April 2019

The National Center E-Note is a monthly electronic newsletter containing research and analysis relevant to unionization and collective bargaining in higher education and the professions.

In this issue:

The National Center's 46th Annual Conference: A Major Success

We thank all of the speakers, panelists, and attendees for making our 46th annual national conference a major success .

The conference brought together of over 400 labor representatives and administrators involved in collective bargaining and labor relations for a substantive examination of collective bargaining after Janus .

The conference would not have been possible without sponsorships by TIAA, Humana Group Medicare Advantage, AFL-CIO United Way Partnership, SEIU, and the AFT.

Below are photographs from the conference.

Mercy College, NLRB Case No. 02-RC-238065

On April 8, 2019, the National Labor Relations Board Region 2 issued a notice of a mail ballot election concerning a petition by SEIU seeking to represent a bargaining unit of 570 full-time and part-time non-tenure track faculty at Mercy College in New York. The tallying of the mail ballots is scheduled for May 2, 2019.

The following is the at-issue bargaining unit at Mercy College.

Included:

All full‐time and part‐time Adjunct Faculty, Lecturers, and Tutors, at all Mercy College locations, including any employees who may hold another position with the college but who also teach as adjuncts and are not excluded, who were employed by the Employer during the payroll period ending March 14, 2019.

Excluded:

All other employees, including managerial employees, guards and

supervisors as defined by the Act.

Miami-Dade College, FPERC Case No. RC-2018-026

On March 27, 2019, the Florida Public Employees Relations Commission tallied the ballots in an election on a petition by SEIU seeking to represent a unit of part-time adjunct faculty at Miami-Dade College. Of the 2,790 faculty in the bargaining unit, 587 voted in favor of representation and 573 voted against.

Included:

All part-time adjunct faculty or part-time instructors employed by Miami Dade College teaching at least one college-credit-bearing or non-college-creditbearing course (including Continuing Education, Off Site Courses and any adjunct faculty in the School of Nursing).

Excluded:

All other faculty, including tenured and tenure-track faculty, full-time faculty, deans, assistants to deans, provosts, employees covered by an existing collective bargaining agreement at Miami Dade College, managers, and supervisors.

St. Johns River State College, FPERC Case No. RC-2018-024

Florida Public Employees Commission has certified United Faculty of Florida as the exclusive representative of a unit of 142 faculty, department chairs, librarians and senior academic advisors. The certification followed a representation election in which the unit employees voted 83-27 in favor of UFF representation.

The following is the at-issue faculty and professional unit at St. Johns River State College:

Included:

Full-time faculty (including department chair, assistant department chair, program director, instructor, and professor), librarians (including public service librarian and campus librarian), and senior academic advisors (including the assistant director of advising/senior academic advisor).

Excluded:

All managerial, administrative, supervisory, and confidential employees including, but not limited to, director of organizational management baccalaureate program, director of bachelor of science in nursing, and all job titles categorized as follows: administrative (including, but not limited to, president, vice president, dean, and director), professional support (including, but not limited to, professional support advisors), career service, other professional services, part-time employees, adjunct faculty, and acting or interim faculty.

Occidental College, NLRB Case No. 31-RC-238837

On April 1, 2019, SEIU filed a petition with the NLRB seeking to represent a unit of 115 non-tenure track full-time and part-time faculty employed by Occidental College in Los Angeles. A notice of a mail-ballot election was issued by the NLRB with the ballots scheduled to be tallied on May 14, 2019.

The following is the at-issue faculty unit at Occidental College:

Included:

All non-tenure track full-time and part-time faculty in the following classifications: professor, associate professor, assistant professor, instructor, professor of practice, and adjunct professor who were employed by the Employer during the payroll period ending March 31, 2019.

Excluded:

All other employees; department chairs; temporary employees; and managers, guards, and supervisors as defined by the Act.

Northeastern University, NLRB Case No. 01-RC-239236

SEIU has withdrawn a recently filed petition seeking to represent 430 full-time non-tenure track faculty at Northeastern University.

According to a media report, the withdrawal was aimed at avoiding a potential adverse decision by the currently constituted National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) that would reverse or modify Pacific Lutheran University, 361 N.L.R.B. 1404 (2014) and conclude that full-time non-tenure track faulty are managerial under N.L.R.B. v. Yeshiva University, 444 U.S. 672 (1980).

Last month, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit remanded a case to the NLRB involving a claim by the University of Southern California that certain non-tenure track faculty were managerial.

