Tag Archives: Organizing

CUPE 4627 Support Staff at VCC Voice Concerns with BC Government

CUPE 4627, support staff at Vancouver Community College, reported bargaining delays traced to the BC government Public Sector Employers’ Council (PSEC). Despite increases in salaries of managers, PSEC insists on holding the balance of public employees in the province to a net zero worker mandate. CUPE 4627 report

In an unusual move, the employer helped out by closing the facilities and putting up notices that there would be no classes. The faculty association is also on side. Visit the CUPE gallery for photos of CUPE 4627 members on the picket line.

CUPE 4627 head steward Jo Hansen says the problem isnt the employer, but the BC Liberal provincial government. She says negotiations were completed months ago and are only being held up now by government advisor Lee Doney and the Public Sector Employers Council. The local has been without a contract since 2010.

Duquesne appeals NLRB decision on union

Tribune-Review: Duquesne appeals NLRB decision on union

Board decision to reject the university’s request that it be allowed to withdraw on religious grounds from an agreement allowing part-time faculty to form a union, officials announced today.

The United Steelworkers petitioned the labor board on May 14 to supervise a union election to represent about 130 part-time faculty.

The NLRB issued a ruling Monday after Duquesne sought to withdraw from the vote because, as a religious institution, it qualifies for an exemption from NLRB jurisdiction, said Bridget Fare, a university spokeswoman.

How did Quebec Students Mobilize Hundreds of Thousands for Strike?

Labor-Relations Board Seeks Input on Faculty Unions at Private Colleges

Labor-Relations Board Seeks Input on Faculty Unions at Private Colleges

The National Labor Relations Board is soliciting legal briefs on the question of whether or not faculty members at private colleges should be considered managers, a distinction that determines whether they are eligible for union representation.

Since a 1980 ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, National Labor Relations Board v. Yeshiva University, professors at private colleges have been typically classified as managers and, therefore, largely barred from forming unions. In asking for the briefs in its announcement this week, the NLRB said it was seeking help in responding to a case involving Point Park University, a private institution in Pittsburgh where faculty members petitioned for a union election and voted, in 2003, to be represented by a local chapter of the Communications Workers of America.

Duquesne Adjuncts Seek to Form Union Affiliated With Steelworkers

The Chronicle: Duquesne Adjuncts Seek to Form Union Affiliated With Steelworkers

Adjunct faculty members at Duquesne University are seeking to form a union affiliated with the United Steelworkers, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports. The steelworkers’ union said non-tenure-track faculty at the Roman Catholic college had formed a group called Adjuncts Association of the United Steelworkers and hoped to organize a collective-bargaining unit to push for more job security and better pay and working conditions. The steelworkers’ union is considering trying to organize adjuncts at several other colleges in the Pittsburgh area, Maria Somma, its assistant director of organizing, told the newspaper. Richard J. Boris, executive director of the National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions, said on Thursday that he was unaware of any existing faculty union around the country with a United Steelworkers affiliation.

Court rejects UIC union

Inside Higher Ed: Court Rejects Faculty Union

Almost a year ago, faculty members at the University of Illinois at Chicago filed papers to unionize. The drive at the university was seen as a major victory for academic labor, which has struggled in recent years to organize at research universities. And at a time when the treatment of those off the tenure track is an increasingly important issue to faculty leaders, the new union was to have combined tenure-track and adjunct faculty members. Since then, the union has been engaged in a legal fight with the university, which has argued that Illinois law does not allow joint units for tenure-track and non-tenure track faculty members. Along the way, the union won most of the skirmishes, but that ended on Thursday.

Read more: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/03/23/appeals-court-rejects-faculty-union-u-illinois-chicago#ixzz1qFOD1Hhh
Inside Higher Ed

Union Win at Oregon

Inside Higher Ed: Union Win at Oregon

University of Oregon faculty members may have a union soon, after a group representing faculty members at the university filed about 1,100 signed authorization cards with the state’s Employment Relations Board Tuesday. Officials at United Academics, an organization representing tenure-track, non-tenure-track and research professors, said that the number represented a majority of the institution’s approximately 2,000 faculty members.
The university has until April 4 to object to the petition for unionization, according to an official at the Employment Relations Board. Oregon is a state where no election is required as long as a certified majority of the employees in the proposed unit file cards. A challenge could theoretically come if 30 percent of the faculty members petition for an election, but no organizing has taken place for such a challenge.
The now-likely formation of the faculty union at Oregon would be a major victory for academic labor, which has struggled in recent years to organize at research universities. “It shows that faculty members are increasingly frustrated at the increased corporatization of research universities,” said Jack Nightingale, associate director for higher education organizing at the American Federation of Teachers. He said the effort to organize at Oregon was about two years old, with the AFT working with the American Association of University Professors and local faculty members.

