Special Programs

The Office for Arts Integration (OAI) Faculty Release Time Awards (RTA) are designed to offer faculty a release from classroom teaching by providing the department/unit course coverage up to $18,000 for a semester. The OAI Faculty RTAs are to be used to support creative activity broadly defined, to:

• Collaborate on creative projects with peers across disciplines
• Discover new practices for teaching, educating students, or presenting work
• Engage with the public in reciprocal fashion

Faculty RTAs may be held on their own or in conjunction with OAI Small Grants or other external or internal awards to complete a project, dive deeply into the process of an existing project, or focus intently on research at the beginning of an arts integrative project.

OAI defines “Arts Integration” as that which engages creative practice and/or artists in the collaborative and experimental building of work/curriculum/production that will benefit how a topic is considered, how it has been treated historically, and how it can be imagined anew. All applicants must make clear the creative component of the work and its novel approach to their practice and/or their consideration of disciplines with which they are engaging. Like the Small Grants Program, the criteria for an OAI Faculty RTA are:

• Projects must include creative practice as a visible and critical element
• Projects must be cross-disciplinary in some aspect (we can support performance, in its broadest sense, IF it is a component of a larger cross-disciplinary / conceptual approach)
• Creative practice must be an equal element in the project and not “in service to” another discipline
• Projects must present a novel or experiment-driven approach
• Projects must have a clearly articulated plan for the support requested
• The project’s target audience(s) must be clearly identified
• Projects must serve communities within a 50-mile radius of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. They may venture elsewhere but must have a local component for our campus and external community to engage/witness/participate.
• If projects bridge divides among the university and surrounding communities (in language, country of origin, social class, racial makeup, etc.), please explain how your proposal builds on existing partnerships or relationships.

Deadlines

The OAI Faculty RTA has rolling deadlines. However, it is important that faculty confer with their EO in a timely fashion to ensure consideration of the respective units’ scheduling needs. Applications will be reviewed between 4-6 weeks after submission.

Eligibility

OAI Faculty RTAs are open to full time Illinois Tenured and Tenure Track Faculty members with at least a 2:1 teaching load (i.e. three courses an academic year) and 100%-time Specialized Faculty. A minimum of 3 years must lapse before a faculty member is once again eligible to apply for an OAI Faculty RTA, if awarded.

The application is only complete when accompanied by an OAI Executive Officer (EO) Approval Form that indicates the faculty member has been in conversation with the leadership of their respective unit(s).

The OAI team expects faculty members continue to meet their obligations on campus during their leave time which may include committee work; advising and supporting graduate students towards thesis/dissertation progress/completion; and shared governance commitments. If OAI support exceeds course release costs, faculty in consultation with their EO can use the funds toward their research project and will be expected to report such at the end of the leave period.

Applicant Requirements

• Must have EO Approval Form.
• In all announcements and publicity for your project, please amplify the work and value of the Arts by crediting as follows: “This project has been supported by the Office for Arts Integration at the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign.”
• Awardees will be required to submit a Final Report at the 18-month marker, post-award.