Tentative Agreement Ratified by FA Membership

FA members voted to approve the tentative agreement today (11/30).  Here’s a press release we’ve sent out to announce as much.

The SIUC Faculty Association (FA) is pleased to announce that its members have voted to ratify the tentative agreement with the SIUC administration reached earlier this month. Once the agreement receives final ratification by the SIUC Board of Trustees, it will be signed by both parties and serve as the contract between the tenure-track and tenured faculty represented by the Faculty Association and the SIUC administration. The four year agreement covers the period from July 1, 201o until June 30, 2014. 

“While we are disappointed that it took sixteen months of negotiations and a strike to reach this agreement,” FA spokesman Dave Johnson said, “the agreement will help us defend academic freedom, shared governance, and academic priorities on this campus, and we are proud of the hard work, resilience, and dedication by our members that has made this progress possible. We are also thankful for all the support from other unions on campus, from members of the community, and from our students here at SIUC, hundreds of whom came out to march and rally in support of their professors.”

 The following are among the important provisions of the tentative agreement.

• A transparent process ensures that tenured and tenure-track faculty can only be laid off in the event of a bona fide financial exigency.
• Conditions justifying furloughs are more clearly defined, the number of furlough days is limited, and the FA may continue to pursue its unfair labor practice charge regarding FY 2011 furloughs. 
• Faculty gain a greater say in defining their workload through departmental operating papers.
• Faculty retain the right to decide how best to teach their courses, including the decision over whether to offer a course via distance education.
• The student-faculty ratio remains unchanged, and includes distance education offerings.
• Conflict of interest policy and procedures for investigating accusations of sexual harassment will be bargained to resolution in a timely way.

“We are ready to open a new page on relations between campus unions and the administration,” Johnson added.  “We think it is in everyone’s interest, especially those of the students we all serve, for the administration and campus unions to work together. It shouldn’t take us 500 days, much less a strike, to get a new contract into place.  Last year the SIUC administration insisted on imposing its own terms on campus unions, and this fall it took a strike to reach a final agreement. We’re ready to do all we can to build a better relationship with the administration, and we hope that the administration is willing to do so as well.”

Faculty Associatio​n ratificati​on vote on tentative agreement

Dear Faculty Association Member,

The Departmental Representative Council (DRC) voted unanimously (30-0) on November 17 to recommend that the membership of the FA approve the tentative agreement negotiated by the FA and Board bargaining teams. The tentative agreement goes on to the full membership for ratification.

The full text of the tentative agreement has been published on the bargaining information page of the FA web site.

Other aids for understanding the tentative agreement are also available there and direct links follow this message.

• An informational meeting on the tentative agreement will be held for the membership of the Faculty Association on Monday, November 28, 2011  from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m.  , in Engineering A111.

• Voting on ratification of the tentative agreement will take place on Wednesday, November 30, 2011 from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. in the Sangamon Room at the SIUC Student Center.

Only dues-paying members of the Faculty Association who are currently part of the bargaining unit may vote. Absentee voting is permitted.

There will be a separate ballot on Wednesday, November 30 for members to vote on Delegates/Alternates to the IEA Representative Assembly, Ethnic Minority Delegate/Alternate to the IEA Representative Assembly, Region 2 Vice-Chairperson, and Region 2 Ethnic Minority Representative.

Sincerely,
Randy Hughes

LINKS:

Summary of the tentative agreement

Full text of tentative agreement

Full text of tentative agreement with changes highlighted

Back to work agreement

More info on the Tentative Agreement

We’ve now posted a couple of further items to help you review the tentative agreement:

Summary of tentative agreement

Tentative agreement with changes highlighted

 

DRC unanimously recommends tentative agreement

The Departmental Representative Council (DRC) voted unanimously (30-0) tonight to recommend that the membership of the FA approve the tentative agreement made with the SIUC administration. A general membership meeting to discuss the agreement is scheduled for November 28, with voting to take place on November 30.  This strong endorsement by the DRC is another indication of the substantial progress made in this agreement. The agreement is already posted on the bargaining page on this site (scroll to the bottom for the latest info); further help in interpreting the agreement, including a summary of changes since the last agreement, should be posted by tomorrow (Friday) afternoon.

