Pre-Tenure Leave Program (Undergraduate)

Pre-Tenure Leave Program
(Undergraduate)

Responsibilities in the areas of teaching, scholarship, and service to the University community place significant demands on the time of Washington and Lee faculty. These demands can be particularly taxing for tenure-track faculty as they initiate their scholarship agenda and formulate pedagogical strategies most effective for their new environment. In order to assist junior faculty in beginning to meet those responsibilities successfully, the University has developed an optional leave program to allow a junior faculty member to take release time in order to focus more fully on pedagogical and/or scholarly development.

Eligibility
Faculty holding tenure-track appointments are eligible for pre-tenure leave after two full years of service at Washington and Lee, and must complete their leave before the year in which their tenure review takes place. Faculty who receive credit for prior teaching at other institutions are not eligible if their probationary period at W&L is three years or fewer.

Options
• Paid leave for one twelve-week term
• Paid leave for two four-week terms

Application Guidelines
• Applications should be made in the year prior to the desired leave period.
• Applications will be made directly to the appropriate Dean via Watermark by the same deadline as routine leave applications, November 1.
• Applications will be no more than three, single-spaced pages and must be explicit about the applicant's scholarly and/or pedagogical goals.
• Candidates must receive a formal written endorsement from their department head.
• Applications will be judged based on clarity, specificity, significance of the outcome proposed, and feasibility of the plan for achieving the proposed objectives.
• The dean may require revision of applications in order to maximize benefits to the applicant, department, and institution.
• After a pre-tenure leave has been approved by the appropriate dean, the dean will notify the faculty member, the department head, the provost, and others in the university who maintain records about faculty status.
• Upon completion of the leave, the faculty member will submit a report to the appropriate dean and department head on the progress of the leave.

Post-tenure Sabbatical Leave
• All faculty members remain eligible for leave in the year following a favorable tenure decision.