EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Your UAOSU bargaining team and the administration team met at 9:30am-2pm on Tuesday, February 18. The administration team passed three articles, showing almost no movement on crucial faculty priorities. We passed six proposals to the administration team and informed them that we have filed an Unfair Labor Practice due to their handling of faculty work coverage during the CGE strike last fall. We have been at these negotiations for over a year, and are seeing decreasing movement from administration. Given this, our bargaining team has also filed the paperwork to go to mediation.
UPCOMING SESSIONS & EVENTS
Use the links below to add these to your calendar.
- Tues Feb 25 9:30am-4:30pm Cascade Hall 141 (Please check the bargaining page on our website before you come by – if this session ends early, we will post on our website)
FULL UPDATE
This session began much as our last one did: the administration team asked what we planned to do with the full-day session, given that many articles are on our side of the table. We again reiterated that nearly all the proposals on our side are interlinked with compensation, which has been on their side for over a month. The administration team called a caucus.
After, the administration team brought three proposals: Term of the Agreement and Academic Classification and Rank are identical to their previous pass, striking all our remaining proposed language. In Compensation, too, they have returned to their previous proposal, adding only a single, unhelpful line. At our previous session, we once again emphasized the inadequacy of their merit-only structure, which does not guarantee a pool of money to be distributed. In response, they added a line assuring that UAOSU could request an annual breakdown of how merit raises have been distributed. Given that we already get regular salary reports, this is hardly a significant offer. Further, it completely fails to address our concerns. Absent a pool, we cannot be sure that the administration will distribute anything beyond the minimum to eligible faculty – and we fear that their new system incentivizes supervisors to evaluate faculty more harshly in order to save money on raises. After waiting over a month for this counterproposal, it is deeply disheartening to see the same inadequate proposal yet again.
After a caucus, our team brought six proposals. In Periodic Review of Faculty (PROF), we have again rejected the administration’s assertion that the adjustments to the structure of PROFs must wait until 2028 to be completed. The Administrative Modernization Project should not stand in the way of faculty getting reviewed as usual. We also reinserted language defining and limiting when a faculty member’s work can be deemed “failed to meet expectations” in a review. Given the administration’s intransigence on merit-only raises, we must have protections to ensure that faculty reviews are fair.
In Promotion and/or Tenure, we again rejected the administration’s definition of what constitutes an overall negative PROF and how it can trigger a Post-Tenure Review.
In Research Support and Copyright, we have accepted most of the administration’s last proposal. We recognize that the federal funding situation is currently in a state of instability and confusion, and while we still believe that growing the bridge funding pool and returning additional overhead to PIs would be good moves for research, we can return to these issues in future negotiations. We did reassert that faculty who develop Ecampus courses should retain a right of first refusal to teach those courses. We want to limit the administration’s ability to exploit short-term labor to develop Ecampus courses.
In Term of the Agreement, we again proposed a three-year contract.
We also brought back two proposals related to the work coverage during the CGE strike. In No Strike, No Lockout, we again proposed that faculty will not be expected to take on the work of striking employees. We also brought back an LOA on Faculty Work Coverage During the CGE Strike (which the administration team previously refused to engage with) affirming that faculty will not be disciplined or receive negative repercussions related to any work they covered or refused to cover during the strike. We informed the administration team that we have filed an Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) with the state Employment Relations Board related to this issue. If you have not yet informed us of your experience being asked to cover work during the strike, please do: email info@uaosu.org.
Finally, we informed the administration team that we will be filing for mediation. Our negotiations have stretched over a year, and the administration team has repeatedly brought us identical proposals, refusing to show movement even after repeated conversations about the problems with what they have proposed. Filing for mediation means we will be assigned a mediator from the state, who will work with both parties to move toward an agreement. We plan to hold our remaining February bargaining session, and it may be 4-6 weeks until we can schedule our first mediation session. We are frustrated to be at this point and hopeful that a mediator can help us push through these blocks and settle a contract.
Our website provides a table with links to the articles for which we have presented proposals, along with the administration’s counterproposals.
The next bargaining session is 9:30am–4:30pm on Wednesday, February 25 in Cascade Hall 141. We may not use the full session, but we intend to bargain for as long as we can have productive conversation. Even if you can only drop by for half an hour, your attendance matters: show the administration that faculty are watching 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.
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,
Kelly McElroy and Your Bargaining Team