In this issue, we also announce publication of the latest volume of the Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy and report on the following recent higher education elections and filings at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and state labor relations agencies:

Lastly, the newsletter provides a link to a recording of our March 2, 2022 webinar titled Race, History, and Academic Freedom, A Teach-In as well as information about three recently published books about higher education: Collective Bargaining in Higher Education: Best Practices for Promoting Collaboration, Equity, and Measurable Outcomes, edited by Daniel J. Julius; Power Despite Precarity: Strategies for the Contingent Faculty Movement in Higher Education by Joe Berry and Helena Worthen; and Ellen Schrecker's The Lost Promise: American Universities in the 1960s.

The National Center's 2022 annual conference on April 11-13, 2022 was a major success. We thank all the panelists, moderators, and attendees for their participation.

Below are links to video recordings o conference presentations along with links to panel descriptions, panelists bios, and reading material. Click here for the full conference program.

Welcoming Remarks from Jennifer J. Raab, President, Hunter College, CUNY, Theodore H. Curry, Professor of Human Resources and Labor Relations, Michigan State University, Christopher Simeone, Director, Department of Organizing and Services, AAUP, and William A. Herbert, Executive Director, National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions, Hunter College, CUNY.

Keynote Presentation by Montserrat Garibay, Senior Advisor for Labor Relations, Office of the Secretary, U.S. Department of Education in conversation with Kathleen Mulligan, Director of the National Labor Leadership Initiative, Cornell University, ILR School. Panelists Bios

Panel: The Future of Higher Education with Arthur Levine, The Great Upheaval: Higher Education's Past, Present, and Uncertain Future, Ann Kirschner, University Professor, City University of New York, Discussant, Adrianna Kezar, Endowed Professor and Dean's Professor of Leadership, USC, Director, Pullias Center, and Director, Delphi Project, Discussant, and Daniel Greenstein, Chancellor, Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education, Moderator.

Panel: Reassessing and Reexamining the History of Higher Education with Elizabeth Tandy Shermer, Indentured Students: How Government-Guaranteed Loans Left Generations Drowning in College Debt, Cristina Viviana Groeger, The Education Trap: Schools and the Remaking of Inequality in Boston, Davarian Baldwin, In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower: How Universities Are Plundering Our Cities, and Ellen Schrecker, The Lost Promise: American Universities in the 1960s, and Suzanne Kahn, Managing Director of Research and Policy, Roosevelt Institute, Moderator. Panel Description and Panelists Bios. At our request, the panelists prepared the following bibliography for further study of the issues.

Panel: Contract Negotiations under COVID and Beyond with Margaret E. Winters, former Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs, Wayne State University, Ricardo Villarosa, Wayne State University AAUP-AFT, Dominick Fanelli, Associate Director Labor Relations, University of Michigan, Kirsten Herold, President, Lecturers' Employee Organization, AFT Local 6244, and Homer C. La Rue, Labor Arbitrator, Mediator, and Professor of Law, Howard University School of Law, Moderator.

Panel Description and Panelists Bios; Reading Material

Panel: COVID and Higher Education: The Role of Unions and Arbitration Regarding Vaccine Mandates with Richard Bales, Professor of Law, Pettit College of Law, Ohio Northern University, Eve Weinbaum, Co-President, Massachusetts Society of Professors, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Michael Eagen, Associate Provost for Academic Personnel, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and Charles Toombs, President, California Faculty Association, Moderator.

Panel: Pandemic Organizing and Bargaining Lessons in Higher Education with Larry Savage, Chair, Department of Labour Studies, Brock University and Lauren Byers, United Faculty of Florida, Unit Service Director, Organizing Specialist, Barry Miller, Senior Policy Advisor on Labour Relations, York University, Discussant and Moderator.

Panel Description and Panelists Bios; Reading Material

Panel: Lessons Learned: Organizing and Collective Bargaining by Graduate Assistants During the Pandemic with Jacob A. Bennett, MFA, PhD, University of New Hampshire, Ben Serber, Higher Ed Organizer, North Dakota United and Past President, FSU Graduate Assistants United, Amy L. Levant, Assistant Director of Labor and Employee Relations, University of Illinois, Chicago, and Joseph van der Naald, Graduate Student Researcher, Program in Sociology, Graduate Center, CUNY, Moderator.

Panel: Limiting the Use of Student Evaluations in Contracts: Challenges in Vision and Enforcement with Steven Newman, former President, Temple Association of University Professionals, Temple University, Ian Sakinofsky, Professor of HR Management, Ryerson University, Laura Murphy, Dutchess United Educators, Alexandra Matish, Associate Vice Provost for Academic and Faculty Affairs, University of Michigan, and Timothy S. Taylor, Arbitrator, Scheinman Arbitration and Mediation Services, Moderator.

