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September 2023 Newsletter

In this newsletter, we republish a recent National Center study analyzing unionization growth and strike activity in higher education for the period January 1, 2022-June 30, 2023. We also announce the availability of additional National Center archival research material on our website and announce the addition of two new members to our Board of Advisors. 

The newsletter reports on the recently concluded regional conference at the University of Illinois-Chicago and recent union certifications, elections results, and new representation petitions filed.

Lastly, the newsletter includes links to video recordings from or 50^th anniversary conference earlier this year, links to articles in the current volume of the Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy, an announcement about an upcoming labor history book on contingent faculty, and job postings with the California Faculty Association.

Save the Date: National Center's 2024 Conference in New York City

The National Center will be holding our 51st annual national conference on March 17-19, 2024 in New York City. The conference will be held at the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College and at the CUNY Graduate Center.

The theme of the conference will be New Crossroads in Collective Bargaining and Labor Relations in Higher Education and the Professions.

Registration and program information will be announced in future newsletters and on our website.

National Center Study of New Units and Strikes in Higher Ed: 2022-23

Earlier this month, a new study by the National Center was published analyzing data concerning union growth and strike activity in higher education for the period January 1, 2022-June 30, 2023. The study was a special feature in a report titled The State of the Unions 2023: A Profile of Organized Labor in New York City, New York State, and the United States by our colleagues at the CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies.

We thank CUNY Distinguished Professor Ruth Milkman for inviting the National Center to contribute our research to the recent report.

The National Center study is republished below.

Union Organizing and Strikes in Higher Education: 

The 2022-2023 Upsurge in Historical Context

By William A. Herbert, Jacob Apkarian and Joseph van der Naald

As this report documents, the recent uptick in union organizing has not been large enough to reverse the long-term decline in union density, yet the labor movement revitalization of the post-pandemic period is nevertheless an important development. Media attention has focused especially on the organizing drives at Amazon, Starbucks, Apple and other iconic brands. Yet while workers have voted to unionize in those companies, management intransigence has thus far meant that no collective bargaining agreements have been reached at any of them. By contrast, in other sectors of the economy, such as higher education and among medical interns and residents, the recent spate of organizing has led to significant gains.

Higher education is the industry in which such gains have occurred on the largest scale to date. Organizing among college and university faculty, graduate assistants and other student workers is not new, but it has accelerated in recent years, especially since the Great Recession. Equally significant, in 2022-2023, strikes have increased in higher education – in some cases among long-unionized workers and in others for union recognition. This special feature analyzes these developments in historical context.

U.S. labor unions have represented academic employees for more than half a century, primarily at public four-year higher education institutions and community colleges.[1] Over the past decade, however, successful unionization in higher education has accelerated sharply, especially among contingent faculty and graduate student-workers at private colleges and universities. Since January 2022, an even more dramatic upsurge took shape, primarily among student workers (both graduate assistants and undergraduates). This recent growth in student unionization has far exceeded that among faculty–whether contingent or tenure-track. 

In the same period (January 2022 through mid-2023), faculty and student workers alike (as well as postdoctoral scholars and other academic researchers), have engaged in an unprecedented level of strike activity across the country, alongside the national strike wave taking place in other sectors. Although the largest stoppages in this period were at the University of California, notable strikes also took place in the New York area, at Rutgers University, the New School, and Fordham University.

Higher Education Union Growth, 2022-2023

The labor organizing upsurge among student workers has included teaching and research assistants in both the humanities and the previously quiescent STEM fields, as well as undergraduate resident advisors, student dining hall workers, and library staff. This new wave of campus labor activism, although larger in scale than before, builds on more than five decades of growth in higher education unionism.[2]

While graduate and undergraduate student unions are of long standing,[3] the increased scope and success of recent campaigns reflect several new elements. Those include: the recent rise in public support for organized labor with 77percent of young adults approving of unions;[4] the increased centrality of social justice issues in student-worker organizing; the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on campus working conditions and its broader effect on public awareness of labor issues;[5] growing support for workers in higher education from industrial unions like the United Automobile Workers (UAW), the United Electrical Workers (UE), and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU); and the resourcefulness of undergraduate student-workers at Columbia University, Grinnell College, and Bennington College, all of whom successfully organized independent unions.

Alongside recent organizing at Starbucks, REI, Apple, and Trader Joe’s, the upsurge in student worker unionization reflects a wider labor awakening among younger workers. Union organizing has been trending upward among college-educated young workers, and especially those who are difficult to replace, like academic workers. For them, voting to unionize is far more likely to lead to recognition and a contract than among high-turnover and low-wage workers at companies like Starbucks, which has not yet signed a single contract despite hundreds of elections in which workers voted to unionize and repeated rulings by the National Labor Relations Board against the company’s anti-union conduct. The growing presence of higher education workers in established unions is far from trivial: indeed, academic workers now make up approximately one-quarter of the UAW’s membership.[6]

Figure B1 shows the rapid growth in unionization among graduate and undergraduate student workers for the period from January 1, 2013 to June 30, 2023. The line graph in this Figure shows the cumulative number of bargaining units, while the bar graph shows the number of new bargaining units added in each year -- displaying the dramatic uptick that began in 2022. Indeed, during 2022 and 2023 alone unions won 30 new student-worker collective bargaining units, representing a total of 35,655 workers. Most of these involved graduate student workers, who comprise 62 percent (19) of the new units – including two that also include undergraduate workers. Graduate students make up 93 percent (33,314) of the total number of student-workers newly organized in this period.

