Eastern Washington faculty affirm union representation

Full- and part-time faculty at Eastern Washington University have voted overwhelmingly for formal representation by their union, the United Faculty of Eastern. The election was the second to take place since the state Legislature in 2002 cleared the way for faculty bargaining in the four-year state university system. Faculty at Central Washington University voted for union representation last June.

When the mail ballot vote was counted on Nov. 19, the tally was 338 voting yes and 46 voting no. UFE president Anthony Flinn says while the outcome seemed inevitable, the size of the yes vote—88 percent—speaks to the strength of the union culture at Eastern. Under voluntary recognition, the UFE has been representing faculty for 10 years. Last April, the administration made a move to terminate the UFE contract, which was due to expire in June. When the union filed for a certification election in May, this prevented any change to the faculty’s contract status. The administration’s meddling with the contract helped cement faculty views about the need for a union.

“We’re really rooted now,” says Flinn. The union is also larger than the voluntarily recognized unit was because the state Public Employment Relations Commission ruled that the state university unit should include adjunct faculty, who number about 100. The unit also includes about 100 part-time faculty, who are defined as those who work more than 50 percent time and thus qualify for some benefits.

The next step for the union is building maximum membership and holding campus forums to determine priorities for bargaining the next contract. In the coming weeks, Flinn also plans to address faculty at Western Washington, where a union card drive is under way.

Both UFE and the local at Central Washington University are affiliated with United Faculty of Washington State, which is affiliated with AFT Washington, the Washington Education Association and their two national affiliates, the AFT and NEA.

Illinois union settles strike

Chicago’s notorious winds were chilly indeed this fall, when two higher education strikes buffeted the city in two months. More than 500 faculty and professional staff at Northeastern Illinois University, represented by the local chapter of the University Professionals of Illinois/AFT, braved the barricades Nov. 19 after contract talks broke down over insurmountable salary and workload differences. It was to be almost three more weeks before the four-year contract was settled and ratified on Dec. 8, allowing 12,000 students to go back to classes the following day—just in time to complete the semester.

The strike began soon after the conclusion of the City Colleges of Chicago strike by the Cook County College Teachers Union/AFT (see the December 2004/January 2005 AFT On Campus). As with the CCCTU, the NEIU-UPI settlement came when a state legislator, the Rev. James T. Meeks, intervened and brought the institution’s top decision-makers face to face with union leaders. In a dramatic finish, when all but the salary package was agreed upon, NEIU board chair Daniel L. Goodwin donated $400,000 to fund adequate raises.

Goodwin’s gift, to be paid out in four installments over the life of the four-year contract, enabled an increase of 3.5 percent each year to cover cost-of-living raises and to address two salary problems: pay inequities for instructors who were the lowest-paid in the state, and salary compression created as new faculty were hired at “market rates.”

The gravest issue for the union and the university, says UPI chapter chair Ed Hunt, is the plight of instructors, whose number has grown from 15 in the early ’90s to more than 175 now. In general, faculty and staff have always been aware of declining pay, increasing workload and little respect from management for the work they do. But “those most burdened by this,” says Hunt, “were instructors who are paid scandalously low salaries.

“One of our guiding principles was that instructors must get paid for the work they do—paid the same benefits as other faculty. Tenure-track people recognize that more and more of teaching is being done by instructors. They are concerned that they are turning into indentured labor, and this decreases the quality of our programs.”

While administration officials acknowledged the problem, they couldn’t come up with the money to solve it. Even the involvement of federal mediators proved unproductive.

At the request of students, Meeks stepped in and convinced both parties to change their negotiating formula. Both sides agreed that years of higher education funding cuts by the state Legislature and level funding last year created the crisis, says UPI statewide president Sue Kaufman, who assisted the union in negotiations.

Goodwin’s gift made the difference between an increase of 3 percent and 3.5 percent. With equity adjustments, some instructors may see increases of as much as 15 percent, says Hunt.

