Ohio University faculty continue to learn about unionization, meeting last week with representatives from Akron’s faculty union and talking further this week about the next steps at OU.
Somewhere between 70 and 80 faculty members went to the meeting last week, according to the event’s organizers. The Akron faculty members and leaders of OU’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors were impressed by turn out on a summer afternoon.
“It went pretty well,” said Dave Witt, a member of Akron’s AAUP. “They were telling us that last year, they had about 20 people show up for a similar thing.”
Kevin Uhalde, president of OU-AAUP, said he organized the meeting both to inform faculty about unions and to gauge the level of faculty interest.
What I can say now that I didn’t know a week ago is that the people who are following this at all are almost all supportive and committed,” Uhalde said.
At its June meeting, Faculty Senate discussed a resolution recommending faculty form a collective bargaining unit, or union. Since then, the faculty say they have been inspired to learn more by a feeling that administrators don’t consider faculty input. Senate expects to vote on the resolution in the fall after a second reading.
Geography professor Geoffrey Buckley said he went to the meeting to learn more about faculty unions in general and how one might work at OU.
“I was impressed by what they had to say,” he said. “It wasn’t a hard sell. People were pretty enthusiastic (at the meeting). They seemed very positive.”
Buckley, a senate member, said faculty across the university seem supportive of the move toward unionization.
Witt was also pleased with the response. “They were really responsive and one question led to another,” he said. “I don’t think there were two seconds of silence in those two hours.”
Witt and Uhalde said faculty raised questions about the role of Faculty Senate on a unionized campus, limits on the union’s power, and the role of the national organization in union structure.
They said those questions were easy to answer: Faculty Senate would still function, administrators could still make unpopular decisions even with a union, and under AAUP, each campus’ union is autonomous in contract negotiations.
Uhalde and about 20 others at OU met again yesterday to discuss further efforts to educate the faculty. He said he thinks the next step is making sure faculty are aware of the discussion coming up in Faculty Senate and that professors know where to go for more information.
Reader Comments
I support this undertaking. OU's financial priorities are seriously out of line with our current financial condition. The OU administration is on a hiring spree for second-tier administrators (Associate VPs of various kinds, Associate Provosts, and analogous positions in Athletics, Chief of Staff for McDavis, etc). These positions, typically costing about $150K each, (excluding benefits and staff) is a reason for our financial trouble and why it will be very difficult for us if the state makes cuts. And remember that with an openly admitted $1.8M deficit, Athletics is now demanding a significant expansion. Almost half of the student general fees support Athletics now (to the tune of about $14M) -- and they still have a large deficit.
What is the limit of delegation in this University? Why does the Provost need a large staff, and why do we need all the sub-VPs -- we functioned well without such people in the past. It is certainly not acceptable to argue that other places do it, thus we should too!
Meanwhile, the really useful staff (in departments, performing maintenance etc) are at risk of further cuts.
This administration pays only lip service to Faculty Senate and to individual faculty. The faculty have only one course left.
This would be a horrible, horrible mistake for Ohio University. Faculty should give serious thought to this before jumping headfirst into such a crazy decision. Many unionized campuses have had serious problems over the years, and often deteriorate academically following the introduction of collective bargaining. One need only research a bit into the University of Bridgeport's union disaster to think twice before doing such a thing.
I hope that the large amount of faculty against the union (mainly older professors) make their case before it is too late!
Ok.... So I promised myself that I would stop commenting below these things... but bobcat_football.... all I can say is .... "Ummmm.... What?"
Really?.... did you just try to make a comparison between the situation at Bridgeport and Ohio University?
First off.... the two institutions are not comparable in the slightest...
On the one hand we have Bridgeport... a small private university that at its height had only 9000 enrolled students... and that was only for a short time.... collective bargaining was not the reason Bridgeport experienced trouble... the fact is it was affected by the same economic downturns that have hit higher education across the board from the late 1970s onward... The fact that Bridgeport was so small with such a small endowment made it hit them especially hard. I am sure your post has something to do with the faculty strike that occurred there during the early 90s... allow me to address that.
Bridgeport was already in a dire condition prior to the strike... even the AAUP investigators that went there afterward noted that.... the problem was that the university attempted to lay-off a bunch of employees in a way that was inconsistent with the contract (The contract required a one year notice of termination so people coulc find other jobs... Bridgeport gave 30 days) ... So there was a strike... a strike all sides would note was very bitter.
Are you familiar with the term "Straw Man"? It is when you give a melodramatic example that is in fact an outlier as a basis for an argument... and that is what you were doing... Bridgeport was the longest faculty strike in the history of higher education... and was the only one in memory where the administration hired "replacements" (aka. scabs) to break the strike... this is another reason the strike was so bitter... you are trying to make this sound like this is a common occurrence... and that is simply not the case.
The fact is, in the United States, roughly 98% of all contract negotiations are decided without any work stoppage or strike, strikes are incredibly rare, and can only be done with a vote of the union membership. During the time I have done both my Bachelor's and Master's degrees at Ohio University... there has not been a single strike at a public institution of higher education in the state of Ohio, even though many of them have unions.
Now, for those of us who want to stay more level-headed and do actual "apples to apples" comparisons of institutions that have collective bargaining (I hate that term, but what can I say? It works) Ohio provides us with ample comparisons. Akron, Kent State, Toledo, Cincinnati, Cleveland State, and Wright State all have collective bargaining, and it has not made negative effects on their academics. In fact, according to OU's own data, all of these institutions are even in a good financial state compared to us except for Cinci (whose problems stem from the fact that they engaged in a lot of construction that they could not afford, had nothing to do with that "evil" collective bargaining).
I am wondering where you found the data (other than your Bridgeport Straw Man) that said universities "often deteriorate academically following the introduction of collective bargaining". I have read extensively on this... and I could not find any data to back that up. Rutgers seems to be doing fairly well academically even with a union.... There are a few SUNY campuses that score higher than us on the US News and World report rankings and they have a union, and the University of Vermont is pretty good, “even” with collective bargaining... Now I am not doing this to knock on OU, because I would put the students at OU up against anyone in the country because I think we are that damn good. I am only doing this to show that your entire argument was resting on one case... an extreme case... and that you even put sole blame on the faculty union at Bridgeport for something that had many aspects and is much more complex than what you made it out to be.
If we want to see the results of faculty collective bargaining... I say we look at our sister institutions in Ohio. What has happened to Kent State, Akron, or any of the other universities that we like to compare ourselves to in the aftermath of collective bargaining? Have their academics plummeted? Did fire rain down from the sky? Did they have to close up shop? The answer is no, things went right along roughly as they did before, just now there was a union contract. Sure… some of the union elections were close and hotly debated, but that is what happens in democratic elections occasionally. The day before professors chose collective bargaining… people went to class, got grades, did research, their laboratories operated, articles and books were published, and students made progress towards their degrees. The day after collective bargaining was adopted… well… people went to class, got grades, did research, their laboratories operated, articles and books were published, and students made progress towards their degrees.
I guess all I am trying to say is (longwindedly as usual) life goes on. Anyone who tries to act as if a faculty union will somehow destroy the institution is being, at best, overly dramatic, or at worst deliberately misleading. I will give you the benefit of the doubt.
As I said before in another thread… it is their right to engage in this kind of discussion under ORC 4117… plenty of other campuses have it in Ohio… this is a typical employee relations issue that all large businesses experience… the sun will come out tomorrow.
I am done discussing this… I hope I have persuaded you… if not… I guess this is just another time when we will have to agree to disagree. Enjoy the rest of your time at OU.
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