The election margins in favor of unionization among student workers in 2022-2023 reflect broad support for labor. On average, 91 percent of eligible student-workers voted in favor of unionization in representation elections in 2022-2023 (four additional units were recognized following card checks). These voting margins considerably surpass the 75 percent average of pro-union votes by graduate assistants in elections during the 2013-2019 period.[7] The 2022-2023 successes include union drives at Yale University, the University of Chicago, the University of Minnesota, and Johns Hopkins University, all of which had attempted but failed at organizing in the past.

Support from established unions for student-worker organizing has been instrumental in most of these victories, as Figure B2 shows. Since January 2022, the UE supported 37 percent (7) of the new graduate assistant units, representing around 19,000 workers, whereas before 2022 the UE had represented only two graduate assistant units (at the University of Iowa and the University of New Mexico). The UAW, which has been a dominant player in student-worker organizing for decades, was certified to represent 21 percent (4) of the new graduate student bargaining units in 2022-2023—involving over 5,600 workers. These two unions were followed by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the Communications Workers of America (CWA) representing two new graduate student units, and the Office and Professional Employees International Union (OPEIU), the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the Teamsters’ union, and UNITE HERE each representing one unit. 

The growth in the number of undergraduate bargaining units is a notable new development. Prior to 2022, there was one long-existing unit of resident advisors and tutors at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, along with an undergraduate dining staff unit at Grinnell College. But in 2022-2023, new undergraduate student-worker unions were established at Columbia University, Barnard College, and Wesleyan University, among other campuses. Although these undergraduate units are noticeably smaller than their graduate assistant counterparts, this could change if the current SEIU campaign to organize 10,000 undergraduates at California State University is successful.[8] These campaigns also involve different unions than those leading graduate student organizing. The OPEIU won recognition in 36 percent (4) of the 11 new undergraduate units, alongside an equal number of recognized independent student-worker unions, as Figure B2 shows.

A comparison of 2022-2023 with the nine-year period prior to 2022 reveals the extraordinary and historic character of the recent phase of student labor organizing. The 30 new student bargaining units established since January 2022 represent a nearly 50 percent increase over the total number of graduate and undergraduate student-worker units (21) organized over the entire 2013-2021 period.[9] Only three units were recognized during the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021.

In another departure from longer-term trends, nearly three-quarters of the new graduate assistant units and all the undergraduate bargaining units organized during 2022-2023 were at private colleges and universities. By contrast, prior to 2016, nearly all units were composed of graduate student employees at public institutions. Geographically, 70 percent (21) of the new graduate and undergraduate student-worker bargaining units established since January 2022 were located in the Northeast, including 27 percent (8) in Massachusetts and 23 percent (7) in New York.

The sharp 2022-2023 uptick in student-worker union organizing overshadows activity among faculty, for whom unionization growth was slower than in the pre-pandemic period, as Figure B3 shows. (Like Figure B1, Figure B3 shows cumulative growth of bargaining units in its line graph, and units added each year in its bar graph.) Between 2013 and 2021, 126 faculty collective bargaining units won recognition, involving a total of 42,466 faculty. SEIU organized the largest share of faculty units over the period, 59 percent (74), with a total of 25,963 (predominately non-tenure-track) faculty. In the 2013-2021 period, most of the new faculty bargaining units were at private (including both for- and non-profit) institutions, which accounted for 55 percent (70) of the total. The bulk of newly organized faculty bargaining units in the 2013-2021 period were at institutions in Florida (16), New York (17) and California (18).

By contrast, only 11 new faculty units have been recognized since January 2022, involving less than 4,000 faculty members. Although growth was slower, it is notable that 10 of these new units (91 percent) included non-tenure-track faculty. SEIU was the bargaining agent for 45 percent (5) of these new units, which is consistent with its leading role in organizing non-tenure-track faculty over the past decade.[10] Although most new faculty units were at private colleges and universities, the two largest ones organized in 2022-2023 were at public institutions: Harrisburg Area Community College and Miami University, represented by the National Education Association (NEA) and the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) respectively. Six new faculty bargaining unions have won recognition in New York and California since 2022, two of them based at Skidmore College in upstate New York.

Whether the slower faculty unionization growth since January 2022 is a post-pandemic anomaly or symptomatic of a longer-term trend is unclear. Several new faculty organizing campaigns are currently underway, and they may well result in future growth, particularly among contingent faculty at private institutions. In addition, future growth at public institutions may occur as new legislation expands public-sector collective bargaining rights. The most recent example of this involves Maryland, where community college faculty were granted the right to unionize starting in September 2022.   