Read more: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/03/15/university-oregon-faculty-takes-step-toward-unionizing#ixzz1pcyNEbPh
Inside Higher Ed

Petitions for Support of BC Teachers Gather Force

Please be sure to sign and circulate the Post-Secondary Petition in Support of BC Teachers / BCTF.  The goal is 2,500.  Thank you!

*The Kill Bill 22 Petition has breached 7,000 !

Michigan Senate Approves Bill to Block Unions by Graduate Research Assistants

The Chronicle: Michigan Senate Approves Bill to Block Unions by Graduate Research Assistants

A Republican-sponsored bill that would bar graduate research assistants at Michigan’s public universities from unionizing has been approved by the State Senate. Consideration of the bill coincides with debates over whether research assistants at the University of Michigan should be classified as students, not as employees entitled to collective-bargaining rights. The bill, which now heads to the House, threatens to upend a case pending before an administrative-law judge, who is scheduled to deliver her recommendation to the Michigan Employment Relations Commission on March 13.

State Attorney General Seeks to Thwart Union for U. of Michigan Graduate Researchers

The Chronicle: State Attorney General Seeks to Thwart Union for U. of Michigan Graduate Researchers

Michigan’s attorney general, Bill Schuette, is seeking to intervene in proceedings before that state’s Employment Relations Commission to try to get it to block graduate-student research assistants at the University of Michigan from unionizing. In a motion submitted to the commission on Wednesday, Mr. Schuette argues that the case “involves matters of significant public interest” because the unionization of the university’s graduate research assistants “has the potential to significantly damage” its reputation as a research institution. Leaders of the union drive responded by issuing a statement arguing that graduate researchers have a right to decide whether to unionize without outside interference. When the commission meets on December 13, it is expected to vote on asking an administrative-law judge to conduct a faculty inquiry into whether the university’s graduate-student research assistants should be thought of as employees eligible for unionization, or simply considered as students.

NLRB Proposes Speeding Up Unionization Votes at Private Colleges

The Chronicle: NLRB Proposes Speeding Up Unionization Votes at Private Colleges

Employees of private colleges would find it easier to vote on forming unions under rules changes proposed by the National Labor Relations Board and scheduled for publication in Wednesday’s Federal Register. Among other changes, the proposals would allow for the electronic filing of election petitions, establish standardized time frames for the resolution or litigation of election-related disputes, defer litigation over most voter-eligibility issues until after elections, and consolidate all election-related appeals to the board into a single post-election appeals process, according to an NLRB news release. The proposed revisions are expected to meet opposition from many private-sector employers that fall under the board’s purview and have complained that speeding up elections would leave them too little time to mount effective anti-unionization campaigns and would otherwise stack the deck against them.

Labor Board Rejects Religious Exemption for Saint Xavier U. and Says Adjuncts Can Unionize

The Chronicle: Labor Board Rejects Religious Exemption for Saint Xavier U. and Says Adjuncts Can Unionize

A regional official of the National Labor Relations Board has ruled that Saint Xavier University, a Roman Catholic institution in Illinois, is not sufficiently religious to fall outside that agency’s jurisdiction, and has cleared the way for the institution’s roughly 240 adjunct faculty members to hold a unionization vote.

Purple Thistle Institute—Radical change from below

Announcing the Purple Thistle Institute!
RADICAL SOCIAL CHANGE FROM BELOW

The Purple Thistle in East Vancouver, Coast Salish Territory is super‐pleased to announce that in JULY 2011 we will be running a three‐week summer institute. We’d be thrilled if you would consider attending.

WHAT IS IT? The PTI will be something like an alternative university, or maybe better: an alternative‐to-university.

