Organizing

Campus Activities

Contracts

Organizing

Washtenaw Community College OP/Ts---the newest NEA higher ed members in Michigan---are going to the bargaining table for the first time under the MEA/NEA banner.

This group of 100 Office and Technical Personnel became a Michigan Education Association/NEA unit after a January 1998 representation election.

The initial bargaining session took place on June 1, 1998.

Professional staff at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale have taken the first steps toward joining their faculty colleagues at the bargaining table.

Organizers say the nearly 400 non-managerial staff have begun signing cards asking the Illinois labor board to hold an election to establish collective bargaining rights.

The university professional staffers are concerned about salary disparities and gaining a voice in shaping the policies they work under.

"Like the faculty, we want a place at the table when professional staff policies and working conditions are being set," says one of the campus leaders.

Campus Activities

The Alabama Education Association has won an 8.5 percent salary increase for its community college members.

A strong political action program and intensive lobbying by higher education members helped win the salary boost.

AEA community college faculty also made big strides forward on the issue of reasonable teaching loads. They fought off attempts by the chancellor to require an 18-hour load per semester. Faculty will have 15-hour loads when Alabama's community colleges go from a quarter to semester system this fall.

Faculty at Labette Community College in Kansas are refusing to accept a contract imposed by the college.

A factfinder had recommended that the college not remove binding arbitration from the current contract. But the trustees indicated they will do just that.

The reaction of the faculty: The majority will forego pay raises that exceed $2,000 in many cases and keep working under their old contract rather than lose the arbitration clause---and go back to the bargaining table next year.

Contracts

The Faculty Association at Southern Illinois University has a tentative agreement on a first contract.

After 15 long months of negotiations that followed a successful campaign to win bargaining rights, Association members will be voting on an agreement providing a 14.5 percent increase over three years.

In addition, the new agreement protects the faculty's traditional tenure and promotion rights.

The contract also strengthens the faculty voice in the departmental decision-making process---by pro- viding faculty significant contractual authority in such areas as curriculum, admission standards, and graduation requirements.

Notes the bargaining team: "Before collective bargaining, salaries, hours, and working conditions were all governed by the Board of Trustees, and the faculty were simply advisers.

"Under this contract," adds the Southern Illinois team, "the items that fall under this rubric will be legally protected and negotiated. The faculty will have the authority to participate in decisions and pursue disputes to mediation and arbitration."

After first rejecting a proposed contract, Minnesota's technical college faculty have approved a new two-year agreement.

This contract is the final piece in the creation of a statewide bargain agreement that provides equity in pay and workload for members of the United Technical College Educators, a joint NEA/AFT affiliate.

The new contract provides salary increases of at least $2,500 for all faculty.

More importantly, notes UTCE President Bruce Hemstad, the new agreement provides workload equity for all technical college faculty across the state, something that eluded negotiators in the last round of bargaining.