Bargaining unit growth among post-doctoral scholars and academic researchers has been modest over the past the past year and a half. Prior to 2022, there were six post-doctoral bargaining units nationwide, and one unit of academic researchers, representing over 14,000 members in total.[11] Since January 2022, two new post-doctoral units and one academic researcher unit have won recognition, representing a total of over 2,000 employees.

Higher Education Strike Activity, 2022-2023

In addition to new organizing, in the period since January 2022 there were 20 strikes by workers in higher education, as Figure B4 shows. These strikes involved a mix of student workers, faculty, and post-doctoral workers. Almost a third (32 percent) of all the strikes that occurred since 2013 took place in 2022 and the first half of 2023. Moreover, the frequency of strikes accelerated rapidly during that period, with fully half of the 2022-2023 stoppages taking place in the first six months of 2023. Six of the 10 strikes in 2023 involved faculty and post-doctoral units, and five involved student workers. (The strike at Rutgers University involved faculty, post-doctoral scholars, and graduate assistants and therefore appears twice in Figure B4, as does the strike at the University of California, which involved different bargaining units and ended on different dates.) Eight of the 22 strikes in 2022-2023 involved already-unionized graduate student workers, while three were undergraduate strikes seeking union recognition.

This explosive growth in strike activity in higher education is unprecedented within recent memory. In 2013-2017, there were only four student-worker strikes. The number began to rise in 2018, and growth continued thereafter, with at least five strikes in each year starting in 2019. While among graduate student-workers and faculty, national unions were the dominant force in these strikes, the pattern was different for strikes conducted solely by undergraduate student-workers, with seven of their 10 strikes since 2013 led by an independent union or conducted without a union.

College and university faculty strikes are not new. For example, there were 14 faculty strikes in 1977.[12] But such activity (and indeed, strikes in other sectors as well) had largely dissipated by the mid-1980s.[13] Faculty strikes increased slightly in 2016, with four strikes, followed by a slight decline until after the pandemic. There were four strikes by faculty and postdoctoral scholars in 2022 and another six in the first half of 2023, a substantial increase over previous years, as Figure B4 shows. Of the eight faculty strikes in 2022-2023, five involved combined units of tenured, tenure-track, and contingent faculty; two were limited to contingent faculty; and one involved only tenured and tenure-track faculty. 

The strikes at the University of California in 2022 and at Rutgers University in 2023 exemplify a deliberate strategy of organizing simultaneous and coordinated work stoppages across separate bargaining units. The University of California strikes were the largest in the history of U.S. higher education, involving multiple bargaining units representing a total of over 45,000 graduate assistants, researchers, and post-doctoral scholars. The strike at Rutgers University was a wall-to-wall strike that involved over 9,000 tenured and tenure-track faculty, contingent faculty, post-doctoral scholars, and graduate assistants. The successful outcomes of those strikes may lay the groundwork for more multi-unit strikes in higher education in the years to come. 

[1] William A. Herbert and Jacob Apkarian, “Everything Passes, Everything Changes: Unionization and Collective Bargaining in Higher Education,” Perspectives on Work, 21 (2017): 30-35. https://www.lawcha.org/wp-content/uploads/HerbertApkarian_POW_HigherEd_2017.pdf

[2] William A. Herbert, Jacob Apkarian, and Joseph van der Naald, “Supplementary Directory of New Bargaining Agents and Contracts in Institutions of Higher Education, 2013-2019” (New York, NY: Hunter College, 2020). https://www.hunter.cuny.edu/ncscbhep/assets/files/SupplementalDirectory-2020-FINAL.pdf.

[3] William A. Herbert and Joseph van der Naald. “Graduate Student Employee Unionization in the Second Gilded Age.” in Revaluing Work(ers): Toward a Democratic and Sustainable Future, ed. T. Schulze-Cleven and T. Vachon (Champaign, IL: Labor and Employment Relations Association, 2021), 221-46. https://academicworks.cuny.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1739&context=hc_pubs

[4] Meg Brenan, “Approval of Labor Unions at Highest Point Since 1965,” Gallup, September 2, 2021. https://news.gallup.com/poll/354455/approval-labor-unions-highest-point-1965.aspx

[5] Rachel Berkowitz, “Physics graduate students join their peers in unionization efforts,” Physics Today, May 16, 2023. https://pubs.aip.org/physicstoday/online/42358/Physics-graduate-students-join-their-peers-in

[6] Breana Noble and Jordyn Grzelewsk, “What the growing influence of higher education workers means for the UAW's future,” Detroit News, April 23, 2023. http://rssfeeds.detroitnews.com/~/736972577/0/detroit/home~What-the-growing-influence-of-higher-education-workers-means-for-the-UAWs-future

[7] Herbert and van der Naald, “Graduate Student Employee Unionization.”