FA Thank You Party

In appreciation for the many contributions of our members and supporters, the SIUC Faculty Association is sponsoring a Thank You Party from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. this Saturday, November 19 at Hangar 9 (511 S Illinois Avenue). All who supported the FA during the last couple of weeks are invited to share a little food and drink and celebrate our joint achievement in reaching the tentative agreement on the Faculty Association contract. Spouses or partners are welcome to come as well.  See you there.

Tentative agreement released

The FA and administration have signed a tentative agreement, including a back to work agreement.

Links to the agreement and to the back to work agreement (which is part of the overall agreement) are posted under Bargaining Section. 

Here are direct links to the relevant documents:

Tentative agreement  |  Back to work agreement

We will provide helps to interpret these documents, including an annotated version to show what has changed since the last contact, and an “executive summary” of major changes, shortly.

Strike Ends

The DRC voted tonight to end the strike. The last proposal sent our way by the BOT bargaining team can form the basis of a tentative agreement we can submit to members. We’ll provide more details on the proposal in coming days, and the full text of the contract once it is worked out with the BOT. There will be at least one meeting to answer members’ questions about the agreement, followed by a vote by the full membership on whether or not to ratify the agreement.

In the meantime, here’s the text of a press release sent out to the media.  

Let’s keep it going

Despite the break in negotiations last night, real progress is being made at the bargaining table.  We had a great day yesterday, and we can have an even better day today.  And we will get a great agreement signed, and soon.  We’re closing in on a victory for the FA and for SIUC.

Here’s a message Randy Hughes is sending around to the FA membership.

Progress to date.  November 9,  2011

Today, Wednesday, November 9th, we’re still on strike. But there is good news, too. In twelve hours of negotiations, our bargaining team made progress on a number of fronts. We are near agreement on language that will ensure that we retain our right to pursue our Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) charge concerning the unilateral imposition of furlough days last spring. And there was also some progress on countering the inflammatory and disrespectful language in the BOT back to work proposal. But at 9:00 pm the two bargaining teams mutually agreed to break off work for the night and return to the bargaining table at 9:30 am on Wednesday.

Slow progress, while better than no progress at all, is frustrating. And we all want to be in the classroom rather than on the picket line. But it’s important to remember everything that our hard work and resolve has enabled us to achieve so far. We’ve protected tenure. We’ve ensured that administrators cannot force faculty to teach distance education against our own academic judgement. We’ve strengthened shared governance by strengthening the faculty’s ability to control their own operating papers. We’ve reached a workable compromise on overload pay. And we’ve established a schedule for dealing with procedures concerning Conflict of Interest and Sexual Harassment.

Most heartening of all may well be the incredible support we’ve received from SIUC students. Their support has not only helped us achieve progress at the bargaining table, but is a victory in itself – a victory for our university, its students, and the bond between faculty and students on campus.

While we’ve made much progress, several important issues remain. The BOT proposal on furloughs, while it has been improved since the terms imposed on us in the spring, still fails to provide adequate transparency and accountability. Their back to work proposal would not provide for the make up days we would like to offer to students whose classes have been covered by unqualified substitutes. While it contains new language protecting actions taken in support of the strike, it still gives the false impression that faculty have engaged in misconduct and threats. And the administration is still unwilling to offer us the same chance for securing fair share that it has offered other locals.

These issues are worth fighting for. And if we remain united in our commitment to securing a fair agreement, we have every reason to believe that we can reach one sooner rather than later.

Joint statement released

The strike will continue tomorrow.  At 9:02 pm this evening the BOT and FA negotiating teams released the following joint statement.

The BOT and FA teams met for 12 hours today. Despite efforts to find a tentative mutual agreement on all items, no tentative agreement was reached.  The teams agreed to meet again at 9:30 am tomorrow morning and resume negotiations.

We will release a more detailed statement on today’s developments later tonight. The news is not all bad: we made some progress today, and we’ve made tremendous progress over the last few days. Student support for our cause has heartened us all. And we remain confident that we will reach a fair final agreement with the administration, and are committed to doing so as soon as we possibly can.

Stone Center Rally, 3:00 pm Wednesday

The SIU Board of Trustees will meet in executive session at the Stone Center tomorrow afternoon. We will rally there at 3:00 PM to give them some advice on how to end this strike: with a fair contract for SIUC faculty.  Join us.

RALLY

WEDNESDAY 3:00 PM

STONE CENTER

1400 Douglas Dr.

In the happy event of a contract settlement in the meantime we will gladly let the BOT meet in peace.