The idea is to bring together a bunch of engaged, interested people to talk about theory, ideas and practise for radical social change. We’ll have a great time, meet good people, get our praxis challenged and with luck refine and renew our ideas, politics and energies.

Importantly, the conversations will very deliberately cut across radical orientations – anarchists, socialists, lefties, progressives, anti‐colonialists, anti‐authoritarians, ecologists of all stripes are welcome.

The idea is to work, think and talk together – to articulate and comprehend differences sure – but to find common ground, get beyond factionalized pettiness and stimulate radical ecological and egalitarian social change. We want to get good people with good ideas together to talk and listen to each other.

WHEN IS BEING HELD? July 4th – 23rd, 2011

WHAT WILL THE SCHEDULE LOOK LIKE? Essentially all three weeks will follow the same pattern. We will be running 6 days a week with Sundays off. We will be offering 8 morning classes of which participants will be able to choose up to four to attend. Then we will all have lunch together, then every afternoon community work placements will be offered. Evenings will be a mix of open‐space activities, shows, speakers, films and free time.

WHAT WILL THE CLASSES BE LIKE? We have put together an awesome roster of instructors and speakers including Astra Taylor, Cecily Nicholson, Carla Bergman, Am Johal, Matt Hern, Geoff Mann, Glen Coulthard and lots more. The classes will be fairly rigourous (loosely at an upper‐year university level) and include a certain amount of reading and some writing. Attendance is not mandatory and you can engage with as much or as little as you like. The classes include: Decolonization, Activist Art, Urban Studies, Deschooling, Understanding Economics, Contemporary Social Philosophy and Critical Theory.

WHO IS THIS FOR? The PTI is for anyone, of any age, but we will be giving priority to youth, racialized and low‐income folks. As mentioned the classes will be pretty rigourous intellectually, but please don’t let that scare you off. The language will not be overly academicized and as long as you like to read, think, talk and listen you’ll probably be OK. The one real requirement is that you are keenly interested in radical social transformation and come with a generous spirit ready to listen and collaborate.

WHAT WILL IT COST? The three weeks are priced on a sliding scale: $350 ‐ $500. This includes lunch six days a week. If you are coming from out of town, need a place to stay and want to kick down an extra $100 we will find you a good billet who will give you a bed and feed you. There will be a few bursaries available, but we are going to need most people to pay at least the minimum.

HOW DO I APPLY? Hit us with an email at institute@purplethistle.ca and we’ll send you a formal application and instructions.

Labor Board Gives NYU Graduate Students Another Shot at Union Vote

The Chronicle: Labor Board Gives NYU Graduate Students Another Shot at Union Vote

The National Labor Relations Board this week reversed a regional director’s decision that had stymied efforts by graduate teaching and research assistants at New York University to vote on union representation.

Monday’s 2-to-1 decision does not give the graduate assistants the green light to engage in collective bargaining, but it does say that they deserve a full hearing on their request for a union vote. The regional director had rejected that request in June without a hearing, citing a 2004 decision by the national board that halted unionization of teaching assistants at private colleges on the grounds that they were students, not workers.

Nova Southeastern U. Contractor Is Ordered to Rehire Janitors Fired Over Union Activities

Miami Herald: Fired NSU janitors must be rehired, federal agency says

Three Nova Southeastern University janitors will get their jobs back after a federal panel ruled they were illegally targeted.

Three former Nova Southeastern University janitors who lost their jobs during a unionizing drive at the school in 2007 must be reinstated to their old posts, a federal labor agency has ruled — and each will also receive tens of thousands of dollars in back pay.

Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/09/04/1807712/fired-nsu-janitors-must-be-rehired.html#ixzz0yyv7ohlv

Faculty-Union Allies, Hopeful About Obama’s Labor Board, Hear From Its Leader

The Chronicle: Faculty-Union Allies, Hopeful About Obama’s Labor Board, Hear From Its Leader

It’s only a matter of time before the National Labor Relations Board is faced with a challenge to a 2004 ruling that says graduate students at private institutions aren’t employees and therefore don’t have bargaining rights, its leader told attendees at a labor conference here on Monday.

“This is not an issue that we’ll bring up, but I have heard there are cases out there in the works,” said Wilma B. Liebman, the opening speaker at the conference, held at the City University of New York’s Baruch College.