[8] Rocky Walker, “Cal State undergraduate workers seek union representation,” CalMatters, April 18, 2023. https://calmatters.org/education/higher-education/2023/04/cal-state-undergrad-unions/

[9] Herbert and van der Naald, “Graduate Student Employee Unionization.”

[10] Herbert, Apkarian, and van der Naald, “Supplementary Directory.”

[11] Herbert, Apkarian, and van der Naald, “Supplementary Directory,” p. 20.

[12] William A. Herbert and Jacob Apkarian. “You've Been with the Professors: An Examination of Higher Education Work Stoppage Data, Past and Present,” Employee Rights and Employment Policy Journal, 23 (2019): 249-77. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/345387079_Youpercent27ve_Been_with_the_Professors_An_Examination_of_Higher_Education_Work_Stoppage_Data_Past_and_Present

[13] Herbert and Apkarian. “You've Been with the Professors.”

Additional National Center Archival Material Is Now Available

Over the past decade, the National Center has been digitizing our archival materials to make them readily available to practitioners and researchers studying the history of unionization and collective bargaining in higher education.

In our last newsletter, we announced that our website now has links to 25 National Center directories of faculty collective bargaining relationships, published between 1976 and 2020. Those directories, along with our bimonthly newsletters from 1973 to 2000, provide important data and analysis relevant to the trajectory and restructuring of campus labor relations since 1973.

We are pleased to announce that we have now posted on the website links to National Center bibliographies from 1973 until 1997. The bibliographies include references to books, articles, reports, and decisions on faculty and non-faculty collective bargaining issues, the unionization of professionals, sex discrimination, and other specific topics.

Regional Higher Education Collective Bargaining Workshop

at the University of Illinois-Chicago: A Major Success

On September 14 and 15, 2013, the National Center held a regional higher education collective bargaining workshop at the University of Illinois-Chicago. The regional conference was co-sponsored by the University of Illinois System, and the University of Illinois School of Labor & Employment Relations’ Labor Education Program.

The sold-out workshop included over 100 attendees and speakers from Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, Minnesota, New York, New Jersey, Oregon, and California.

This was the third regional workshop organized by the National Center since 2013, with the last two being held in California. It is part our effort to revive the tradition of holding regional programming similar to the events the National Center sponsored in earlier decades.

Best Practices in Collective Bargaining Panel with (l-r) Diana Valera, President CFAC/IFT, Columbia College, Mark Bennettt, Laner Muchin, Marcia Mackey, Michigan Education Association (moderator), Melissa Sortman, Assistant Provost and Director, Faculty and Academic Staff Affairs, Michigan State University, and Elizabeth Towell, SEIU Local 73

Best Practices in Collective Bargaining Panel with (l-r) Stephen Yokich, Dowd, Bloch, Bennett, Cervone, Auerbach & Yokich, LLP, Robb Craddock, Labor and Employee Relations Executive Director, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Mike Newman, Deputy Director, AFSCME Council 31, Richard W. Fanning, Jr., Clark Hill, PLC, and Terry Curry, former Associate Provost and Associate Vice President, Michigan State University (moderator)

Collective Bargaining, Discrimination, Affirmative Action, & Title IX Panel with (l-r) Ricky Baldwin, Assistant Director, State Division, SEIU Local 73, Risa Lieberwitz, Professor of Labor and Employment Law, Cornell ILR and AAUP General Counsel, Augustus Wood, Assistant Professor, School of Labor & Employment Relations, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Julie Miceli, Husch Blackwell, and Karen Stubaus, Vice President for Academic Affairs, Rutgers University and National Center Affiliated Researcher (moderator)

Legal Obligations under Public Sector Statutes and NLRA Panel with (l-r) Richard W. Fanning, Jr., Clark Hill, PLC, Ellen Strizak, General Counsel, Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board, Angie Cowan Hamada, National Labor Relations Board Region 13 Director, and Alice Johnson, General Counsel Cook College Teachers Union (moderator)

Community Colleges: Distinct Bargaining Issues and Challenges Panel with (l-r) Robert Boonin, Dykema, PLLC, Tony Johnston, Cook County Teachers Union Local 1600 President,

Andre' L. Poplar, Vice Chancellor for Human Resources and Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion, Oakland Community College,

Shannon Altson, Director of Business, Legal & Human Resources, Michigan Education Association, and Joshua Welker, Dean of Business and Institutional Effectiveness, John Wood Community College (moderator)

10 Best Practice Tips from Experienced Labor Arbitrators with (l-r)

Meeta Bass, Arbitrator

Cary Morgen, Arbitrator, and Betty Widgeon, Arbitrator, (moderator and panelist)

The National Center Welcomes New Members to Our Board of Advisors

The National Center is pleased to announce that Doriane K. Gloria, CUNY's Senior Vice Chancellor for University Human Resources and Labor Relations, has joined our Board of Advisors.