Panel Description and Panelists Bios; Reading Material

Panel: Federal Funding, Inequality, and Higher Education: Politics and Policy-Making with Adam Harris, staff writer at the Atlantic, National Fellow at New America, and author, The State Must Provide: Why America’s Colleges Have Always Been Unequal — and How to Set Them Right, Rebecca S. Natow, Assistant Professor of Educational Leadership & Policy, Hofstra University and author, Reexamining the Federal Role in Higher Education: Politics and Policymaking in the Postsecondary Sector, and Sosanya Jones, Associate Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies, Howard University, Moderator.

Panel Description and Panelists Bios; Reading Material

Panel: Becoming JEDI: Labor-Management Strategy to Challenge Racism on Campus and Stem Community College Enrollment Decline with Courtney Brewer, Professor of Psychology, Executive Vice President, Faculty Association Suffolk Community College, Christina Vargas, Chief Diversity Officer and Title IX Coordinator, Suffolk County Community College, board member, ERASE Racism NY, Patty Munsch, Interim Vice President for Student Affairs, Suffolk County Community College, Jennifer Browne, Associate Dean for Curriculum Development, Suffolk County Community College, Lauren Liburd, Specialist, SCCC Foundation, Co-Chair Achieving the Dream Committee, and Cynthia Eaton, Professor of English, Secretary, Faculty Association Suffolk Community College, Moderator.

Panel Description and Panelists Bios; Reading Material

Panel: Collective Bargaining and Shared Governance: Findings from the 2021 AAUP Shared Governance Survey with Lynn Pasquerella, President, Association of American Colleges and Universities, Timothy Reese Cain, Associate Professor of Higher Education, University of Georgia, Hans-Joerg Tiede, Director of Research, American Association of University Professors, and Michael Loconto, Arbitrator and Mediator, Loconto ADR, Boston, MA, Moderator.

Panel Description and Panelists Bios; Reading Material

Panel: Achieving Pay Parity for Part-Time Faculty in Community Colleges with

Sandra Weese, Organizing Director, California Federation of Teachers, Ron McKinley, Vice Chancellor of Human Resources and Employee Relations, Peralta Community College District, Dyana Delfin-Polk, Peralta Community College District Board of Trustees, and Jennifer Shanoski, President, Peralta Federation of Teachers, AFT Local 1603, Moderator. Panel Description and Panelists Bios; Reading Material

Panel: An Update from NLRB and Public Sector Labor Relations Agencies on Higher Education Issues with Mark Gaston Pearce, Executive Director, Workers’ Rights Institute, Georgetown University Law School, and former National Labor Relations Board Chairman, J. Felix De La Torre, General Counsel, California Public Employment Relations Board, Ellen Maureen Strizak, General Counsel, Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board, and Jennifer Abruzzo, General Counsel, National Labor Relations Board.

Panel Description and Panelists Bios; Reading Material

Panel: Faculty Unionization and Collective Bargaining in the Philippines: Similarities and Differences with Benjamin Velasco, Assistant Professor, University of the Philippines, School of Labor and Industrial Relations, Rene Luis Tadle, Associate Professor, Philosophy, University of Santo Tomas and Lead Convenor, Council of Teachers and Staff of Colleges and Universities of the Philippines, Gerardo L. Blanco Associate Professor, Higher Education, Academic Director, Center for International Higher Education, Boston College, Shannon Lederer, Director of Immigration Policy, AFL-CIO, and Ashwini Sukthankar, Secretary/Treasurer, International Commission for Labor Rights. Panel Description and Panelists Bios

Panel: Higher Education Legal Update with Henry Morris, Jr., Partner, Arent Fox LLP, Monica Barrett, Bond, Schoeneck & King PLLC, Angela Thompson, CWA Special Counsel for Strategic Initiatives, and Aaron Nisenson, Senior Legal Counsel, AAUP, Panelist and Moderator. Panel Description and Panelists Bios; Reading Material

The National Center's research team continues its work in seeking responses to our electronic national census survey, which collects current information about all collective bargaining units and contracts in higher education involving faculty, administrators, postdoctoral scholars, and student workers.

The survey seeks bargaining unit size (the number of employees represented) and bargaining composition (the titles covered), along with other important information. The current survey is a continuation of data collection performed by the National Center since its creation.

We thank the hundreds of unions and institutions that have submitted survey responses. After nine months of contacting labor and administrator representatives, however, we still have a long way to go to complete the data collection. Therefore, we need your help and cooperation. Please join the other unions and institutions from around the country by answering the survey today.

