We are reviewing here six “myths” identified and
challenged by the CFA that they attribute to their critics. (The first three
are in Part One, linked in the right-hand margin.) We argue that these misframe
and oversimplify the issues, and exemplify certain “myths” themselves.
Myth #4: “Union
advocates aren’t interested in excellence. They would destroy our merit based
system and make everyone equal.”
The CFA is interested in excellence. That’s
why we talk about class size, the growth of insecure adjunct jobs, allocation
of faculty lines and research money, faculty salaries and benefits, and health
and safety. In our conversations around campus, we are routinely asking for
input about what faculty can do to improve the quality of education and
research at UIUC―the centerpiece of excellence.
How would a union preserve our system of
merit-based salaries? Under collective bargaining agreements, faculty at other
research universities have decided to create merit raise pools over and above
basic increases, to be distributed as department heads decide.
On the other hand, everyone should be
treated fairly and decently. We could negotiate to raise the extremely low
base-line salaries of non-tenure track faculty.
What faculty member, administrative or not, union
advocate or not, doesn't support
reasonable class sizes, competitive salaries and benefits, safe and healthy working
conditions, teaching and research excellence, and fair and honest treatment of all
employees?
It is a
myth that without a union there is no one to advocate for or pursue such
priorities.
Faculty working in shared governance, and in units
across the campus, have been fighting for these goals for a long time (some of
these faculty might also be union advocates, but that doesn’t make them
uniquely union issues). And the
administration is listening: more classes with enrollments under 20 and a 50%
increase in research funds for faculty in humanities, arts, and social sciences
are two of the goals found in the Chancellor's Strategic Plan for 2013-2016,
for example. This year saw a nearly 5% average salary increase across campus,
even higher in units that have traditionally lagged behind their peers.
The relationship of faculty unionization to
excellence is ambiguous: it is the nature of unionization to have a leveling
effect, in salaries and in other respects. The CFA is saying here that, if we
were unionized, most salary increases would be across-the-board, and only a
portion (to be negotiated) set aside for merit. How would that hinder the
flexibility of unit executives to reward deserving faculty or negotiate with faculty being recruited
elsewhere?
Most faculty would have no rights to negotiate
over their salaries at all: that would be done for them by the union.
It is a
myth that creating a faculty union would guarantee significantly higher
salaries. Cary Nelson, former President of AAUP and a strong faculty union
advocate on our campus, says: “[R]esearch shows that, although unionized
community college faculty earn more than their nonunionized counterparts, full-time unionized and non-unionized
faculty at 4-year institutions earn about the same.” (“What Unions Do”).
About the same? Huh. And we would be curious to
know if this comparison takes into account the dues paid out of faculty
salaries on unionized campuses, or if their net salaries are actually lower.
Myth #5: “Dues will be excessive, and
unpredictable from year to year.”
Not true. We will be setting our own dues by
majority vote. Union dues don’t change until members vote to increase (or
decrease) them.
Dues vary from union to union. Some unions
assess themselves a flat rate, in others dues are a percentage of salary. For
example, at Rutgers, union dues are .75% of a person’s salary. Typical faculty
union dues are about 1.25%-1.5% of gross salary.
Dues go to the local, state and national
affiliates to fund the union office and staff, lobbying, union-related
campaigns, policy research, member education, legal costs to represent members,
and research for negotiation and enforcement of the contract.
What is excessive apparently depends on who is
charging and who is receiving. In 2010, when non-administrative faculty members
at UI gave up 2% of their salaries, on a one-time basis, to help save staff
jobs (administrators gave up an even higher percentage), many of those who are
now advocating for a faculty union were outraged: a 2% cut! But it seems
reasonable to these same people to require their colleagues to pay nearly that
much every single year for the privilege of being in a union.
And don’t forget that all faculty will have to pay some level of “fair share” dues to the
union even if they don’t want to be union members. How "fair" is that?
Moreover, no one knows what the amount of these dues
will be until after the union is
formed. Don't like it then? Too late!
As for where the money goes, nobody is talking
about the fact that a large amount of the union dues goes to state and national
organizations. That’s a lot of money,
from a large campus like this: which may explain why state and national unions have
invested so much of their own time and resources, including sending in their
own organizers, to try to get a faculty union established here.