Senior Vice Chancellor for University Human Resources and Labor Relations Doriane K. Gloria was appointed to her position in June 2023 after serving as CUNY's Vice Chancellor for University Human Resources since December 2019. Previously, she served at the highest levels of human resources management in higher education, health care and nonprofit organizations. Most recently, she worked as the vice president of human resources at the New York Blood Center, where she was recognized for her leadership in increasing employment opportunities for individuals with disabilities. She also served in a similar capacity at the Physician Affiliate Group of New York, where she designed, built and staffed a human resources infrastructure for this primary affiliate of the NYC Health and Hospitals Corporation. Prior to that, Ms. Gloria was the chief human resources officer at Suffolk County Community College, the largest community college in the State University of New York system, where she developed and implemented college-wide policies to improve labor and employee relations, benefits planning and training programs. She is an expert in performance management, talent acquisition and retention, benefits and compensation, employee/labor relations and many other skill sets within the human resources arena. She started her career at NYU Medical Center, where she worked for nearly 20 years, rising to the position of senior director of human resources for the network of medical facilities that included NYU Hospitals Center, the Rusk Institute of Rehabilitation and the NYU School of Medicine. Ms. Gloria earned her MBA in management and organizational behavior from NYU’s Stern School of Business, and a BBA in management from Hofstra University.

The National Center is also pleased to announce that Martin Balinsky has joined our Board of Advisors replacing Candi Churchill.

Martin Balinsky has been the statewide vice president of the college bargaining council of the United Faculty of Florida (UFF) since 2018 and the chapter president at UFF-Tallahassee Community College (UFF-TCC) since 2022, where he had served as its vice president since 2016. UFF has about 9000 members and serves over 20,000 bargaining unit members, in about 40 different chapters. Balinsky was a founding member of the UFF-TCC collective bargaining chapter in 2016, when it petitioned for and won a faculty vote for recognition, and has served as a member of the chapter’s bargaining team since that time, carrying the role of co-chief negotiator from 2016-2022 and having successfully helped bargained four contracts. Balinsky has successfully led his chapter through legislative challenges in Florida while continuing to maintain a belief in the power of collaborative relationships between faculty and administrators in successfully reaching agreements that benefit both sides. 

Frederick County Comm. Coll.: AFT Certified to Represent FT Faculty

Frederick County Community College, SHELRB Case No. EL 2024-02

On September 21, 2023, AFT was certified by the Maryland State Higher Education Labor Relations Board following a card check to represent a unit of approximately 90 full-time faculty employed by Frederick County Community College, which is located in Frederick, Maryland.

The following is the description of the new faculty unit:

All eligible Full Time Faculty employees, as described in the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, and defined in Maryland State Education Law §16-701(j)(1), employed by Frederick County Community College, excluding managerial employees, supervisors, confidential employees as defined in Maryland State Education Law §16-701(j)(2).

Howard County Comm. Coll.: AFT Certfied to Represent FT Faculty

Howard County Community College, SHELRB Case No. EL 2024-03

On September 21, 2023, AFT was certified by the Maryland State Higher Education Labor Relations Board following a card check to represent a unit of full-time faculty employed by Howard County Community College.

The following is the description of the new faculty unit:

All eligible Full Time Faculty employees, as described in the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, and defined in Maryland State Education Law §16-701(j)(1), employed by Howard County Community College, excluding managerial employees, supervisors, confidential employees as defined in Maryland State Education Law §16-701(j)(2).

Columbus College of Art and Design: AFT Files to Represent Faculty Unit

Columbus College of Art and Design, NLRB Case No. 09-RC-325680

On September 13, 2023, AFT filed a petition seeking to represent a unit of approximately

170 adjunct faculty at the Columbus College of Art and Design.

The following is the proposed bargaining unit:

Included: Adjunct Faculty, Adjunct Instructor, Associate Professor, Assistant Professor, Professor, AICAD Fellow Employees.

Excluded: All administrators, including the following titles: President, Provost, Chief Financial Officer, Vice President, Associate Vice President, Dean, Director, Department Chair, Department Head; Administrative Support Staff, Custodial Staff, Program Manager, Senior Admissions Counselor, Admissions Counselor, Coordinator for Community Education, Senior Academic Advisor, Facilities Manager, Website Coordinator, Lab Tech, Assistant Registrar, Student Services Associate, Corporate Engagement and Annual Giving Coordinator, Alumni Engagement Coordinator, Financial Aid Assistant, Financial Aid Counselor, Fabrications Manager, Donor Relations Manager, Faculty Director of Galleries, Clinical Therapist, Safety and Security Operations Coordinator, Payroll/Benefits Manager, Editor.

University of Kansas: AAUP- AFT Files to Represent Faculty Unit

According to a news report, United Academics of the University of Kansas, AAUP-AFT (UAKU), filed a petition last week with the Kansas Public Employment Relations Board seeking to represent a unit of full-time and part-time tenured, tenure-track, and non-tenure track faculty at the University of Kansas.

Northeastern University: Graduate Assistants Vote to Unionize

Northeastern University, NLRB Case No. 01-RC-311566

On September 19-21, graduate assistants at Northeastern University participated in a representation election to determine whether a majority want to be represented for purposes of collective bargaining by Graduate Employees of Northeastern University- UAW (GENU-UAW).