Another accomplishment of the negotiations, notes Hunt, is that the union completely rewrote its contract, which was first negotiated when the university was part of the centralized board of governors system. The union was able to hold off a demand that faculty increase their workload. Finally, faculty received back pay for the weeks they were on strike, and the money was in their hands before Christmas.

“To see both sides committed not just to settling the strike but to seeing that employees were well looked after just speaks volumes about the level of respect in the room,” says Meeks. The state senator has introduced a bill in the Legislature, H.B. 750, that would provide a $500 million boost to higher education funding in the state. He is hoping to drum up enough support to guarantee an override to the governor’s promised veto.

Vt. adjuncts want in from the cold

The Community College of Vermont (CCV) is unique in a number of ways. For one thing, its entire faculty is adjunct. Yet, with low tuition and open enrollment, it serves more than 9,000 Vermonters spread over 12 locations and one online “site” each year.

CCV also stands out as one of the few public institutions of higher education in the Northeast that is not unionized. “It is no coincidence that the faculty of the Community College of Vermont are among the lowest paid in the Northeast,” writes Ernest H. Broadwater, president of Vermont State Colleges Faculty Federation/ AFT in a letter of support for organizers at CCV.

Those organizers may change all that. Focusing on job security and communication, they are beginning to explore the possibility of a union. Their first task: education. Citing an “enormous lack of broader perspective on the potential and role of community colleges,” Heather Luden, an English professor who is helping to lead the effort, says, “We are very isolated from [the] broader community. We don’t go to conferences; we don’t receive academic journals; we don’t have department heads to keep us current. The fact that other community colleges have unions, have full-time faculty, have departments, have professional development and networking opportunities, have faculty who publish, have health benefits, etc., usually comes as news to the people who have shown up at our meetings.”

Primary issues Luden and others plan to pursue include compensation for canceled classes (CCV carries a 20 percent cancellation rate); systemwide notice of faculty vacancies; resources such as administrative support, e-mail and voice mail, and meeting and planning space on campus; seniority recognition; a faculty review process; professional development opportunities; and participation in curriculum planning.

“With 600 to 700 adjunct faculty members and a student body that’s the second largest in the state,” says Bill Noble, who teaches creative writing online, “it’s time to balance the equities so each of us—faculty, students, administration—can operate on a level playing field.” Polly McCray is more specific about what she wants from a union: “The ability to speak my mind without a fear of not being hired again, [and] the ability to buy into the group health at whatever rates the college is paying.”

With so much work to be done educating faculty about the possibilities a union might offer, McCray doubts union cards would circulate before next semester—and even that might be early. But she and others hope that long-overdue organizing at CCV will, eventually, make all the difference.

Florida faculty ratify two new contracts

Faculty at two universities in Florida recently ratified contracts, showing that reasonable negotiations and fair contracts can triumph over statewide changes hostile to unions.

Before last year, the faculty at Florida’s 11 state universities fell under one contract, negotiated between the United Faculty of Florida/AFT and the state board of regents. A devolution of that system, initiated by the governor’s office, now requires separate contracts with local trustees.

Trustees recognized UFF as the bargaining agent at eight of the universities last year; then in the spring, Florida Atlantic University (FAU) was the first to ratify a three-year contract. In November, faculty at the University of South Florida (USF) ratified a three-year contract. Both settlements retain important rights from the previous, centralized agreement, as well as improvements.

“What’s important here is the union reestablishing its institutional presence on these campuses,” says Steven Weinberger, executive director of UFF. “The USF contract brings back what had been the status quo. We gave up nothing and made some important gains.” He notes that the USF contract, which, for its first year, provides a 2 percent increase with additional raises up to 5 percent based on merit, builds on some features in the FAU contract. Both parties also agreed to reopen bargaining on wage increases when the state’s financial picture is clearer down the road. Weinberger expects most other universities to fall in line with similar advances. “We’re making meaningful progress at Florida State University, Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University, University of North Florida, University of West Florida and New College,” says Weinberger. But at the University of Florida, management is threatening the integrity of the bargaining unit, says Weinberger, by questioning its composition. And negotiations are at an impasse at the University of Central Florida and at Florida International University, where administrators are pushing for control over curriculum, program offerings, promotions, benefits and discipline. Meanwhile, Gulf Coast University faculty, disappointed after a chilly start, anticipate the new contracts will promote a climate change.

