Sabbaticals

Sabbatical allows faculty to engage in scholarly development or other activities that will increase their scholarly achievement and capacity for University service. A sabbatical is a significant investment in and sign of support for a faculty member, and faculty are expected to return to the University for at least a year following their sabbatical. Written applications for sabbatical leave must be submitted to the dean or department chair no later than October 1 of the year before the intended leave.

Policy

This document describes the policies on this campus regarding sabbatical or academic leaves. Its aim is to ensure coherent and uniform guidelines and procedures and to clarify state policies. Further information is to be found in the State University Policies and Procedures related to Sabbatical Leaves in Article XIII, Title E, of the Policies of the Board of Trustees of the State University of New York.

A sabbatical leave is defined as a leave for the purpose of encouraging faculty members to engage in scholarly development or other activities that will increase their scholarly achievement and their capacity for service to the University. As a leave of absence with pay constitutes a significant investment on the part of the University in the future career of the individual faculty member, it is granted to eligible faculty on the understanding that the faculty member has an explicit obligation to return to his or her position at full service at the University for a minimum of one year. If a faculty member fails to return from sabbatical to accept employment elsewhere, he or she will be expected to remit to the University any salary paid by the University during the leave period. At the conclusion of the sabbatical leave the faculty member must forward to the Provost, with the endorsement of their department Chair and Dean a detailed report on professional activities and accomplishments during the period of the sabbatical leave.

Eligibility

Academic employees holding continuing appointments who have completed at least six consecutive years of service within the university or who, if they previously have had a sabbatical leave, have completed at least six consecutive years of service within the university from the date of return from their last sabbatical leave, shall be eligible for sabbatical leave.

General Information and Timeline

Application for a sabbatical should be made through Interfolio. The application should include a detailed description of the proposed research or other scholarly project and the relevance of the proposed activity in contributing to the University's objectives, as well as the suitability of the faculty member's background and qualifications for carrying out the project. Circumstances beyond control of the faculty member may necessitate a change in plans. All such changes must be approved, in writing, through the normal administrative channels as soon as such need is known. Applicants should also include information on significant scholarly contributions since the last sabbatical leave.  If the request includes visiting an embargoed country/entity [https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/Pages/Programs.aspx], please confirm that you have reviewed the proposed visit with the University Export Control Officer and that the visit has been approved. For more information on Export Controls, please refer to http://research.stonybrook.edu/export-controls.

Sabbatical leave applications should include information on salary from any non-State University sources to be earned by the faculty member while on leave. Whether this sabbatical leave is for six months at full salary or half state salary for one year, the total salary to be earned while on sabbatical from state plus other sources should normally not exceed the faculty member's full basic annual salary rate (for faculty in the School of Medicine and Dental Medicine who are subject to Article 29 of the UUP agreement, this means their total annual compensation). Faculty applying for sabbatical leave may, with prior approval, accept fellowships, grants-in-aid, or earned income to assist in accomplishing the purpose of their leave. Any such income during the leave period which is to accrue from non-State University sources for assisting in scholarly and research objectives, for relocation expenses, or to offset loss of certain State University benefits (such as health and retirement contributions) may be allowed if proper detailed justification is provided. Salary from grants, contracts or fellowships may be paid for those on a one-half time leave. The amount to be paid can be as high as 50% of the regular annual salary, and the regular state line in all cases must reflect no more than a 50% salary rate.

To allow for the planning of teaching responsibilities for the coming academic year, the leave application request must be submitted to the department Chair no later than October 1 of the academic year prior to the one for which the leave is intended. Please see the table below as an example:

The Chair will forward the request with an accompanying recommendation to the appropriate dean.  Deadlines for submission are established by each dean, but are no later than October 15.

If the period of sabbatical does not start within the traditional academic year, the application must be submitted to the department Chair no later than six months prior to the beginning date of the proposed sabbatical leave. Since no extra allocations of funds are available to implement the sabbatical policy, support of sabbaticals must be covered by regular departmental allocation. Therefore, the department Chair's recommendation should include a statement about the proposed method of handling the normal duties of the faculty member on leave.

On or before November 1, the dean of the division shall review the application and with his or her own recommendation forward it to the Provost for core campus divisions or the Vice President for Health Sciences, who has been designated by the Provost to approve applications submitted to deans of the Health Sciences schools. The Provost or the Vice President may approve such leave deemed appropriate and shall forward his or her recommendation to the President for final approval. It should be noted that administrative approval of applications for sabbatical leave will include both a budgetary and substantive review.

Illness, or other unplanned circumstances, may cause interruption of an approved sabbatical. In all such cases, the faculty member shall be placed on another leave, with or without salary as appropriate. The President may reestablish the balance of the sabbatical leave at the mutual convenience of the campus and the employee.

The above structure is to ensure the continued integrity of an extremely valuable University mechanism for the professional development of its faculty.

Applying for Sabbatical

Starting Fall 2021, all sabbatical requests must be made through Interfolio. A Stony Brook University unified workflow template has been created, and is available in the "Review, Promotion, and Tenure" module. This template is integrated with "Faculty180" Faculty Activity Reporting System, and a faculty member's CV for the last 6 years is generated automatically based on their Faculty180 profile when the candidate submits their sabbatical request. In  addition to filling out the Faculty180 profile, faculty will have to fill out the Sabbatical Request form. For informational purposes and to simplify the preparation of the answers, the file with the form questions is available to faculty -- the answers can then be copy-pasted into the Interfolio online form.

After the faculty member returns from the sabbatical, this template will also be utilized for sabbatical report submissions.

To allow for the planning of teaching responsibilities for the coming academic year, the sabbatical application request must be submitted through Interfolio no later than October 1of the academic year prior to the one for which the leave is intended. The dean will then review the request and forward it to the Provost office no later than November 1.