Fourteen professors have accepted the faculty retirement incentive, Provost Peter Lange said Tuesday.
Lange said the incentive was not crafted to help trim Duke’s budget, but to encourage older professors to retire and allow the University to hire younger academics.
“This initiative was all about faculty renewal, not budget cuts,” Lange said.
Under the incentive program, professors agreed to retire by June 30, 2011 in exchange for additional payment from Duke. To be eligible, a professor had to meet the Rule of 75, meaning that his or her age and years of work at Duke sum to at least 75.
Lange said he does not know how much the incentive packages will cost, adding that “it won’t be huge.”
Professors from the School of Medicine and the School of Nursing were not eligible for the incentive, and no professors from the Pratt School of Engineering or the Sanford School of Public Policy chose to retire.
Deans discussed the incentive, first announced in October, with individual faculty members in their schools. The deadline for professors to retire was originally Dec. 14, 2009, but was later extended to Jan. 30 of this year.
Additionally, 44 professors have entered other individual agreements with the University to retire in the future, which help the University plan to replace these professors, Lange said.
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