By Lian Bunny
Assistant News Editor
At the beginning of the 2014-15 academic year, St. Bonaventure University will offer a new phased retirement program for long-serving faculty.
Application for the voluntary phased retirement program became available to faculty with 20 or more years of cumulative full-time service as of Dec. 31, 2013. Faculty members who qualify have already been notified.
This program allows faculty to transition from full-time teaching to part-time work. Gradually, those apart of the program will retire.
This program will allow medical benefits to continue until the faculty member is fully retired but not beyond retirement, according to Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Michael Fischer.
If interested, faculty must submit an application by March 3. Fischer and University President Sister Margaret Carney will review the applications.
“Sister Margaret and I have the right for someone to apply and for us to say ‘No, we can’t accept your retirement at this point. We can’t accept your phased retirement because we just can’t manage it with departmental needs.’ We have the ability to manage [the program],” Fischer said.
Because of the program’s flexibility, Fischer said he doesn’t anticipate a net financial cost to the university. Fischer also wanted to clarify this program is not intended to cut back on the number of faculty members.
“We always try to manage things proactively so we aren’t in financial trouble,” Fischer said. “We look at where we have our faculty needs, and sometimes when people retire, we’ll look and say we no longer have a need in this area. We won’t hire someplace else. So I’m sure some (faculty reduction) would happen, but we’re not trying to target a big reduction in faculty.”
Although this program is being offered because of faculty interest, there has been no participation thus far. Fischer estimated about 35 to 40 faculty members qualified for the voluntary program. However, there have been no formal applications submitted yet.
Richard Simpson, a professor of English, said he was not interested in the program at this time. He has been teaching at Bonaventure for approximately 44 years.
Likewise, his colleague Patrick Panzarella, professor of English, said he is not ready for a phased retirement. Panzarella is chair of the English department and has been teaching at Bonaventure for 49 years. Although he is not currently interested, he said he believes the program has good intent.
“(Its purpose is) to formalize what has been taking place on an individual basis over the past several years.” Panzarella said. “(It’s meant) to offer faculty an opportunity to phase into retirement or to think about retiring and to plan and adjust staffing levels to enrollment and programmatic needs.”
In the past, Bonaventure has offered a similar retirement program. Its guidelines were altered to create the new phased retirement program.
“As people retire, as we always do, we look at where our needs are and our greatest needs. If people want to do this then we want to be transparent about what we can do,” Fischer said.
Fischer added that faculty interest drove the administration to be up front about the program.
“Knowing there were multiple people at least interested in phased retirement, who had come forward and asked what we could do, we said, ‘Let’s just put the cards on the table transparently. Here’s what we are and aren’t able to offer,’” he said.
bunnyla13@bonaventure.edu
