NEA Higher Ed Conference

I spent last Friday and Saturday at the NEA's Higher Education Conference in Chicago and thought I'd post a report here while it was still fresh in my memory.

I suppose blog readers curious and/or critical about the NEA (I remain curious, being a relative newcomer) may first want to hear some general characterization of the attendees and tone of the conference. Compared to the academic conferences I usually attend (in classics and, strangely enough, political science), one striking feature was the range of institutions and hence range of faculty represented: not only research faculty, but community college faculty and faculty from four year schools without major research missions were naturally to be found, as were many non-tenure track faculty. Less tweed, more egalitarian. The sessions I attended were well attended and well presented, though it struck me as a bit odd that many presentations rehashed articles published in the most recent NEA Almanac of Higher Ed (here's a link the the NEA's site for this publication, though the most recent volume there is from last year). Questions and comments from the floor ran a gamut--as they do at academic conferences--from insightful to self-absorbed. In the last comment at the conference, for example, a faculty member made the excellent point that the Obama administration's plans for higher ed didn't seem to call for much in the way of faculty input, while going on and on about her own personal expertise, experiences, and credentials in a way destined to lessen anyone's interest in getting such input.

Four Union Ad

In case you missed it, I embed below the ad the IEA unions have placed in the DE, hoping to reach new students and their parents.

Four Union Ad

Just a little respect for adjuncts

Inside Higher Ed has an interesting article from the trenches, a meeting of the Association of College and University Attorneys, where discussion turned to how to negotiate with adjunct faculty. 

Their suggested best practices mixed sympathy for the adjuncts' plight -- recommending less costly ways to give them more respect -- with suggestions for how to avert unionization and manage protests during contentious negotiations.

Alas, it's too late to avoid unionization around here, but perhaps that bit about respect may contain some good advice. Inside Higher Ed earlier covered a similar meeting of adjunct labor activists.

One issue discussed in both articles is disparity between tenured-track faculty and their second-class cousins in the NTT ranks.  I tend to think we at SIUC have managed that tension fairly well--but then I would, since I'm tenured. Our setup, where both TT and NTT are unionized by the NEA, providing some degree of coordination and communication between them, but each has a separate local that can bargain separately on its own issues, seems like a pretty good idea.

SIUC in the NEA "Advocate"

One of the little perks of NEA membership is receiving their bimonthly newsletter. Yes, this sounds rather dull and, yes, for my first few years as a member I sent it straight to the recycling bin myself. But then I started reading the cover stories (which usually introduce some pedagogical issue) and began to appreciate it. SIUC is the only campus I've been on that doesn't have a high-profile "center for teaching and learning" or the like that puts out new teaching ideas on a regular basis, so this NEA publication fills that void for me. I've picked up some good ideas there. The June issue of the newsletter has a number of short articles on teaching portfolios; like all such pedagogy items, it also contains a helpful bibliography, including many items readily available online.

The Advocate also contains a updates on union news on the higher education front. Which brings us to my excuse for blogging this, a quotation found on page four of the June issue.

You can't solve a problem if one side chooses to impose its position without compromise. That leaves the other party with the sole option of taking its own unilateral action.

Those words were uttered by our own Natasha Zaretsky (of the History Department), as part of the statement announcing the filing of intent to strike notices. Like many a benefit of NEA/IEA membership, this one can be had for nothing--by surfing to the NEA higher ed website.  Or you can join the union and pay your fair share and get it in the mail.

Tactical legal victory in Wisconsin

A Wisconsin judge has ruled that the Republican controlled state legislature violated the state's open meeting law when it gutted the pensions and collective bargaining rights of state employees.

This is by no means a final defeat for the Republican plan: the state's supreme court may overturn this lower court ruling, and the legislature could pass the law again even if the courts do invalidate their first action. But it is a pretty clear indication of the lengths to which opponents of public employee labor unions are willing to go to attack unions.

We are part of a big fight on the national and state level that will have a tremendous impact on the status of our jobs. We are lucky to be allied with a union (IEA/NEA) that retains some power on the state and national level. They will have more power if you join them. If you're a tenured or tenure-track faculty member click here for information on how to do so.  (You won't even have to pay dues until September.)

Pensions under threat

[Update: Both Carbondale area representatives, Assemblyman Bost and Senator Leuchtefeld, oppose this bill, according to the folks at their offices I just talked to.  That doesn't mean that calling them won't help--the more opposition they can cite the better. It may mean that those of you who live outside Carbondale should be particularly quick to call your representatives; the bill apparently has democratic support.]

Kristi Brown and Jonathan Bean have the details. It looks like not even clear language in the state constitution can stop our legislators from reducing our pensions to Social Security. This when, of course, one reason people accept the low wages from the state government is because of their traditionally generous pension plans. Here's IEA president Ken Swanson's appeal for NEA members to make calls.  They provide a toll free number to help (and I'm sure they won't be checking to see if you've paid your dues before hooking you up with your legislators).



If you live in the Carbondale area, contact Leuchtefeld and Bost and urge them to oppose this move--it's SB 512.  If you prefer email, here is the email for Bost (Leuchtefeld doesn't provide an address readily on his webpage): rep.bost@hotmail.com .

IEA on the state budget struggle

I'm not up on all the details of the legislative process, but a quick glance at this IEA report shows that the union is indeed fighting to prevent the sort of pension troubles I mentioned in the last post.  My worry about the IEA's role was misplaced.

This is what happens when one posts in a great hurry--I'm hoping it's at least as much a reflection of the nature of blogging as of my sloppiness & ignorance.

Those of you who wonder about why we should have to pay union dues ought to check out the news on the IEA website.  If the IEA helps prevent (or at least alleviate) these massive cuts to our pensions, you'll have the IEA (and its dues-paying members) to thank. We won't agree with every position the IEA holds, or every tactical decision the union makes, but they are huge player in state politics, and state politics matters.

Lobby Against SB 312

Details from Jonathan Bean, who argues that pending legislation could mean a massive pay cut in order to fund our pensions.

I'll quickly make one response to him here, though.  He asks where the FA is in response to this.  At graduation and grading exams. We don't have a full-time staffer on the pension front. That's because we don't have a full time (or part time) staffer. So, yes, our concerns tend to be local--though, hey, I'm trying, aren't I?

If the IEA is selling us down the river, though, that would be another story. In their potential defense, this may be the perennial debate between choosing to help improve a bad deal to make it slightly less bad and resolutely opposing a bad deal which doesn't get any better, and may well get passed despite one's opposition.

New Joint Union Web Site

The closest thing to news at tonight's general meeting for the IEA unions on campus was the announcement of new joint website for the IEA unions . This site should of course continue to be regarded as the ultimate absolute gold standard for everything you'll ever need to know about faculty issues at SIUC, but the joint union site will clue you in to issues effecting folks other than (tenured/tenure-track) faculty. Among the things it links to is a new set of "FAQs" addressing various areas of concern, ranging from the legalities of "Intent to Strike Notices" to the unions' positions and approach to bargaining, as contrasted with those of the administration.