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2015-16 Retirement Planning - Components to Pathways

2015-16 Vice Chancellor Goldberg Memo on Retirement Planning - Components to Pathways

Date:  November 20, 2015

To:  Deans, Directors, Department Chairs & Administrative Officers

From:  Carole Goldberg, Vice Chancellor, Academic Personnel

 

Since the Pathways to Retirement program was established in 2008, over 80 members of the faculty have taken advantage of the opportunity to establish a specific date for retirement up to two years in the future in conjunction with specific plans of research, teaching, and service both preceding and following the move to emeriti status.  Pathways Plans include an appointee’s letter irrevocably retiring as of a fixed date (usually the penultimate business day of June).

 

The growing popularity of this program is due largely to the willingness of deans and chairs across campus to devote resources to the dual goals of faculty renewal and supporting the continued productive engagement of emeriti faculty.  My office provides guidance and support for the Pathways program, but its continued success and expansion is up to you.  This suggests possible components of individualized Pathways to Retirement agreements that you might discuss with faculty and the process for reaching agreement.  The form that should be used in setting out the plan and obtaining my approval and the Dean’s is found at Pathways to Retirement.  Our new campus Faculty Retirement Liaison, Emeritus Professor David Lopez (www.errc.ucla.edu/Faculty) is available to consult on the components of retirement agreements with chairs and deans, as well as faculty considering retirement.  Please contact my Special Assistant, Professor Robert Goldstein when you are ready to finalize a Pathways agreement (goldstein@law.ucla.edu). 

Here are some elements you may want to include in a Pathways agreement:

 

 

  1. Recall:  Campus administrators may enter a pre-retirement agreement with a faculty member who is at least age 60 with 5 years of UCRP service credit for a recall to service after retirement for up to three years, beginning no sooner than the date of retirement + 30 days.  Recall may be renewed year by year thereafter.  Recall may be for teaching, research, or administration, and must be based on programmatic need and budgetary capacity.  The agreement should specify: the course(s) to be taught or other services to be rendered; a rate of compensation not to exceed 43% of pre-retirement compensation for each fiscal year; and that it is contingent on the faculty member’s continued willingness and capacity to maintain  a pre-retirement quality of performance.  Recall teaching is compensated on a per course basis, following campus guidelines.  See APM-205.
  2. Deferral of Five-Year Review:  Agreements may defer a five-year review (or a review’s remedial plan) for up to one year, immediately preceding separation; see UCLA CALL, Appendix 12.  Averting a five-year review in this manner may be advantageous because a five-year review may lead, in cases of reduced scholarly output, to an increase in teaching and service.
  3. Chair’s Grant of Teaching Relief:  Teaching obligations may be shifted or reduced where departmental needs justify such alterations (e.g., the department will benefit if the faculty member engages in curriculum development or co-teaching, provides special administrative services, or concludes unfinished research or catalogues one’s scholarly work and research).  The specifics are up to departments and schools, in line with their needs and resources.  In special circumstances, a faculty member may return from a sabbatical (as required by the APM) to such modified teaching relief.  Please consult me regarding this or any other modification of your standard sabbatical practice.
  4. Space:  Consistent with campus guidelines for emeriti/ae offices and laboratory space, Chairs, with support from their Deans, may approve an allocation of space for up to two years, with allocations thereafter subject to availability.  (A Pathways to Retirement Plan does not involve any campus augmentation of current departmental space.)
  5. Research Funds:  At the expense of the School or Department, research funds may be made available, provided that use is restricted to standard uses of research funds, all purchases of durable goods remain the property of the school, and unspent funds revert to the Dean at the end of a specified period.
  6. Research Professor:  Most emeriti faculty continuing active research programs have embraced the opportunity to apply for the new Research Professor title (or Distinguished Research Professor, for Above Scale Faculty), which they may use in lieu of Professor Emeritus.  Chair’s and Dean’s support for this title may be included as a component of Pathways agreements, pursuant to UCLA CALL, Appendix 38.