Grad students keep FICA exception

Graduate employees got an end-of-the-year present from the IRS, when the Dec. 21 Federal Register published final rules governing student employee Social Security tax, or FICA, exceptions. For months, one draft of the rules had eliminated the student exception that graduate employees have always enjoyed. The IRS was intent on changing the rules to collect the tax from medical residents, but, to the dismay of graduate employees and institutions alike, its draft language also had folded in the student workers.

The AFT and other organizations presented legal analysis and testimony against that change, however, and they prevailed.

“The overarching principle of the new regulations,” says AFT legal department senior associate Teresa Ellis, is “as it had been in the old regulations. That is, in order to be eligible for the student FICA exception, the employment must be ‘incident to and for the purpose of pursuing a course of study.’” This provides the flexibility that protects employees of an education institution.

Earlier last year, graduate employees were up in arms over the possible change. Scott Henkel, president of the Graduate Employees Union/AFT at Michigan State University, spoke at an IRS hearing and David Hecker, president of the Michigan Federation of Teachers & School Related Personnel, helped him arrange a meeting with U.S. Rep. Sander M. Levin (D-Mich.), in which he asked the congressman to protect graduate employees from a provision that was never meant to apply to them in the first place.

“Our work was particularly important,” notes AFT vice president William Scheuerman, president of the United University Professions/AFT at the State University of New York. “We were the only union or organization that put actual graduate employees in front of decision-makers so they could hear firsthand what these changes would mean.”

Additionally, the IRS dropped its requirement that the student employee be enrolled at least half-time to be eligible for the exception.

International enrollments slide

Three separate surveys are showing declining numbers of international students at colleges and universities. This has educators worried that an exodus away from U.S. education will deal a blow to the $13 billion education industry as well as to the cross-cultural exchange that occurs with these students on campus.

The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) shows an 18 percent drop in international students at 125 universities over the last year. The Institute of International Education (IIE) shows the first decline since 1971, down 2.4 percent since the previous academic year. Undergraduates led the shift, especially those from China, where enrollment fell by 20 percent. Japanese enrollment fell 14 percent and enrollment from India by 9 percent.

IIE also reports gains among graduates, but among the top 25 host institutions, graduate student enrollment declined by 3 percent. CGS found differently, reporting a 6 percent decline among international graduate students across the board, with the largest declines seen among engineering students. And a coalition of five educational groups, led by NAFSA: Association of International Educators, found that international enrollment declined at nearly half the universities surveyed. Applications have decreased even more dramatically—a full 28 percent, according to CGS.

Educators blame the dip on a number of factors, including post-Sept. 11 security measures that make obtaining visas slow and difficult. Other factors include increasing competition from other countries, particularly England and Australia; increasing educational resources in home countries; and prohibitive costs.

Trouble begins early. Some students are required to travel to a central city far from their homes to attend a visa interview. Once they arrive in the Unites States, they risk major delays if they want to visit home and return. Stories of students stuck across oceans, especially in China, unable to return to their studies, are common. Fadi Zoghby, a Lebanese graduate student and Graduate Employee Organization/AFT member at the University of Michigan, lost an entire semester waiting for his visa after a trip home. The Visas Mantis security check program further restricts students in the sciences, who are targeted for additional scrutiny due to suspicions of terrorist activity.