Non-tenured CMU faculty looking to unionize

Central Michigan Life: Non-tenured CMU faculty looking to unionize

The Michigan Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers Michigan are seeking to organize with Central Michigan University’s non-tenured faculty.

U of Oregon faculty weighs union

The Register-Guard: UO faculty weighs union

Comparatively low pay and a rift with administration are driving the possibility of unionizing, organizers say

Concerned about comparatively low pay and what some see as top-down management, faculty members at the University of Oregon are exploring the possibility of forming a union.

Faculty union may be on the horizon at U of Oregon

Daily Emerald: Faculty union may be on the horizon

After two meetings, faculty closest to unionization since mid-70s, Douglas says

Unionizing faculty could lead to higher salaries for University professors, more generous state allocations to the University and greater faculty influence in campus affairs, panelists at two meetings held on campus this week argued. The United Academics of the University of Oregon organized the meetings, held Tuesday and Wednesday.

Union updates

Philadelphia Inquirer: Temple says faculty stalling contract talks
Temple University has filed an unfair-labor-practice complaint against the faculty union, accusing it of failing to continue negotiating a contract because of disagreement over union membership fees.

Socialist Worker: Contract fight at Manhattan School of Music
NEW YORK–After winning a hotly contested union certification battle in May, some 150 teachers of the Manhattan School of Music’s Pre-college Division–all of whom are trained as classical or jazz musicians–will enter into collective bargaining negotiations with the administration this fall.

South Coast Today: Faculty union and administration not on same page at UMass Dartmouth
When the fall semester begins at UMass Dartmouth next week, it won’t just be the physics students who will be getting a lesson in friction. The university’s administration and largest professional union aren’t seeing eye to eye over the most recent round of budget cuts and consolidations and, almost to a person, faculty and staff describe the situation as “tense” and “confusing.”

Hartford Courant: UConn Rattled By Union Drive For Doctors
Doctors are getting nervous about changes in health care, too, especially the ones at the University of Connecticut Health Center in Farmington. Everybody’s on edge as the health center administration adopted a dangerous strategy against the doctors when it distributed an e-mail Thursday seeking to impede a movement by doctors to form a union.

Sudbury Star: LU reaches deal with non-faculty staff union
Laurentian University reached a tentative agreement with the union representing about 250 non-faculty staff on Sunday morning.

Sun Journal: Union, USM may have agreement
LEWISTON – One of four unions working without a contract for the University of Maine System has reached a tentative agreement on a new deal.

Sun-Sentinel: Brogan, FAU faculty union duke it out to governor
Florida Atlantic University President Frank Brogan’s relationship with the faculty union isn’t improving much in his final weeks in office. Brogan, who plans to leave FAU by mid-September to become chancellor of the state university system, sent a letter to Gov. Charlie Crist saying he’s “disappointed by the level of vitriol,” that United Faculty of Florida has expressed on its blog.

India Express: IIT, IIM faculty to get better pay
The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved the revision of pay scales of faculty, design, scientific and other academic staff of the centrally funded institutions including IITs and IIMs with retrospective effect from January 1, 2006.

Indiana Daily Student: IU officials decide to continue with employee bonus plan
IU will continue with its plan to distribute up to $500 per person to faculty and staff making less than $30,000 a year despite a meeting between IU officials and union leaders July 31.

San Diego News Network: California Budget Crisis Diaries: Lawsuit targets Schwarzenegger
Legislative leaders may be out for summer session but their vacation can’t be too sunny. The cuts throughout the budget – which was signed into law July 28 – are gradually sinking in. Some agencies still don’t understand the impacts, while others continue to receive IOUs, and now, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is facing a lawsuit.

San Francisco Chronicle: Execs still get raises as UC cuts staffing, pay
On the same July day that the UC Board of Regents cut $813 million from UC budgets – setting in motion pay cuts, layoffs and campus cutbacks – the board quietly approved pay raises, stipends and other benefits for more than two dozen executives.

The Crimson: FAS Cuts Janitor Hours
School officials say the moves save jobs, but union calls reductions ‘drastic,’ ‘unnecessary’
The Faculty of Arts and Sciences implemented work hours reductions for over 100 janitors in July—a move that FAS officials say will help cut costs while avoiding layoffs, but union representatives say will devastate worker living standards.