The National Center's research team will continue to be telephoning and emailing leaders and staff of unions and institutions that have not yet submitted a response. To avoid such communications, we urge you to respond to the electronic survey today.

A word version of the survey is also available. You can request one, or submit questions to our research team members, via email: ncscbint1@hunter.cuny.edu. We will be happy to answer your questions and provide you with timely assistance in completing the survey.

The data collected will be used for a new open-source directory of collective bargaining relationships and contracts. Remember that without current data, we will not be able to produce a new directory for your use.

The National Center is pleased to announce publication of the latest volume of the Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy on the theme of Collective Bargaining in the Pandemic.

During our 2022 annual conference the Journal's co-editors, Jeffrey Cross and Gary Rhoades, made an announcement about the new volume.

Pandemic Responses: What They Reveal About Crisis Management, Decision-Making, and Shared Governance by Daniel J. Julius

Retrenchment Clauses and the Problem of Force Majeure: Evidence from AAUP Chapter Collective Bargaining Agreements in Ohio by Dominic Wells and Trey Peters

Asymmetries in the Bargaining Process by Margaret E. Winters

The Journal is an open access, peer-reviewed, online periodical, the purpose of which is to advance research and scholarly thought related to academic collective bargaining and to make relevant and pragmatic peer-reviewed research readily accessible to practitioners and to scholars in the field.

We encourage scholars and practitioners in the fields of collective bargaining, labor relations, and labor history to submit articles for potential publication in future volumes.

The Journal is supported, in part, by a generous contribution from TIAA and is hosted by the institutional repository of Eastern Illinois University.

Dominican University of California, NLRB Case No. 20-RC-290727

In a unit of 106 full-time faculty, 78 voted for CFT representation and 14 voted against. Notably, the university did not claim that the full-time faculty were managerial under the Yeshiva doctrine, nor did it claim that NLRB lacked jurisdiction because the institution is religiously-affiliated.

Included: All full-time faculty employed by the Employer at its facility located at 50 Acacia Avenue in San Rafael, California.

Excluded: All other employees, guards, and supervisors as defined by the Act.

Harrisburg Area Community College, PLRB Case No. PERA-R-20-306-E

On April 8, 2022, the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board (PLRB) tallied the ballots in an election involving a petition filed by the Harrisburg Area Community College Education Association, PSEA/NEA to represent a combined bargaining unit of full-time and regular part-time faculty at Harrisburg Area Community College.

The tally demonstrated that in a unit of 828, 335 faculty voted in favor of Harrisburg Area Community College Education Association, PSEA/NEA representation and 198 voted against.

The following is the composition of the new faculty unit at Harrisburg Area Community College:

Included: All full-time and regular part-time teaching faculty including senior professors, professors, associate professors, assistant professors, department chairs, instructors, librarians, including adjunct librarians, direct instructional support adjuncts, and program and campus directors with academic rank, health science lab instructors, and adjunct faculty.

Excluded: Adjunct faculty who have not been employed for two (2) of the past six (6) terms (excluding winter sessions), and excluding non-faculty professional employees, college in the high school teachers, instructors limited only to non-credit workforce related courses, management level employees, supervisors, first-level supervisors and guards as defined in the Act.

Santa Clara University, NLRB Case No. 32-RC-294533

Art Center College of Design, NLRB Case No. 31-RC-293741

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, NLRB Case No. 01-RC-289879

On April 6, 2022, the National Labor Relations Board Region 1 tallied the ballots in an election concerning a petition by United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) to represent graduated assistants at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology MIT).

The ballot tally demonstrated that in a bargaining unit of 3,823 graduate assistants, 1785 voted for UE representation and 912 voted against.

The following is a description of the new graduate assistant bargaining unit at MIT:

Included: Graduate students enrolled in Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) degree programs who are employed to provide instructional or research services, including research assistants, teaching assistants, and instructor G's.

Excluded: Undergraduate students; graduate student resident advisors; graduate fellows who are not also employed as either research assistants or teaching assistants; hourly graders who are not also employed as either research assistants or teaching assistants; graduate students not seeking MIT degrees, including visiting students; office clericals, managers, guards, and supervisors as defined in the Act.

Fordham University, NLRB Case No: 02-RC-291360

The ballot tally demonstrated that in a bargaining unit of 360 graduate assistants, 229 voted for CWA representation and 15 voted against.

The following is a description of the new graduate assistant bargaining unit at Fordham University:

Included: All graduate students enrolled in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences who receive remuneration from the University for services that are approved as attendant on their enrollment by the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

Excluded: All other graduate students and employees, federal work study students, and graduate students not working in positions in which they perform services that are approved as attendant on their enrollment by the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and all guards and supervisors as defined in the Act.

