The fight for fair pay
Takeaways:
Dear colleagues,
The administration has finally begun bargaining with us around economics. On November 8, they presented us with counters on Leaves and Benefits. It took months of organizing and actions, the threat of a labor board charge, and a crowd of faculty showing up at Chancellor Gabel’s office on November 16 with our demand that they bargain, but after sustained pressure they finally presented a counterproposal on Compensation on November 17. Their counters are disappointing, but we knew that they would resist our demands for fair pay. The administration is invested in maintaining a status quo in which they can pay us as little as possible and make changes to our pay and benefits unilaterally. We voted to form a Union because this status quo is not working for us and we know that it is also not working for the university.
Specifically, the administration proposed a 3% raise effective upon ratification of the contract (not retroactive to July 1) and subsequent annual raises tied with whatever they arbitrarily and unilaterally decide for non-bargaining unit employees. This is clearly unacceptable. The administration has said repeatedly that the university is on good financial footing and the Board of Trustees has acknowledged that our salaries are not competitive with our peers and need to be improved “as soon as possible.” You told us in the bargaining survey that improving salaries for the lowest-paid faculty is your top priority in this contract. What the administration offered falls far short of that goal, and of their own public statements.
The good news is that we now know the administration’s opening position, and we have a framework in which to win improvements. For example, the administration’s Compensation proposal included a salary floor for some faculty ranks, annual raises for part-time faculty (who until last year have always been excluded from annual cost-of-living raises), and a standard minimum for promotion raises. So we have the framework, and now we need to work to pressure the administration to raise the numbers.
The way we raise the numbers is with support from all of you. If you have not yet signed a membership card, sign one. If you have been on the fence about getting involved, get involved. The administration thinks that they can wear us down with delays and get us to accept a bad deal. But we have seen that when faculty take action, we get wins at the table and we have won so much already. We need all of you to help us drive this home.
In solidarity,
Your bargaining committee
Tyler Bickford (chair), Professor, English, Oakland
Pete Bell, Teaching Assistant Professor, Chemistry, Oakland
Nicholas Bircher, Part-time Professor, Nurse Anesthesia, Oakland
Chloe Dufour, Faculty Librarian, ULS, Oakland
Anthony Fabio, Associate Professor, Epidemiology (Public Health), Oakland
Lech Harris (secretary), Part-time Instructor, English, Oakland
James Hill (archivist), Visiting Assistant Professor, History, Oakland
Megan O’Brien, Master Teacher, Falk Laboratory School, Oakland
Sabrina Robinson, Part-time Instructor, Slavic, Oakland
Evan Schneider, Assistant Professor, Physics and Astronomy, Oakland
Paul Scott, Assistant Professor, Health and Community Systems (Nursing), Oakland
Jeffrey Shook, Professor, Social Work, Oakland
Stacey Triplette, Associate Professor, Spanish, Greensburg
Abagael West, Teaching Assistant Professor, Biological Sciences, Oakland
Links!
- The administration finally felt the pressure and presented their Compensation proposal.
- As expected, their first offer is nowhere near enough, and we all have a big fight on our hands to win the raises we deserve.
Dear colleagues,
The administration has finally begun bargaining with us around economics. On November 8, they presented us with counters on Leaves and Benefits. It took months of organizing and actions, the threat of a labor board charge, and a crowd of faculty showing up at Chancellor Gabel’s office on November 16 with our demand that they bargain, but after sustained pressure they finally presented a counterproposal on Compensation on November 17. Their counters are disappointing, but we knew that they would resist our demands for fair pay. The administration is invested in maintaining a status quo in which they can pay us as little as possible and make changes to our pay and benefits unilaterally. We voted to form a Union because this status quo is not working for us and we know that it is also not working for the university.
Specifically, the administration proposed a 3% raise effective upon ratification of the contract (not retroactive to July 1) and subsequent annual raises tied with whatever they arbitrarily and unilaterally decide for non-bargaining unit employees. This is clearly unacceptable. The administration has said repeatedly that the university is on good financial footing and the Board of Trustees has acknowledged that our salaries are not competitive with our peers and need to be improved “as soon as possible.” You told us in the bargaining survey that improving salaries for the lowest-paid faculty is your top priority in this contract. What the administration offered falls far short of that goal, and of their own public statements.
The good news is that we now know the administration’s opening position, and we have a framework in which to win improvements. For example, the administration’s Compensation proposal included a salary floor for some faculty ranks, annual raises for part-time faculty (who until last year have always been excluded from annual cost-of-living raises), and a standard minimum for promotion raises. So we have the framework, and now we need to work to pressure the administration to raise the numbers.
The way we raise the numbers is with support from all of you. If you have not yet signed a membership card, sign one. If you have been on the fence about getting involved, get involved. The administration thinks that they can wear us down with delays and get us to accept a bad deal. But we have seen that when faculty take action, we get wins at the table and we have won so much already. We need all of you to help us drive this home.
In solidarity,
Your bargaining committee
Tyler Bickford (chair), Professor, English, Oakland
Pete Bell, Teaching Assistant Professor, Chemistry, Oakland
Nicholas Bircher, Part-time Professor, Nurse Anesthesia, Oakland
Chloe Dufour, Faculty Librarian, ULS, Oakland
Anthony Fabio, Associate Professor, Epidemiology (Public Health), Oakland
Lech Harris (secretary), Part-time Instructor, English, Oakland
James Hill (archivist), Visiting Assistant Professor, History, Oakland
Megan O’Brien, Master Teacher, Falk Laboratory School, Oakland
Sabrina Robinson, Part-time Instructor, Slavic, Oakland
Evan Schneider, Assistant Professor, Physics and Astronomy, Oakland
Paul Scott, Assistant Professor, Health and Community Systems (Nursing), Oakland
Jeffrey Shook, Professor, Social Work, Oakland
Stacey Triplette, Associate Professor, Spanish, Greensburg
Abagael West, Teaching Assistant Professor, Biological Sciences, Oakland
Links!
- If someone forwarded this to you, sign up to receive these emails
- Find previous bargaining updates here
- Status of bargaining
- Get in touch with your Council rep
- Get involved with the Communication and Action Team
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