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Contingent Faculty Get More Job Security
The California Faculty Association (CFA) and the California State University system reached a contract agreement in March that incorporates groundbreaking protections for contingent faculty. The CFA, which is affiliated with the AAUP, represents tenure-track and contingent faculty as well as some academic professionals in the CSU system, which has twenty-two campuses across California and a twenty-third under construction.
The three-year contract, hammered out after prolonged negotiations between the union and CSU administrators, addresses pay raises, family leave, and other important issues. It also acknowledges that the ratio of students to tenure-track faculty in the CSU system has grown to levels that raise "serious concerns." That ratio is now almost 30 to 1, according to George Diehr, a professor of management science at CSU–San Marcos and a member of the CFA bargaining team. A decade ago, the ratio was in the vicinity of 25 to 1, he says.
To restore that ratio, CSU would need to create about 2,000 new tenure-track positions. While that number of positions will not be created, CSU has agreed to undertake at least 1,200 new tenure-track faculty searches during the 2002–03 academic year.
The contract also contains provisions designed to give greater job security to the contingent faculty, who, Diehr estimates, now teach about half the classes at CSU. Beginning in fall 2002, contingent faculty with six years of service will receive three-year contracts, which will typically be renewed as long as work is available "except in instances of documented unsatisfactory performance or serious conduct problems." Experienced lecturers will be given preference for courses they are qualified to teach when course assignments are made, and departments will receive dedicated funding to cover the cost of raises for lecturers so that budgetary pressures do not encourage them to hire cheaper, less experienced lecturers.
These achievements grow from a strong and cohesive effort on the part of CFA members, says Richard Moser, a staff member in the AAUP’s Department of Organizing and Services. "CFA activists made the future of CSU a public issue all over the state." Their efforts included holding teach-ins at every CSU campus and organizing protests and rallies across California. CFA members also focused on persuading CSU chancellor Charles Reed to support a settlement. In February they staged protests at five of Reed’s public appearances, four in California and one in New York. Larry Glenn, chair of the AAUP’s Collective Bargaining Congress, and Flo Hatcher, chair of the Association’s Committee on Part-Time and Non-Tenure-Track Appointments, traveled from Connecticut to help with the New York protest.
"This contract goes to show what can be accomplished when full-time and contingent faculty members work together toward a common goal," Moser says.
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