Myth #6: “We don’t
need a union: we have shared governance.”
“Shared governance” means that faculty,
students, and administration shape decisions affecting the educational and
research missions of the university. Shared governance gives faculty the major
and definitive role in academic decision making at the level of the department
and school, and in the Academic Senate.
While a union and collective bargaining
would strengthen shared governance, and the roles of a union and the Academic Senate
may overlap, the two organizations would not and cannot play identical roles.
Only the Senate can define and approve
academic programs, such as majors, minors or master’s or doctoral degrees. Only
the Senate can evaluate the intellectual strength and validity of research
initiatives, such as centers or institutes.
On the other hand, the Senate does not have
any say about wages, benefits, workloads, staffing levels, hiring initiatives,
health and safety, working environments, contracts or notices of appointment. A
union can negotiate these issues in collective bargaining for a contract. All
of these very much affect the quality of education and research on our campus.
A union can lobby for increased public spending on higher education, and for
improved faculty benefits. The Senate cannot do this.
A fuller engagement with these arguments can be
found in Nick Burbules’s article in the Chronicle
of Higher Education, linked in the right-hand margin. But here we need to
clear up some misinformation.
It is not
true that “the Senate does not have any say about wages, benefits,
workloads, staffing levels, hiring initiatives, health and safety, working
environments, contracts or notices of appointment.” One of the standing
committees of our Senate is devoted to Faculty and Academic Staff Benefits;
another one, the Senate Committee on Campus Operations, is charged with
engaging campus administration on the academic environment and our working conditions generally. On
our campus, the faculty Campus Budget Oversight Committee makes recommendations
to the Provost about the budgets of each College. As for staffing and contract
issues, the language of faculty Notices of Appointment was changed last year as
a direct response to a request from the University Senates Conference, and, in
most Colleges, hiring priorities are
approved by the elected executive or advisory committee. All of these matters
are indeed addressed through shared governance – no bargaining sessions
necessary, and no annual dues charged!
And while the Senate and its leadership do not
engage in collective bargaining, we have frequent discussions in committee
meetings and other venues with campus and university officers, advocating for
tenure track and non-tenure track
faculty.
It was the Senate that pressed to approve
multi-year contracts for non-tenure track faculty, and we are currently working
with campus administrators to strengthen grievance procedures for them. The
recent campus decision to allocate additional money for faculty salaries over
and above the President’s authorization, and to target especially long-standing
shortfalls in the arts and humanities, came partly as a result of frequent
conversations with Senate leaders.
It is a
myth that only collective bargaining can address problems with salary and
working conditions, or that only unions can resolve them. These issues can be
addressed through either shared governance or collective bargaining, but with
very different strategies – one more collegial, the other more adversarial.
What faculty union advocates don’t tell you is
that if a union were formed, shared governance discussions about these issues could not continue: it is the union
position that would limit Senate responsibilities to narrowly-construed
“academic” matters. In practice, at many universities unions have also deeply
involved themselves in academic matters as well – to take one example, debates
over online education, which many unions see as a threat. As Burbules
concludes, “In all
this, the union contract can define and limit the role of the senate but not
vice versa. These are in no way equivalent or symmetrical roles. You cannot claim to be 'strengthening' shared governance if you take rights and responsibilities away from it.”
*** This
blog is a jointly authored project by two people who believe that the campaign for tenure-track
faculty unionization has damaged morale and divided our campus, and that a
faculty union, if ever established, would erode academic quality and undermine
our highly successful system of campus shared governance, which has earned
nationwide praise.
We speak for
ourselves. We have no organization behind us, we don’t ask for funding, we
don’t pay national hired guns to come in and make the case for us.
We want to
start a different campus conversation about faculty unionization, which we
believe will be more thoughtful and substantive when people have all the facts.
We
welcome and will consider postings from others expressing issues and concerns
about faculty unionization. We know that many faculty are very upset about the possibility
of working on a unionized campus.
If you see
any information here that is inaccurate, please tell us and we will correct it.
