Faculty often spend 20–30 hours weekly on teaching and service, leaving little room for scholarship. Join the OFE and guest speaker Heather Witcher (Auburn University at Montgomery) for actionable, evidence-based strategies to streamline your workload and build a sustainable research agenda without compromising teaching quality. The workshop covers efficient grading techniques that provide better feedback in half the time, strategic service boundary-setting that protects research blocks from administrative creep, and semester planning methods that create realistic pockets of research time within heavy teaching loads. You'll discover how to repurpose existing course materials into research projects, leverage classroom experiences as data sources for scholarship, and establish sustainable research habits that fit into 15-30 minute daily blocks rather than requiring large time commitments. You'll leave with concrete strategies for protecting research time from teaching expansion, and a realistic action plan for launching your scholarly agenda while maintaining teaching excellence and managing service obligations effectively.

Heather Witcher is an Assistant Professor in the English and Philosophy Department at Auburn University at Montgomery. She received her MA and Ph.D. from Saint Louis University. As a writing coach for Defend, Publish, and Lead, Heather has guided many faculty to increased scholarly productivity and success.