In response, government administrators have been tutored by the State Department in more efficient handling of student visa requests. The timeline for admissions decisions for international students has been moved up and FBI clearance is no longer an early requirement. Visas Mantis clearance has been extended beyond six months to a full year, new consular officers have been added and an electronic Visas Mantis system has replaced cable. On campuses, universities are trying to address Sevis fees, meant to cover federally mandated tracking of international students.

If all goes as planned, these measures will improve the system and lure international students back.

TAs bring yuletide message to Wis. leaders

Santa, aka University of Wisconsin Teaching Assistants’ Association co-president Mike Quieto, paid an unexpected visit to Wisconsin’s capitol in December, leading about 50 university workers and students in pro-education, pro-labor carols directed at the Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee members.

“Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way, Oh what pain it is to see tuition hiked each day—HEY!” they sang. Their verse began, “We want low tuition—more diversity, healthcare for TAs, and no adversity.”

Also on the activists’ wish list: fair contracts for all state employees, including faculty and TAs; restoration of faculty and classroom cuts from 2002; and an increase in scholarships for working-class students and students of color. The group distributed a “naughty and nice” list of legislators, tallying those who have opposed or supported union causes. “Nice” lawmakers were rewarded with candy canes, “naughty” ones with lumps of coal. Gov. Jim Doyle was treated to a whole bag of coal, says Quieto, for laying off state employees, contracting out work, attacking healthcare and cutting university budgets.

TA contracts in Wisconsin remain frozen after a two-day walkout last spring. TAs are fighting to retain their no-cost health benefit, while the state insists they pay half of what their full-time counterparts pay: an $11 monthly premium for a single worker, $27.50 for a family, according to Quieto. Until a new agreement is reached, the workers will continue to receive benefits, but salaries, too, remain frozen. “By not getting a raise, we’re falling further behind,” says Quieto. “We want something to keep up with the consumer price index. We were behind before, we’re behind now, we’re getting ‘behinder’ faster.”

Quieto hopes negotiations will resume early this year, before the contract expires in June. The university, he said, is pushing to bargain both the 2003-05 contract and the 2005-07 contract at once. “Bargaining’s going to be tough,” he says. “If we can’t get something acceptable, we’re not going to sign it.”

Illinois unions gain in a tough climate

In addition to the hard-fought agreement at Northeastern (see page 5), two additional Illinois universities signed new labor contracts in recent months. As a result, salaries went up 4 percent at Chicago State University and 3.1 percent at the University of Illinois-Springfield.

University Professionals of Illinois/ AFT won the 4 percent increase at CSU for the first year of a two-year contract, and 3.5 percent for the second year. The contract has a one-year extension, as it originally was to expire in 2005; now it expires in 2006. Ellie Sullivan, secretary treasurer of UPI, negotiated the contract, and says there is additional money for minimal salary adjustments and degree increments. She adds that, because the agreement was a reopener only, no changes other than salary were made.

At U of I-Springfield, Normajean Niebur, UPI chapter president, is disappointed in the one-year contract that was ratified on Jan. 12. Its 3.1 percent salary increase is insignificant when the salaries of most support staff affected are less than $10,000 a year. At that rate, says Niebur, “When you get 3.1, you get nothing. We’re really hurting. We’re getting farther and farther behind.” This is the third year in a row this chapter has gone to federal mediation.

“I’ve got people here that are single parents. They have to have this job,” says Niebur. “They’re afraid to go out on strike, [and] the university knows that.” Niebur hopes to embarrass the university into better treatment by reaching out to students’ parents and taxpayers to explain how their money is being spent. The small salary increase, she said, is especially galling as the university builds new gardens and installs web cameras in public areas on campus.

“The University of Illinois at Springfield does not care about their support staff,” she says. “We have had new duties added to our jobs. When people retire, their positions are not being filled.”

Sue Kaufman, UPI president, says that while she is pleased to have concluded a “very tough round of bargaining,” the battle at Northeastern is indicative of problems faced by the entire state. “The state must prioritize higher education,” she says. “It’s just an abominable situation.”