The following is the description of the faculty unit at Northeastern University that was subject of SEIU's petition:

I ncluded:

All full-time non-tenured or non-tenure track faculty employed by Northeastern University at its campuses located at 360 Huntington Avenue, Boston and 89 Broad Street, Boston, Massachusetts, including, but not limited to, faculty with the titles Assistant Teaching Professor, Associate Teaching Professor, Teaching Professor, Visiting Assistant Teaching Professor, Visiting Associate Teaching Professor, Visiting Assistant Professor, Visiting Associate Professor, Visiting Professor, Visiting Lecturer, Assistant Academic Specialist, Associate Academic Specialist, Academic Specialist, Senior Academic Specialist, Executive Professor, Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, and Professor of the Practice. Bargaining unit faculty above who also have title or responsibilities identified in the exclusions remain included within the unit, unless they are a supervisory, managerial or confidential employee as defined by the Act.

Excluded:

Part-time faculty, including adjuncts, tenured and tenure-track faculty, deans, provosts, professionals and non-professional employees, department chairs, graduate assistants, graduate students, research assistants, clinical fellows, teaching fellows, athletic coaches, academic advisors, maintenance employees, clerical employees, post-doctoral scholars, assistant clinical professors, associate clinical professors, clinical professors, clinical instructors, assistant co-op coordinators, associate co-op coordinators, co-op coordinators, “remote faculty” (i.e., faculty assigned to non-Boston campuses and/or faculty who only teach online and do not have a reasonable expectation of teaching in person), and guards, supervisors, and confidential employees as defined by the Act.

Union County College, NJPERC Docket No. CU-2018-011

On March 20, 2019, the New Jersey Public Employment Relations Commission affirmed a decision to add academic specialists to an AAUP-represented unit of instructional and professional library staff at Union County College. The agency rejected the college's argument that the academic specialists were supervisors under New Jersey's collective bargaining statute.

In Re Grievance John Summa, Supreme Court Docket No. 2018-22

On April 5, 2019, the Vermont Supreme Court issued a decision affirming the decision by the Vermont Labor Relations Board denying a grievance filed by John Summa, a lecturer in the University of Vermont's Department of Economics, challenging the university's failure to reappoint him.

Summa was hired as a lecturer by the university in 2009 and was in the bargaining unit represented by United Academics. Although he had been reappointed following his first four-year review, he was not reappointed as a result of the second review, which commenced in the 2016 fall semester. 

The four-year review process includes written classroom evaluations by tenured and tenure-track faculty and student course evaluations. During Summa’s second four-year review, the peer evaluators raised serious concerns concerning his classroom performance, and the faculty voted 10-1 against his reappointment. The Department Chair concurred and recommended Summa’s non-reappointment to the Dean. After reviewing the submitted materials, the Faculty Standards Committee voted 5-0 to recommend that the Dean reappoint him, discounting the peer evaluations because of their timing. Nevertheless, the Dean decided not to reappoint Summa based on the shortcomings found in the classroom assessments and Summa's alleged failure to take steps to improve his pedagogical skills.

Summa grieved the Dean’s decision under the collective bargaining agreement between United Academics and the University of Vermont. The Vermont Labor Relations Board denied the grievance finding that that there were no procedural violations that materially impacted the decision, the decision was not arbitrary and capricious, and Summa’s academic freedom rights were not denied.

Following a review, the Vermont Supreme Court concluded the agency's decision was not clearly erroneous and it was supported by credible evidence in the record. The Vermont Supreme Court also rejected Summa's substantive and procedural arguments raised in his appeal.

On April 5, 2019, Arbitrator Daniel F. Brent issued a decision and award sustaining a grievance pursued by the UAW alleging that Barnard College violated the first collective bargaining agreement between the parties when it failed to pay members of the UAW-represented adjunct faculty with a stipend for teaching First Year Seminar courses in the 2017-18 school year consistent with its past practices. The grievance charged that the college violated the anti-discrimination clause of the contract by continuing to pay the stipend to non-bargaining unit members while denying it to bargaining unit members.

The college justified its refusal to continue to pay the stipend to bargaining unit members based on the terms of the collective bargaining agreement, which was silent concerning the stipends. The arbitrator, however, was persuaded by the evidence "that the practice of paying such stipends to bargaining unit and non-bargaining unit employees was recognized by the College despite the absence of an explicit reference in the collective bargaining agreement mandating such payments." The arbitrator concluded that the college "violated a valid and binding past practice that must be enforced if the College is to avoid a violation of the non-discrimination provision negotiated by the parties."