The tally of ballots from the election demonstrates that the graduate assistant voted 1130 to 70 in favor off representation by GENU-UAW in a unit of approximately 2914.

The following is a description of the at-issue bargaining unit at Northeastern University:

Included: All graduate students enrolled at Northeastern University who provide instructional services or research services at the Boston, Nahant, and Burlington campuses.

Excluded: All undergraduate students employed by the employer, fellows, managers, guards, and supervisors as defined in the Act, and all other employees.

In the midst of the election, Northeastern University filed a Request for Review with the National Labor Relations Board in Washington, D.C. In its request, the university seeks to challenge the he NLRB Region 1 Director's Decision and Direction of Election on procedural and substantive grounds.

The Regional Director's decision rejected Northeastern University's arguments that graduate students receiving stipends are not employees under the National Labor Relations Act, citing the decision in Columbia University, 364 NLRB No. 90 (2016), and she also rejected the claim that the Columbia University decision was distinguishable. Lastly, she denied the university’s claims that a community of interest did not exist between student workers paid by stipend and those paid by the hour and between student workers on the university’s three campuses.

Tufts Univ.: SEIU Files to Represent Engineering Graduate Assistants

Tufts University, NLRB Case No. 01-RC-326119

On September 20, 2023, SEIU Local 509 filed a petition with the NLRB seeking to represent a unit of 263 graduate assistants working in the Tufts School of Engineering. SEIU Local 509 already represents graduate assistants working at Tufts Graduate School of Arts and Sciences: https://access.tufts.edu/sites/default/files/documents/hr/2018-2023-GSAS-CBA-Signed.pdf

The following is the proposed unit sought in the recently filed SEIU Local 509 petition:

Included: All PhD students enrolled and working in the Tufts School of Engineering who provide instructional or research services, whether as an Teaching Assistant, Graduate Instructor, Teaching Fellow, Research Assistant, Research Fellow, or course assistant, as a condition of receiving a stipend and/or tuition remission (regardless of funding sources).

Excluded: All undergraduate students; all post-baccalaureate students who work or provide services outside of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences or School of Engineering; all other faculty; all other employees, managers, confidential employees, guards and supervisors as defined in the Act.

Dartmouth College: SEIU Files to Represent College Basketball Team

Trustees of Dartmouth College, NLRB Case No. 01-RC-325633

On September 13, 2023, SEIU Local 560 filed a petition with the NLRB seeking to represent a unit of 15 players on the Dartmouth College men's basketball team. Dartmouth dining staff are already represented by another union, which successfully negotiated a first collective bargaining agreement with the college.

The employee status of college players was the subject of a recorded panel discussion at the the National Center's 50th annual conference. It is also the subject of a memorandum by NLRB General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo and a pending unfair labor practice complaint against the University of Southern California, the NCAA, and PAC-12.

Video Recordings from the 50th Anniversary Conference

The National Center's 50th anniversary conference on March 26-28, 2023 was a major success.

Click here for the full conference program. And click here for the webpage dedicated to the 50th Anniversary conference, which was developed with the assistance of Iris Finkel, Hunter College Web and Digital Initiatives Librarian.

Below are links to video recordings of certain presentations at the National Center's 50th Anniversary Conference.

We thank Roosevelt House Production Coordinator Daniel T. Culkin and Peter Jackson, Hunter College's Chief Digital Media CLT & Production Coordinator and the students of the Hunter College Film & Media Department for recording and producing the videos.

Welcoming Remarks by National Center Executive Director William A. Herbert, Anne Ollen, Managing Director, TIAA Institute, Gary Rhoades, University of Arizona and Co-Editor-in-Chief, Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy, and Karen Stubaus, Rutgers University and Associate Editor, Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy.

Keynote Presentation by Michael Sandel, Political Philosopher and Harvard University Professor with Introductory remarks by Hunter College President, Jennifer J. Raab.

Panel: Title IX: Its Past, Its Present, and Its Future with Frazier Benya, Senior Program Officer, National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, Lance Houston, Title IX Coordinator and Director of Equity and Compliance, Adelphi University, Risa Lieberwitz, Professor of Labor and Employment Law in the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations and General Counsel of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), Tamiko Strickman, Special Advisor to the President and Executive Director of the Office of Equity, Civil Rights, and Title IX, University of Michigan, and Moderators: Karen R. Stubaus, Ph.D., Vice President for Academic Affairs, Rutgers University and Alexandra Matish, J.D., Associate Vice Provost for Academic and Faculty Affairs and Senior Director, Academic Human Resources, University of Michigan. This panel was co-organized by the National Academies' Action Collaborative on Preventing Sexual Harassment in Higher Education.

