To assist associate professors in pursuing promotion to professor, NIU provides up to 15 course releases each academic year. To be eligible to apply for these course releases, associate professors must possess at least six years or more at that rank and intend to pursue promotion in the next two years after receiving the course release.
The university will also release bargaining unit members who receive this benefit from some service obligations such as committee membership during the same semester of the academic year in which they receive the course release.
View Article 28:7 in the Collective Bargaining Agreement (PDF) regarding course release.
Instructions
Associate professors must fill out an application that includes a brief plan outlining steps they intend to pursue to strengthen their ability to apply for promotion.
Department chairs will review these applications and approve any that are feasible with respect to the impact on the department's instructional capacity, provided the plan is appropriate for enabling the bargaining unit member to prepare to successfully apply for promotion within the two years after the course release.
Associate professors whose applications are not approved may apply again in subsequent years.
Please note that applications for course release are due each year in mid-October for the following academic year. This is to allow departments time to make arrangements to allow someone else to teach the course(s) being released.
submit an application for course release