The Faculty Union Experience at Public Universities in Ohio
The following is a recap of the panel discussion hosted by OU AAUP on March 23, 2023.
Panelists
Deborah Smith, President, AAUP chapter at Kent State University (KSU)
Sue Clement, Instructional Faculty President, AAUP chapter at Kent State University (KSU)
David Jackson, President, BGSU Faculty Association at Bowling Green University (BGSU)
John McNay, Past President, AAUP chapter at University of Cincinnati (UC); Past President, Ohio chapter of AAUP; Chair, National AAUP's Government Relations Committee
Highlights
Shared governance: Unionization at KSU, BGSU, and UC has empowered faculty to negotiate on university governance while also strengthening the relationship between the faculty and admin.
Salary & Benefits: Unionized faculty at KSU, BGSU, and UC have been able to negotiate both salary increases for underpaid faculty and annual salary raises for their faculty as a whole. At UC, they have also been able to negotiate a contract with no increases in health care costs.
Workload: Unionized faculty at KSU and BGSU have specified workload policies in their faculty handbooks which cannot be changed without the approval of their faculty senate. Because of the strength and organization of their faculty union, the administration at BGSU hasn’t attempted to make changes to their workload policy.
Regional Campuses: Unionized faculty at UC and KSU have been able to increase salaries for RHE faculty, prevent restructuring of regional campuses, and improve ties between their main and regional campuses.
Instructional Faculty: Unionized faculty at KSU and BGSU have negotiated improved job security, including specified policies around contract renewal and non-renewal, as well as increased rights, such as instructional faculty sabbaticals at BGSU.
COVID: Unionized faculty at KSU, BGSU, and UC were able to negotiate when their administrations pursued budget cuts and austerity measures early in the COVID pandemic. These negotiations led to democratic decision-making and improved outcomes for their faculty.
Summary
Shared Governance
At BGSU, their university president has said that “a union was the best thing that has ever happened to BGSU.”
At KSU, unionization has strengthened the relationship between the faculty and administration, as the two have come together to negotiate and address major university issues.
At UC, the faculty union gives shared governance “teeth.”
At KSU, policies that would affect their collective bargaining agreement (CBA) cannot be changed without the approval of their faculty senate.
Faculty unions generally have lawyers on retainer, which levels the legal playing field between the faculty and the administration. Also, it often means that faculty have legal representation available to them when they face disciplinary proceedings.
Salary & Benefits
At BGSU, salaries were near the bottom among Ohio publics prior to their first CBA in 2013. They have since reached the state median, with some faculty getting 70-100% salary raises.
At UC, their latest CBA includes 10% salary raises over 3 years and no change in health care costs.
The faculty unions at KSU and BGSU are currently negotiating their CBAs, during a time of rapid inflation. They both feel that this is advantageous for them in terms of negotiating annual salary raises.
At KSU, when they agreed to defer their raises early in the COVID pandemic, they were able to extend their CBA, and even non-represented employees got a 3% raise.
At KSU, the CBA includes salary floors to ensure that faculty can’t be hired below an agreed-upon minimum salary.
Workload
Note: According to Ohio law, workload cannot be directly negotiated in a CBA. However, there are many ways for a faculty union to address workload, such as…
At KSU, workload is defined in their faculty handbook, and the faculty handbook cannot be changed without the approval of their faculty senate. In effect, this gives the faculty “veto power” over any changes in workload and the ability to negotiate with their administration.
At KSU, non-teaching activities such as research, service, and supervising graduate students contribute to workload in a way that is described in detail in their faculty handbook.
At BGSU, they have two ways to negotiate workload. First, their CBA requires negotiation over anything established as a “past practice,” which includes workload. Second, they are allowed to engage in “effects bargaining,” which means they can’t negotiate workload directly, but they can negotiate it as an “effect” of other changes to the CBA.
At BGSU, their administration hasn’t tried to alter their workload because of the demonstrated power and organization that their union has.
Regional Campuses
At UC, the faculty union was able to prevent the restructuring of their regional campuses and improved ties between their main and regional campuses. When the University of Miami’s non-unionized faculty voted against a similar restructuring, their board of trustees went ahead with it anyway.
At UC, the union was able to negotiate adjusted salary raises for regional faculty to create greater equity with the main campus.
At KSU, new regional faculty tend to be hired at the “salary floor.” This means that when that floor is increased, regional faculty usually get raises.
Instructional Faculty
At BGSU, their term for instructional faculty has changed from “non-tenure track faculty” to “qualified rank faculty” and these individuals hold the rank of professor with many of the same rights as their tenured colleagues.
At BGSU, instructional faculty are able to take sabbaticals.
At KSU, instructional faculty promotion policies are defined in their CBA.
At BGSU, instructional faculty now have a non-renewal policy that strengthens job security for individuals who have spent more time in their positions.
At KSU, there is a defined process for instructional faculty contract renewals in their CBA. The process gets simplified as an individual holds their position for longer, with just a brief administrative review after 15 years.
COVID
At KSU, the administration wanted to cut salaries and defer raises early in the COVID pandemic, so the faculty union held a vote of its members. The result of this vote was that they agreed to defer raises in order to protect faculty jobs and secure the university’s finances.
At BGSU, they had just renewed their CBA in March 2020, and the administration wanted to “take it back” so that they could lay off faculty. The union was able to negotiate severance and the right of first refusal, meaning that if the jobs came back, those faculty would be first in line for them. As a result, the number of BGSU faculty who lost their jobs and were never brought back as a result of COVID is “in the single digits.”
At UC, the union was able to make the administration compromise on COVID-related cuts.