Trustees of Grinnell College, Case No. 18-RC-291710

On April 26, 2022, the National Labor Relations Board, Region 18, tallied the ballots concerning a representation petition by Union of Grinnell Student Dining Workers (UGSDW) to expand its existing bargaining unit to a wall-to-wall unit of all undergraduate workers on the Grinnell College campus.

In a bargaining unit of 720, 327 undergraduate workers voted in favor of UGSDW representation, and 6 voted against.

The following is the new wall-to-wall unit at Grinnell College represented by UGSDW:

Included: All full-time and regular part-time student workers as defined below working in a position other than or in addition to a position in Dining Services. Student workers are defined as all degree-seeking individuals who are simultaneously (1) enrolled as undergraduate students, full-time or part-time, at the Employer and (2) employed by the Employer.

Excluded: Students whose sole employment relationship with the Employer is in Dining Services, or is an internship, research fellowship, Mentored Advanced Project, or an equivalent relationship, such as externally grant-funded positions, Community Advisors, Overnight Stay Coordinators, and guards and supervisors as defined in the National Labor Relations Act, as amended.

University of Vermont Medical Center, NLRB Case No. 03-RC-291818

On April 14, 2022, National Labor Relations Board Region 3 tallied ballots in an election conducted concerning a petition filed by Committee of Interns and Residents, SEIU Local 1957 to represent interns and residents working for the University of Vermont Medical Center.

In a unit of 347 interns and residents, 209 voted in favor of SEIU Local 1957 representation and 59 voted against. The following is the new bargaining unit at the University of Vermont Medical Center:

Included: All interns, residents, chief residents and fellows employed by the Employer with their home base as the University of Vermont Medical Center.

Excluded: All administrative chief residents, managers, guards, and supervisors as defined in the Act, and all other employees.

Keck School of Medicine of USC, NLRB Case No. 21-RC-292035

On March 10, 2022, the Committee of Interns and Residents, SEIU filed a petition with NLRB Region 21 seeking to represent a unit of approximately 85 interns and residents at USC's Keck School of Medicine.

On April 5, 2022, a notice of a mail ballot election was issued by NLRB Region 1 for the following stipulated unit:

University of Washington, WPERC Decision 13501

On April 14, 2022, SEIU Healthcare 1199NW was certified by the Washington Public Employment Relations Commission (PERC), following a card check, to represent campus security at the University of Washington-Northwest.

The following is the newly certified campus security bargaining unit at the University of Washington-Northwest:

Included: All full-time and regular part-time Campus Security Officers and Campus Security Sergeants at University of Washington – Northwest.

Excluded: Supervisors, managers, confidential employees, employees in other bargaining units, and all other employees.

Georgetown University, NLRB Case No. 05-RC-293476

On April 4, 2022, International Union, Security, Police and Fire Professionals of America (SPFPA) filed a petition to represent a proposed bargaining unit of 73 police and security officers at Georgetown University. Another union, Law Enforcement Officers Security Unions (LEOSU-DC), a Division of LEOSU, affiliated with Law Enforcement Officers Security & Police Benevolent Association. intervened in the representation case.

On April 21, 2022, the NLRB Region 6 Director issued a notice to conduct a mail ballot election for the following stipulated bargaining unit:

On March 2, 2022, the National Center hosted a webinar titled Race, History, and Academic Freedom, A Teach-in. The goal of the webinar was to educate those working and studying on campuses throughout the country about the current attacks on the teaching and learning about race in American history. 

Click here for the link of the recorded event.

Click here for the webinar reading materials.

The panelists were:

Routlege recently published Collective Bargaining in Higher Education: Best Practices for Promoting Collaboration, Equity, and Measurable Outcomes, edited by Daniel J. Julius.

The book contains contributions from a diverse group of scholars, practitioners, and advocates, many of whom have been active in National Center programs and activities. It provides an overview of the contemporary landscape and practical advice concerning collective bargaining and labor relations in higher education.

Routledge is offering a 20% discount for each book purchase. Use this discount code at checkout: code FLY21.

Joe Berry and Helena Worthen have published a new book on Pluto Press titled Power Despite Precarity: Strategies for the Contingent Faculty Movement in Higher Education.

The book describes the historical periods leading to major transitions in higher education faculty. It then examines the three-decade effort by contingent faculty at California State University to improve their working conditions through collective bargaining. Berry and Worthen are well-known contingent faculty activists with extensive experience in organizing contingent faculty nationwide. Their new book draws upon their vast practical experiences and observations to analyze the strategies and challenges of seeking to improve contingent faculty terms and conditions of employment.