Vermont contract talks at an impasse

Faculty at the University of Vermont (UVM) who fought a tough battle to secure the right to bargain in April 2001 have learned that was only a warm-up to the battle they're facing now--the fight to secure a fair contract. After 10 months of discussion and an estimated 200 hours of meetings, on Sept. 4, UVM United Academics/AFT/AAUP and the administration declared that they were at impasse.

The issues that compelled the faculty to unionize have proven to be the stumbling blocks at the bargaining table: salary, the need for a stronger voice in governance as the administration bumbles, and issues of job security and fair treatment for nontenure-track faculty.

The University of Vermont has the reputation of being a "public ivy." However, faculty complain that with salaries among the very lowest in the United States, quality is on the skids. "For 10 years, officials have been promising to do something about compensation," says UA chief negotiator David Shiman. "At the bargaining table, they have the opportunity to do so, but they have yet to take this opportunity."

Of equal concern to the union is the university's use and treatment of nontenure-track faculty. These "temporary" faculty, who make up more than one-third of the 600-person teaching faculty, have worked 10 years on average at the university. Eighty-six percent work without multiyear contracts. In negotiations, the university has been unwilling to extend long-term contracts and adequate pay increases to the nontenure-track faculty.

"The university is trying to split us up along tenure-track and nontenure-track lines to weaken our collective strength," says Linda Backus, acting UA president, "but we want dignity, justice and respect for all faculty."

Having a role in academic decision-making is a priority to the faculty, who are living with the consequences of major administrative blunders committed by people who lack the faculty's long-term investment in the university. Most recently, the university executed a costly early retirement buy-out program that depleted faculty ranks by 13 percent.

The university has refused to give faculty a standard grievance proposal, does not wish to be held to past-practice precedents and wants to keep raises to a minimum. The union is seeking 3 percent across the board plus merit and promotion increases and market adjustments.

Because of the declared impasse, the two sides will meet with a federal mediator. After that, the contract could fall into the hands of the Vermont Labor Relations Board to settle.

Wayne State contract gives fair share

The newest contract for Wayne State University faculty and academic staff brings about something the union has been waiting a short lifetime for--a fair share agreement. Formed as a chapter of the American Association of University Professors 28 years ago, the union of 1,580 faculty and 260 academic staff affiliated with the AFT in 1999 to strengthen their resources and political operating base.

The three-year contract, ratified Sept. 6, achieves this goal. It also provides an overall 10.25 percent salary increase, at a time when the cash-strapped state is talking no increase in university funding.

Michigan Federation of Teachers and School Related Personnel president David Hecker attributes the breakthroughs both to the union's becoming more politically active and to its joining the state labor movement. Wayne State's eight-member board of governors is elected, and political action is the lifeblood of the MFT&SRP. Today, says Hecker, "the board has more people who understand the role of employees on campus, who respect what they contribute, and understand they deserve fair and just compensation and rights and benefits."

The union was able to stave off the university's push for a punitive post-tenure review system. Instead it was able to negotiate resources for a constructive process of peer review and professional development.

The union and university also came to an agreement on how to address rising health insurance costs, with a labor management committee that will oversee changes in the next year.

Finally, the union won a battle at the bargaining table to preserve the status of the academic staff within the union, which the university has been attempting to undermine--especially in the area of professional duty assignments. Administrators "don't understand academic staff," explains Jan Thompson, executive director of the Wayne State AAUP-AFT. They think of people who hold positions such as academic counselors, librarians, archivists, financial aid advisers and so on, as being "glorified clericals." The union held firm that they are professionals appropriately represented in a union of faculty and staff.

Calif. part-timers fight for self-determination

Part-time faculty at the College of the Canyons in California are taking heart from small victories as they fight to exercise their right to unionize. The adjuncts, Part-Time Faculty United of AFT (PTFU), filed a majority of cards with the Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) this past summer to petition for an election to choose an exclusive collective bargaining agent. In response, the college announced it would recognize the adjuncts as part of the existing full-time faculty association--a union of 150 that, in its 25 years of existence, had declined to represent the 400 part-timers.

The AFT filed an unfair labor practice against the community college district. The state PERB asked the District Superior Court to place an injunction on the district and full-time faculty union barring them from negotiating part-time issues until the question of the election was resolved. On Sept. 11, an administrative law judge ruled that the district was not in violation of the state education law.

The ruling is disturbingly "convoluted," says Linda Cushing, AFT national representative. The administrative law judge, who is a newcomer to the court, "relies on specific case law where the decisions he cites established exactly the opposite legal precedent."

To make matters worse, a technical mistake had the effect of lifting the injunction for a period of time before the appeal could be heard. PERB lawyers swung into action and managed to get the injunction reinstated temporarily. "It is unusual to see the board" move that fast, says Marty Fassler, the attorney handling the case for PTFU. "They seem to grasp the importance of the issues at stake."

In the meantime, the College of the Canyons has been canceling classes taught by part-timers, bumping students from their necessary courses or shifting extra classes to the full-timers.

The control of the part-time faculty is of great importance to the college because it is linked to the $57 million pot of state money to be used to provide parity increases. The part-timers are determined that their elected union be the one to speak for them on the question of how parity is defined. Given the part-timers' history with the district and full-time faculty organization, the arguments for a democratically elected bargaining representative get stronger all the time.