Panel: Treasuring the Past and the Spirit of Change: Perspectives from Experienced Arbitrators with Rosemary A. Townley, Arbitrator and Mediator, Howard C. Edelman, Arbitrator and Mediator, Jacquelin F. Drucker, Arbitrator and Mediator, and Homer LaRue, Arbitrator, Mediator, and Professor, Howard University Law School, Moderator. This panel was co-sponsored by the National Academy of Arbitrators.

Panel: Higher Education Unionization: Perspectives from Labor Relations Agencies with John Wirenius, Chairperson, New York State Public Employment Relations Board, Marjorie Wittner, Chairperson, Massachusetts Commonwealth Employment Relations Board, Mary Beth Hennessy-Shotter, Director of Conciliation and Arbitration, NJ Public Employment Relations Commission, and Michael P. Sellars, Executive Director, Washington State Public Employment Relations Commission, Moderator. This panel was co-sponsored by the Association of Labor Relations Agencies.

Panel: Annual Legal Update with Amy L. Rosenberger, Willig, Williams & Davidson, Monica C. Barrett, Bond, Schoeneck & King PLLC, Henry Morris, Jr., Partner, ArentFox Schiff LLP, Aaron Nisenson, Senior Legal Counsel, AAUP, and Brian Selchick

Cullen and Dykman LLP, Moderator.

Panel: Yesterday and Today: Experienced Faculty Leaders in Higher Education with Jamie Dangler, former Vice President for Academics, United University Professions, Art Hochner, Associate Professor Emeritus, Management, Temple University & former President, Temple Assn. of University Professionals, AFT 4531, Charles Toombs, President, California Faculty Association, Kenneth Mash, President, APSCUF, and Penny Lewis, Secretary, Professional Staff Congress/CUNY, AFT Local #2334, Moderator.

Panel: Exploring the Retirement Income Equity Gap with Brent Davis, Economist, TIAA Institute, John Dorsa, Chief Pension Officer, Office of the New York City Comptroller, Valerie Martin Conley, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs, Idaho State University, and Anne Ollen, Managing Director, TIAA Institute, Panelist and Moderator.

Panel: College Athletes, NCAA and the NLRA: An Update with Gabriel Feldman, Sher Garner Professor of Sports Law, Tulane Law School, Joshua Nadreau, Fisher Phillips LLP, Mark Gaston Pearce, Executive Director, Workers’ Rights Institute, Georgetown University Law School, and former National Labor Relations Board Chairman, and Jeffrey Hirsch, Geneva Yeargan Rand Distinguished Professor of Law, University of North Carolina School of Law, Panelist and Moderator.

Panel: Labor Issues Facing Independent Musicians with Marc Ribot, Guitarist and Composer, Phillip Golub, Pianist and Composer, Amir Elsaffar, Trumpeter and Composer, Sulynn Hago, Guitarist and Composer, and Larry Blumenfeld, Moderator. This panel was co-sponsored by the Music Workers Alliance.

The National Center's Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy has published Volume 14. The volume title is "Learning from the Past to Enhance our Future."

The Journal's Editors-in-Chief are Gary Rhoades, University of Arizona, Karen Stubaus, Rutgers University, and Jeffrey Cross, Eastern Illinois University (Emeritus).

Introduction:

Volume 14 of the Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy (JCBA) is partly a selection of new articles, practitioner perspectives, and op-eds, which we briefly preview below. It is also partly a special issue celebration of the 50^th anniversary of Hunter College’s National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions (National Center), featuring a selection of thirteen papers from the annual conference proceedings over the years. Our volume’s title, “Learning From the Past to Enhance Our Future,” echoes this year’s annual conference theme, “Looking Back, Looking Forward.”

In this issue, we happily welcome a new co-editor of JCBA, Dr. Karen Stubaus, Vice President for Academic Affairs at Rutgers University, to join Dr. Jeff Cross (now “retired,” but formerly Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs at Eastern Illinois University and Ferris State University) and Dr. Gary Rhoades Professor of Higher Education, University of Arizona. The 50 years of the National Center’s existence corresponds roughly to the academic lives of the co-editors, as students and employees. Indeed, Karen and Gary have each spent almost their entire professional lives at their respective institutions, having started in 1986. Jeff began his service and work in higher education a decade earlier. Collectively, that affords us a unique vantage point from which to look back on and learn from the selected papers from 50 years of the annual conference’s proceedings.

Building on the closing paragraphs of National Center Director Bill Herbert’s article in this volume, we believe that collective bargaining is “a form of workplace democracy,” and that it is “an important means for advancing higher education and the working conditions at colleges and universities as well as other industries.” (National Center Mission Statement)

As Herbert notes, that marks quite a shift from the National Center’s original, neutral mission to “take no position for or against collective bargaining,” What is continuous, though, is a commitment to the National Center bringing to bear “information and understanding” regarding collective bargaining. Thus, we also believe, as the current National Center Mission Statement indicates, that, "[T]he study of collective bargaining is essential for a knowledge-based dialogue concerning labor-management and educational issues, and is critically important for reasoned societal debate that will lead to social progress."

That is at the heart of our work with JCBA. And that is what we hope this special issue contributes to and provides.

