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Ithaca College Bargaining Team Contract Proposals and CommitmentsContributed by News on 03/23/17 From Senior Vice President Nancy Pringle, Provost Linda Petrosino, and Professor Gwen Seaquist, representatives of the Ithaca College bargaining committee. We have worked hard at the bargaining table to show respect, to listen attentively, and to develop heightened understandings of the special needs and desires of our contingent faculty. Getting through first contract labor negotiations can be challenging and at times frustrating. One thing we believe all members of the campus community can agree upon—our contingent faculty fulfill a very important role in the education of our students, and each and every one of us owes them an acknowledgement of thanks for their service to the college. Our proposals have been developed with three goals in mind:
Funds Available for Professional Development for All Contingent Faculty Part-Time, Per-Course Faculty Wage Proposal Effective from January 1, 2017 -- $4,500 per three-credit course
Our full-time proposal also addresses all of the other open issues, including wages, benefits, and several other provisions which track with the tentative agreements we have already reached with the part-time contingent unit. Ithaca College Bargaining Team Contract Proposals and Commitments Comment from
jgroome on
03/23/17
Thank you from a proud part-time lecturer at Ithaca College for 22 years-Joanie Groome
Ithaca College Bargaining Team Contract Proposals and Commitments Comment from
sgordon on
03/23/17
This is a fair proposal and I commend both the administration and the union for
working so hard to avoid an action that will be harmful to students. Ithaca College Bargaining Team Contract Proposals and Commitments Comment from
tschneller on
03/23/17
This statement by the administration presents their current offer. It does not mean that contract negotiations are finished. Our next negotiation session is scheduled for Sunday - until we have resolved our differences with the administration, we will continue organizing for the strike.
Ithaca College Bargaining Team Contract Proposals and Commitments Comment from
sgordon on
03/23/17
And that is your right. Personally, I have a fundamental issue with actions affecting
students and sincerely hope there is no picket-line to cross. The Administration's offer represents (in my opinion) the opportunity to avoid such a divisive action. Ithaca College Bargaining Team Contract Proposals and Commitments Comment from
rplante on
03/23/17
I would be curious to know how students feel. Are they upset by the
possibility of missing a class while their faculty demonstrate support for this fully legal labor action? Ithaca College Bargaining Team Contract Proposals and Commitments Comment from
tfischer on
03/23/17
The Administration suggests "This offer addresses the fair pay concerns raised by
the union while still maintaining the financial well-being of the college. As many of you know, the college’s budget is built around a tuition-driven model. Unfortunately, enrollment numbers continually shift, and the college needs to take that into account when structuring this offer, so that if enrollments decline, we are still able to meet our financial commitments as well as our ability to continue providing our students with outstanding educational opportunities." The problem with the above statement is that it supposes a false dilemma: that somehow IC can only balance its budget by continuing the inequitable labor practices that disadvantage 41% of the college's faculty. I suggest that this is one of many choices. The college has chosen to rely upon these labor practices to keep costs down. They might as easily slash the 2 million dollar catering budget and expect their highest paid administrators (the 6 figure crew) to work harder for less, like they have continually asked staff and faculty to do for years. Furthermore, IC hires expensive inside and outside counsel. The Admin. has wasted time and money limping to the above proposal. These folks get paid for negotiations. Adjuncts donate unpaid time to come to endless negotiating sessions just to be rebuffed and insulted. The Administration makes a choice about where to cut, who to reward, and who to cripple. It has been argued that top administrators earning 6 figure salaries deserve their "market driven" pay and that we cannot hire the best without this type of incentive. Based on this logic, Part-time adjuncts have zero incentive to do a good job. Yet, we deliver excellence every day because we are educators and we love our students. I suggest that if our top administrators cannot take a large salary and benefits cut to help the college make ends met, if the only incentive they have to feel motivated to do a good job is predicated upon these lavish salaries, then maybe they are not the kind of leadership IC needs and wants. I wish that the Administration had tried much early in the game to remotely move in a reasonable direction in terms of pay parity and longer contracts. Why it has come to the 11th hour is beyond me. And it also seems that using the Intercom to publicize this offer is crafty and strategic. This offer should have been presented to the faculty bargaining committee at any of the many "emergency" sessions that were held over the last week. They are getting desperate Comment from
mdgraham on
03/23/17
Understand that every single thing in here we have had to fight for, tooth and nail. They wanted to give us none of this. If they had, they would've done so years ago. This represents two years of hard volunteer work from contingent faculty. The college has spent hundreds of thousands of student tuition dollars trying to <em>prevent</em> any of this from happening.
