EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The UAOSU bargaining team and the administration team met at 10am on Tuesday, January 23 in the Ag Leaders Room at the LaSells Stewart Center. We passed 9 articles to the administration team.
UPCOMING SESSIONS
Use the links below to add these to your calendar.
- Fri. Feb. 2: 2-4pm (location TBA)
- Wed. Feb. 14: 10am-2pm (LaSells Stewart Center)
- Fri. Feb. 16: 12-4pm (LaSells Stewart Center)
- Wed. Feb. 21: 9am-1pm (LaSells Stewart Center)
- Fri. Feb. 23: 2-4pm (LaSells Stewart Center)
FULL UPDATE
Having finalized ground rules in our January 19th session, your UAOSU team showed up ready to bargain on Tuesday, January 23 with 9 proposals ready to pass to the administration team. However, before passing our proposals, we asked for clarification regarding the newly announced draft freedom of speech and expression policy. This new policy would make significant changes to the current freedom of speech policy that could affect many OSU faculty. Because the existing policy is referred to in our collective bargaining agreement, we notified the administration team of our intent to bargain over their announced changes prior to implementation. The administration team promised to review the draft and existing policies and discuss how bargaining over this subject should proceed at an upcoming bargaining session. Stay tuned to future updates for details.
We then moved on to our proposals. Our website provides a proposal tracker with links to these 9 proposals. To provide some context to these proposals, nearly everything we will be bargaining for in our successor contract will consist of updates to the existing articles in our collective bargaining agreement. These updates will vary in scope, but all of our proposals will build on our existing language to strengthen protections for our bargaining unit and to address needs that our faculty have identified over the last four years. For instance, over the past four years, the administration has occasionally failed to notify us of changes that affect our working conditions and sometimes spoken as if they have no obligation to bargain those changes with us. With the first three proposals we passed on Tuesday–Management Rights, Separability, and Totality of the Agreement–we are seeking to insert language that codifies this obligation with updates to the language that are narrow in scope, but impactful. Similarly, our No Strike, No Lockout proposal uses a small addendum to protect our faculty from being assigned “scab” work in the event that one of our sister unions on campus were to strike. Our Grievances proposal, by comparison, includes multiple new sections that would provide faculty with more time to pursue informal resolutions to issues before they become grievances, as well as additional pathways to resolving grievances.
The next bargaining session is 2-4pm on Friday, February 2 (location TBA). We plan to present articles on Non-Discrimination and more. Even if you can only drop by for half an hour, your attendance matters: Show the administration that faculty are following this process.
You can find a list of the currently scheduled bargaining sessions, as well as read our updates and proposals at uaosu.org/bargaining.
Also, please stop by the formal Bargaining Kick Off event on Tuesday, January 30 from 12-3pm in the MU Journey Room (104) to meet your bargaining team, learn more about the process and our bargaining platform, and grab some food. Please RSVP at uaosu.org/kickoff.
Our power in negotiations comes from all of us working together as a united faculty. Becoming a member is the first step in supporting your bargaining team and securing a strong second contract . You can become a member online by going to uaosu.org/join.
In solidarity,
Bill Thomas and Your Bargaining Team