Strikes and Sick-Outs

[UnionMaid]

The California Faculty Association is going on strike because they viewed the state's offer of 5% raises as too low. 

Why aren't other unions doing this or sick-outs if strikes are technically illegal? Why did UUP, the union that represents the SUNY system accept 2-3% raises in their last negotiation even though inflation was at roughly 7% for two years? Why did UUP accept and then celebrate a huge pay cut in terms of purchasing power?

Why is it that so many people with tons of education, unions, and some ability to navigate complex issues continue to get bullied by ever expanding cast of idiot/social climbing administrators? I don't get why sociology is often so focused on inequality and heroizes social movements, but most faculty will never stand up for themselves. 

[UUP Contract]

Collective bargaining agreements cover many other items beyond base pay. Increasing non-taxable benefits is one way to "boost" pay behind the scenes, such as holding the line on health care costs or increasing retirement contributions. Blocking proposed detrimental policies is also a challenge; these talks are always "negotiations" with administrators who don't have the faculty's interests at heart. In an era of declining student enrollments and often hostile political environments, these sorts of trade-offs are par for the course for union negotiators.

And improving the conditions (and base pay) for contingent faculty members — often a concern in this forum — can help address some inequality issues within the system even though that is not reflected as a pay increase for tenured members. Looking at a single base-pay increase percentage can be misleading. Especially when this is presented as a one-time increase, rather than for multiple years. This contract, for example, includes across-the-board raises, with a 2% raise for 2022 and 3% raises for 2023 through 2025.

Here's a summary of the changes in the latest UUP contract:

• Retention awards that will be on-base salary increases based on length of service for full-time employees who work seven years, and then 12 years;
• Increases in the per-course minimum payment for contingents, with contingents at University centers and health sciences centers reaching $6,000 per three credit course by 2026, and contingents at comprehensive and technical campuses reaching $5,500 a course by 2026;
• Living wage increases which raise minimum salaries for UUP’s lowest-paid academic ranks and professional grades;
• An increased location adjustment pay for members who live on Long Island, in New York City and much of the Hudson Valley;
• For members at the three SUNY hospitals, a choice between holiday pay or comp time for all state holidays, with the default being holiday pay; and an increase in on-call pay;
• Notable increases in Joint Labor Management Committee (JLMC) funding with a provision to continue the JLMC Committee programs after the contract expires instead of sunsetting with contract expiration as they have historically done;
• Paid Parental Leave, which will be added to the contract in addition to the existing Paid Family Leave. Paid Parental Leave provides 12 weeks of leave at full pay for birth, adoption or foster placement, taken anytime within the seven months; the new leave can be taken in addition to or instead of existing leave benefits.
• No increases in basic health insurance costs, including premiums and co-payments;
• Job security gains for contingent faculty with progressively longer-term appointments for part-time and full-time employees; commitment to ongoing discussion to create Lecturer ranks and to create conversion paths from part-time to full-time employment and from contingent to permanent employment;
• Expansion of the Productivity Enhancement Programs, which allows members to reduce their health insurance premium deduction;
  Improvements in the Sick Leave Cap, the medical documentation policy for absences and improvements in the Leave Donation Program and leave accrual rates for part-time academics;
• Agreements to review professional titles and SL salary grade; and
• Expansion of a program that allows members to take courses for free at SUNY if space is available; this benefit has allowed many members to earn additional degrees at no cost.

"Benjamin said that the Negotiations Team fended off many harmful proposals by the state, including proposals for a post-tenure review and to establish mandatory drug and alcohol testing for members."

[UnionMaid]

UUP Contract, you make a good point that contract negotiations are more than just base pay, but UUP really needs to catch up to the CFA and act aggressive to protect/support faculty. A key fight needs to be for pay. Many junior faculty members are taking home less than 3K. That isn't even close to liveable and UUP should be ashamed for allowing this to happen. Not to mention, the lose of our merit based raises and allowing admin to repurpose those merit based raises for "compression" issues. 3K a month doesn't work. UUP needs to realize rural NY is not cheap and is often more expensive than Albany, Rochester, Buffalo, and Syracuse. Faculty can't keep up with what the Long Island students are paying for rent. $1600 for a basic 2 bedroom apartment leaves maybe $1400 each month to cover car, food, student loans, and maybe fun, and never savings. What a nightmare especially when living in some small town in the center of the Rust Belt.

The CFA isn't just fighting for better pay this round:
- 12% raises on top of salaries already higher than ours.
- Paid family leave for a full semester.
- Raises for lowest paid faculty
- better mental health support for students
- gender inclusive bathrooms
- lactation spaces for faculty
- regulation on workloads
- reforms on police - faculty interactions

And this is on top of all the amazing things the CFA has already done for the faculty. already doing much better for faculty, because they take action. CFA is striking now and they almost had a strike in 2016 when they fought for 10.5% raises! Another year when we got our annual garbage raises of 2%.

I know we can't strike in NY because of some horrid law that takes away our key source of power as a union, but we need to start doing something. These retroactive 2% raises are nothing more than retroactive pay cuts. We had two years at roughly 7% inflation, so our 2-3% raises suck pretty bad on top of already being underpaid and overworked.

CSU profs get paid better. The adjuncts were already making 5K+ per class more than five years ago while we were paying as little as $2K-ish. CFA protects their time better, while we allow the universities to make us come back to before classes start to fulfill our advising responsibilities, to teach unpaid independent studies, to get no new course reduction in teaching loads, and so on. UUP allows the SUNY system to force faculty to take some dumbass 6 week online course to gain the chance to teach a summer class online for a whopping $2500, while CSU was paying faculty to show up to a 3 day (only 2 days required) seminar with people who actually know what they are doing and teaching the newest software not just repeating nonsense and wasting time and energy SUNY faculty don't have.

Finally, CFA is smart because they advocate for the students, librarians, and counselors as well. Where is a single student initiative in the UUP contract negotiation? How are we building solidarity with the students, staff, and others?

My on campus UUP representative is worthless. He works more for the admin than the faculty. Those who write for our newsletter don't have any understanding of what jr. faculty are facing and don't seem willing to learn or fight the admin (why would they, the road to an admin position isn't paved in support faculty, but in undermining them).

The best benefit I've seen is my internal UUP rep being there to support me when fighting with HR and letting me know that we have Section K leaves to try out new jobs, that faculty can donate sick days to their peers who need it and such. This is the shit that should be published in the newsletter and mailed out to us each month, not hidden and only visible to those in the know or those desperate/broken enough to reach out past their campus rep.

UUP needs to get it together. From the outside it looks very weak, ineffective, and fitting the stereotype of NY politics. We need CFA style leadership, not whatever we have today.

[UnionMaid]

Since I'm using a guest account, I can't go back and fix typos the typos in the above post. But, typos or not, the point still stands. CFA is doing much better than our ineffective and weak UUP. 2-3% raises aren't anything to celebrate, especially when we had two years of 7% inflation and we were already underpaid to begin with.

I wouldn't wish a teaching/research SUNY position on my worst enemy. The median income for someone in NY with a Bachelors degree is higher or equal to many of the teaching/research SUNY positions. Not fair remuneration for those who spent an extra 10 years in school gaining extra skills and not making any money.

What an absolute joke UUP would celebrate adding 2% to someone's monthly take home pay of 3K and trying to claim wins on things the CFA got their faculty a decade ago. Congrats, we got you an extra 60 dollars a month! That'll help with the increase rent costs and such.