As for disruption? <b>The college creates disruption by trying to avoid treating faculty fairly.</b> Never forget that. A two-day disruption is nothing next to this long-term entrenched resistance to justice and fair treatment, which affects everyone on campus, including students. Ask yourself what the administration's intention is in showing these specifics to the community at this particular moment. Our membership sent us, the bargaining committee, to the table to improve their lives, to begin to lift them out of poverty, and to give them job stability. We will fight for that as hard as we can to get the best deal that we can for our members. This is not yet pay parity, and I don't yet see anything that guarantees job stability for full-timers. The things that matter most to our membership are not resolved. We will review their actual proposals - as opposed to these PR-friendly announcements - in good faith, and consider them fairly. But until we have secured the justice that our membership came together to seek, the strike is on. Ithaca College Bargaining Team Contract Proposals and Commitments Comment from
abarlas on
03/24/17
Contingent faculty have been struggling for two years to get better contracts but it is only now, on the eve of a strike, that the admin has found the political will to act. How can one not see the timing of this announcement as an(other) act of bad faith on its part?
As for students, I had my classes vote on what action they wished to take and they voted to stand on the picket line with me. Only two voted to have class and both have chosen to miss four class sessions each, in spite of my attendance policy. As I see it, missing one session in order to take a stand on an issue a student feels is politically or ethically right is not an unconscionable loss in their education. As for those who don't support the strike: it doesn't have to be a loss for them either to miss a session since it is not impossible for faculty to make it up. No need to turn this issue into another red herring. Ithaca College Bargaining Team Contract Proposals and Commitments Comment from
jrosenbaum on
03/24/17
I served on the faculty at IC from 1987 to 2004. For 17 years prior to that I
served on the unionized faculty at another college, where I represented faculty in contract negotiations four times. At no time, no matter how close we came to deadlines, did that college's negotiators make public the offers being discussed at the bargaining table. Going public is the antithesis of collective bargaining. It does not drive negotiations toward settlement. It has one purpose: to influence public opinion against the faculty by creating the illusion of benevolence. Do not be fooled. Do not give in. If the College truly wants to settle, it would start by keeping negotiations at the bargaining table. I do hope a settlement is reached at the table on Sunday. If not, I encourage all faculty and students to support the contingent faculty on March 28 and 29. — John R. Rosenbaum, Assoc. Prof. (Ret). Ithaca College Bargaining Team Contract Proposals and Commitments Comment from
bburroughs on
03/24/17
You know, if part-time faculty were paid $2000/credit, it
would still amount to less than I earned as graduate student, teaching the same course to the same number of students, without a degree or any teaching experience, in 1998. Now it's 2017, and they have employed the politics of exclusion to craft a $700 per/course PAY CUT to all art faculty in the union. WE are to make the sacrifice here? And for an increase that doesn't even approach parity for others? This issue has repeatedly been brought up with the administration. They nod in understanding, then deny our existence and ignore the "fair pay concerns raised by the union" again and again. I'm not "concerned with fair pay." I'm struggling to get by in a sinking profession, and sick of relying on good credit (cards, aka white privilege) and my spouse's respectable income to make it work. As each passing year gets harder and less sustainable for me, I lay awake for those without the privileges that have kept me in the game. Too many good teachers are slipping through the cracks, their talents, passions, and potential wasted by bureaucratic indifference. That's why I'll be on the picket lines all day, as we try to build a better way at IC- one that values our contributions with something other than empty words. Pay Equity Is a Fair and Reachable Goal Comment from
rfomalhaut on
03/24/17
"I just had a good conversation with a colleague, who like me, is in support of the union and the issues of pay parity and job stability. I sat down to write to you that my colleague and I perceive the proposal [above] as coming a long way toward meeting these requests.
However, before sending this message, I decided to analyze my salary history. I was surprised to learn there was an enormous discrepancy between my part-time pay 11.5 years ago ($3300 per course at the beginning) and my first 1-year contract a few years later ($48,000 per yr plus benefits). I also note that the $5125 per course offered below would be a $41,000 full time equivalent which falls way short of the $48,000 plus benefits I was earning on my 1-year contract 10 years ago. Alas, I am unable to stand behind the college's latest offer." --Received from an IC nten faculty member who wishes to remain anonymous |
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