School of Nursing: Policy on Faculty Office Assignments

Title

School of Nursing: Policy on Faculty Office Assignments

Introduction

Purpose

The School of Nursing is committed to fair and equitable allocation of faculty office space and furnishings. This policy outlines what faculty are entitled to in the assignment and/or selection of office space.

Scope of Applicability

This policy pertains to faculty members of the School of Nursing.

Policy

Office Entitlements

Faculty members who have a 75% - 100% assignment and faculty members who have a 50% - 74% assignment and documented need (communicated from the division managers to the facilities manager) will have an individual office with the following furniture:

• One L-shaped or rectangle desk
• One tall bookcase or shelves attached to the wall
• One file cabinet with three, four, or five drawers
• One desk chair
• Two side chairs (guest chairs)
• One trash can

Faculty members who have less than a 75% assignment and no documented need, will share an office (2 per office) with at least the following furniture:

• Two rectangle desks
• One bookcase or shelves attached to the wall (shared)
• One file cabinet with four or five drawers
• Two desk chairs
• One side chair (guest chair)
• Two trash cans

If a faculty appointment outside of the SON is > 50%, the School will consider office needs and availability prior to assigning an office.

To the extent possible, large corner offices will be reserved for Distinguished Professors and Distinguished Scholars. Otherwise, a Distinguished Professor or Distinguished Scholar is entitled to choose a larger office available at the time of their appointment. Exception would be temporary office assignments dictated by the availability of space.

Exceptions

Faculty members in the phased retirement program (.50 FTE) will be allowed to remain in the faculty offices they occupied prior to entering phased retirement.

Faculty emeriti with any percent FTE are entitled to a shared office as long as space is available. Other Faculty emeriti will be assigned space in the community office designated for retired faculty.

During times in which the University is operating under extraordinary conditions such as during a global pandemic, additional policies and procedure regarding office assignments may be issued by the State of North Carolina, the UNC System Office or the University which may be exceptions to this policy.

Office Assignments / Selection

Each spring, the School of Nursing will issue a call for requests from faculty who would like to be considered for larger or preferred office space. Faculty who request a new office will be given the opportunity to select from the list of available offices according to the points system outlined below.

New faculty members will also participate in the points system and be given the opportunity to select an office if they are available. If they are not available when it is their turn to select an office, they will be assigned one according to these guidelines.

The points system is based on faculty rank, tenure status, percent time (full-time equivalent), number of years with the UNC-CH SON, and number of years as a faculty member outside of the UNC-CH SON. Points assigned for each category are as follows:

Faculty members with the most points will be at the top of the selection list and will be given the opportunity to choose from the list of available offices. Once the first faculty member makes a decision on a new office or to stay in their current office, the second faculty member will be given the opportunity to choose from the list of available office, and so forth. If a faculty member does not choose an office at the time they come up in the points list, they will not be given another opportunity to choose an office until the following year. Larger offices will be reserved for senior faculty or faculty with more tenure at the School of Nursing. Temporary assignments for larger vacant offices will be considered by the School.

If a faculty member requests a move and selects a new office during the process, they cannot request another move for 3 years. Therefore, if a faculty member anticipates a change in point value due to promotion, tenure, additional activities, etc., they should consider waiting to enter the office selection process to benefit from the maximum number of points. (Exception would be temporary office assignments dictated by the availability of space.)

Office Moves

As part of the agreement faculty will make when they chose to move to a new office, they agree that the furniture in the new office at the time of selection will generally stay in the office. The following two circumstances will initiate a furniture move:

1. the faculty member has special furniture in their current office that was purchased and configured for their particular need (i.e. ADA requirements), and
2. the faculty member has more than the standard office furniture outlined above and wants to take the extra items (i.e. an extra bookcase/shelves attached to the wall or file cabinet). In this case, the standard office set-up of good furniture must stay in the vacated office.

Therefore, the majority of faculty members will only have personal items moved to the new office and use the furniture in the new office. Faculty who will be taking any furniture to the new office will need to indicate which items at the time of office selection so that moving arrangements can be made.

Telephone numbers will be transferred to the new office in the majority of cases. An exception would be if a faculty member is moving to take a new position such as a division chair. In this case, the faculty member must take the new phone number of the position.

Contact Information

Policy Contacts

• Lisa Miller, Associate Dean for Administration
• Sam Deal, Facilities Manager

Important Dates

• Effective Date and title of Approver: 1/9/09, Facilities Planning Committee
• Revision and Review Dates, Change notes, title of Reviewer or Approver: 2/2/16, Facilities Planning Committee
• 7/1/18 Dean (edits on 7/24/18 to remove Facilities Planning Committee since this committee was abolished in FY 2017-18)