The Academic Affairs Council (AAC) is tasked with the judicious allocation of resources that support the academic mission of Bates College. This work takes many forms, but includes allotting tenure-track and nontenure-track faculty positions to academic units and deciding which units will have access to replacement or additional courses in a particular academic year.

For Tenure track faculty positions, each fall, the AAC issues a call for position concepts detailing the process for applying for faculty resources and / or reauthorizations. 

Data Used by the AAC

• The TPT is an online “dashboard” that helps faculty think about workload in their program or department. The data in the TPT will be refreshed by September 1 each year.
• Enrollment and Majors data for the academic units at the college is available from this report. The AAC uses these data along with other information to make resource allocation decisions. You must be on campus or connected to the campus computer network to view the report. Like the TPT, the data will be refreshed by September 1 of each year.

The Two Year Plan

For allocating temporary faculty resources such as visiting faculty or course replacements, the AAC has asked all chairs to include the details of such requests in the two-year plan they complete and submit annually. 

Revamped from previous years, the 2YP is a succinct narrative. To help AAC better understand unit needs with regards to temporary faculty resources. This shift moves toward a system where we reduce the number of VAP searches and new hires at the college and where we increase the number of long-term faculty, enabling us to increase the stability of our faculty and curriculum.

Please respond to the following prompts. One or two paragraphs for each question should be adequate.

• What courses do you need to offer in order for students to be able to meet your curriculum and demand? Are there courses or sections you could reasonably not offer one time in the next 2 years and yet meet core curricular needs?

  • Please consider only what your students need to proceed through your curriculum at the 100, 200, and 300 level. 

  • Please consider needs for any majors or minors you offer as well as the general education contributions your unit makes. Note that in considering VAP replacements, the AAC is looking to satisfy needs (not wants) that cannot be met by other members of your unit or through cross-listing. 

  • If seeing a list of your recent offerings and enrollments would help, please email Matt Duvall. 

  • Feel free to attach any supporting documents to your unit’s narrative.

  • You may find it helpful to look at your unit’s data in the Teaching Planning Tool. You must be on the campus network to access the Teaching Planning Tool.  

• Given the needs outlined above, over the next two to three years, what are the courses that you must offer that you are unable to offer given the faculty resources you have over the next two years? Please specify these needs year by year. 

• As you look forward 1-2 years, do you foresee the need or opportunity for a multi-year VAP to meet the needs of your unit? 

• Our goal is to get the information from you that is necessary for us to understand your unit’s needs for the next 1-2 years and to support the Bates curriculum. If there is information that we have not asked for that you think is important, please feel free to add it here and suggest how we can gather it going forward.

Each chair must complete a 2-year plan by October 14, 2026. AAC is not prescriptive to the method of responsing to these prompts. If your preference is to complete the previous excel spreadsheet, please do so using this link. When you have completed your unit’s plan, you may submit it on this page (below), or email it to Matt Duvall.