very productively and positively, could be better deployed if matched to research planning more directly.

The proposal

1. We consider a change of name. In particular we try to remove the term ‘leave’ which it most certainly is not. However, I have had trouble discovering a good alternative and most other research-led universities do seem to use “study leave”. Whilst study leave is usually used for research purposes, I accept that refreshing teaching materials and general scholarship – perhaps catching up on reading or visiting other, especially international institutions - are all legitimate purposes of such periods. (Academic) Study Time or (Academic) Study Period, are possibilities but other suggestions are welcome.

2. We introduce greater flexibility. For many staff, reaching the stage where they can apply for a year’s sabbatical is immensely welcome, and it is certainly valuable and deserved. But it may not always coincide with particular research needs. There will often be times when a shorter period, perhaps two or three weeks or a couple of months, will ensure completion of a publication or research report, or the timely submission of an important funding application. This may, or more likely may not, coincide with a sabbatical. If Departments could allocate short periods to ensure such work is given the time and space required, research output and productivity could be increased and study leave periods made more productive and better integrated with research planning. This would undoubtedly produce some complications for HoDs in the planning of departmental work (not work loads), but I would expect it to be used relatively infrequently, and it only eases the complication they already face of achieving research targets in the context of staff commitments generally. Such periods would accrue against a staff member’s overall entitlement, but would simply be used more flexibly and deliberately than now.

3. Note that the intention is to extend, not replace, the existing Ordinance XV. Proposed amendments to the Ordinance in the light of 2. above have been drafted by the Registry (attached). For simplicity, the name has been left as “study leave” but Senate is invited to consider other possible names.

4. This change could usefully be signalled in RAE returns as an administrative measure designed to enhance and reflect research activity and productivity.

Author – Chris Dunbobbin

Date – May 2007