Barnard College, NLRB Case No. 02-CA-200574

On April 12, 2019, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) affirmed a decision by an administrative law judge (ALJ) dismissing an unfair labor practice complaint alleging that the Barnard College had violated its duty to provide requested information by the UAW concerning the college's reasons for not reappointing certain contingent faculty members in the UAW bargaining unit.

The NLRB agreed with the ALJ that the college had been "generally forthcoming about information regarding faculty reappointments and that the parties had a misunderstanding about the scope of" of a particular UAW request on the topic.

University of Pittsburgh, PERA-R-19-2-W

On April 9, 2019, the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board issued an administrative decision, following an investigation, dismissing a USW petition that sought to represent a ll full-time and regular part-time tenure-stream and non-tenure-stream faculty, and librarians at the University of Pittsburgh. The decision found that USW had failed to submit the required showing of interest by 30% of the at-issue faculty in support of the representation petition. According to a media report , USW is appealing the dismissal.

University of Pittsburgh, PERA-R-17-355-W

According to a media report, the preliminary tally of ballots by graduate assistants at the University of Pittsburgh, conducted by the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board on April 26, 2019, found that 675 voted in favor of USW representation and 712 voted against. The final outcome of the election, however, will depend on the agency's rulings with regard to 153 challenged ballots that have not been counted.

Florida Polytechnic University, FPERC Case Nos. CA-2018-029 and CA-2018-034

On April 25, 2019, Florida Public Employee Relations Commission Hearing Officer Janela D. Ingram issued a recommended order and decision concluding that Florida Polytechnic University engaged in an unfair labor practice when it failed to provide United Faculty of Florida (UFF) with reasonable notice and an opportunity to engage in meaningful negotiations over the university's decision to abolish the wellness counselor and assistant librarian positions in the UFF-represented bargaining unit and laying off the employees in those titles: Kate Bernard and Casey Fox.

The Hearing Officer also concluded that the University engaged in an unfair labor practice by laying off Bernard and Fox in retaliation for their active participation on the UFF bargaining team. In reaching that conclusion, the Hearing Officer found that the "evidence of the University's overall anti-union stance is unrefuted. It is apparent that the climate at the University's campus was charged with tension between the administration and unit employees. The University's president and provost admitted that they preferred to work without a union in place and fought hard to oppose the creation of a union at the University."

Lastly, the Hearing Officer found that Florida Polytechnic University engaged in a separate unfair labor practice when it decided not to renew the teaching contract of Professor Christina Drake in retaliation for her protected union activity. The Hearing Officer reasoned:

"Moreover, it is very apparent that the administration was frustrated and discontented with Drake's outspokenness on behalf of UFF regarding personnel and student issues and alleged retaliatory conduct of the University. Drake expressed these concerns not only with the University but also to individuals and sources outside the University who she believed could influence the administration's conduct."

The university has fifteen days to file exceptions to the recommended order and decision.

SEIU Higher Education Market Director

 

JOB POSTING

 

PRIMARY JOB DUTIES :



· Supervises field representatives

· Coordinates field representative activity with other components of the Local Union

such as organizing, politics and trainings

·      Consults with and advises Higher Education chapter leadership regarding chapter

issues, strategies and tactics

·      Coordinates community, research and political support for Higher Education

bargaining and contract campaigns

·      Coordinates with SEIU Faculty Forward campaign

·      Advises and directs many officers and stewards on problem-solving and grievance

processing

·      Plans, develops and coordinates steward training and leadership development

·      Reviews and directs grievance processing, including determining the merits of

grievances

·      Develops and coordinates chapterwide faculty committee

·      Monitors to ensure compliance and time limits

·      Maintains liaison with various college and university

personnel to facilitate problem solving on all levels

·      Meets with management to discuss various issues

·      Works with negotiator to run bargaining committees and

interim bargaining efforts

·      Attends membership, chapter and local meetings

·      Responds to member concerns and complaints

·      Performs related work as required

·      Evaluates work performance of staff

 

QUALIFICATIONS:

 

·      At least 4 years of union experience at a senior level

·      At least 1 year experience with a faculty union

·      At least 1 year supervisory experience

·      Good written and oral communication skills

·      Ability to work in stressful situations

·      Willingness to work long hours, travel in and out of Florida and work on weekends

and evenings

·      Good understanding of the contingent faculty labor market

·      Good knowledge of contract interpretation, and federal and

state employment laws

·      Excellent computer skills, including excellent working knowledge of the Voter

Activation Network (VAN)

 

Resumes should be sent to  [email protected]