Volume 14 includes two articles, two new interview articles, an op-ed, and a practitioner perspective. Together, they reflect and address longstanding issues in collective bargaining as well as provoke thought and discussion on the ongoing, pressing issues of today and the foreseeable future. Richard Boris provides an op-ed from his perspective as immediate-past Executive Director of the National Center. He repeats and expands upon several critical observations and suggestions as possible guides for the National Center’s future. From his perspective as Senior Labor Advisor, American Association of University Professors, Mike Mauer traces the AAUP’s history of advocacy and protection of academic freedom through collective bargaining. Bill Herbert has written a history of the National Center tracing events leading to its creation at the City University of New York (CUNY), and then summarizing the National Center’s evolving leadership, programming, research, and publications. Giovanna Follo’s practitioner perspective is an autoethnography describing personal dilemma that led her, a pro-union advocate, to cross the picket line.

We also introduce a new format with this issue—interviews with practitioners (and authors), which apropos of the volume’s theme, provide rich historical perspective to inform the future path of collective bargaining in the academy. The first, “Centering anti-racism and social justice, toward a more perfect union,” is a conversation with Cecil E. Canton (former Associate Vice President) and Charles Toombs (current President) of the California Faculty Association, based on work each has published about about the historical progression and future work of CFA in moving towards a more social justice- centered union. The second, “Power despite precarity,” is a conversation with longtime contingent faculty labor activists and scholars, Joe Berry and Helena Worthen, about their recent book, which looks at the history of the contingent faculty labor movement, provides an in-depth exploration of the case and contract of the California Faculty Association in regard to contingent faculty, and identifies strategies for the future.

Selections from 50 years of annual conference proceedings. Working with the National Center’s Director, Bill Herbert, the co-editors selected papers from each of the decades of the conference proceedings, for a baker’s dozen of papers. Inevitably, such a small selection of (thirteen) papers from such a long span of time means that many valuable and interesting papers have been left out. As we go through a brief discussion of the papers we’ve selected and why, we will also refer the reader to some examples of other such papers that we feel are particularly noteworthy, and/or that are authored by folks who have made important academic contributions in other professional conferences and academic journals as well. Further, we note and encourage you to search on the JCBA website, which has a tab to connect to the most downloaded papers.

A half century spans a long period of time encompassing many developments in higher education collective bargaining and society. In making our thirteen selections, we have sought to include conference papers that were timely, as markers of key historical developments, as well as timeless, pointing to enduring issues in collective bargaining. As we elaborate a bit below, it is striking how many issues have re-emerged or been in play in an ongoing way throughout the decades. At the same time, even so, as with the successive, iterative negotiation of collective bargaining agreements, which involves debate, deliberation, and negotiation around similar issues, each negotiation builds on the foundation of previous ones. History, then, informs, is there to be learned from, and is always carried in some manner into the present, even as it is newly negotiated for the future.

In collective bargaining in higher education, as in society, what may once have seemed settled law and/or practice can become surprisingly unsettled decades later. Here we are, fifty years after Roe v Wade, more than ever (re)litigating, negotiating and navigating issues of gender and women’s reproductive, medical, and travel rights in ways that directly implicate universities. So, too, over six decades after a civil rights movement and landmark Supreme Court decisions and legislation, we continue to (re)negotiate and navigate the rights of minoritized and marginalized people in ways that play out in and shape higher education. Just as we continue to (re)legislate, litigate, and negotiate the right to vote, so we see similar ongoing struggles in regard to the collective bargaining rights of different categories of (academic) employees in different sectors of higher education. For the National Center’s entire history, and each decade of the editors’ collective experience, higher education has been in the midst of and subject to an austerity agenda. The polarized politics of the 1960s and 1970s are present again in current attacks and legislation regarding, assaulting, and banning Critical Race Theory, LGBTQ+ rights, and more, violating the academic freedom, human rights, and dignity of members and institutions in the higher education world, more than five decades after Stonewall. As the saying goes, plus ça change, plus c’est la meme chose.

As with collective bargaining negotiations, issues keep cycling back, as we see in selected papers of the past 50 years of conference proceedings. Yet it is not negotiated on the same territory by the same players with the same expectations as Nicholas DiGiovanni’s 2015 conference paper nicely articulates, and history and the future are not stories of linear, relentless, progress. Yet, if there is this ongoing back and forth, of two steps forward and one or more step(s) back, we hope and work towards that being in the context, as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., said, of a larger trajectory of and arc of the moral universe that bends towards justice. So, we see it is in higher education collective bargaining, with new groups of employees at the table and with a more expansive range of issues being negotiated to intersect workplace and social justice.

The conference papers we have selected are bookended by Sidney Hook’s 1973 essay on “The academic mission and collective bargaining,” and Thomas Auxter’s 2016 retrospective analysis, “Collective bargaining and labor representation for higher education in a ‘right to work’ environment.” The matters they address look to learn from the past and enhance the future of higher education, as characterizes our special issue.

As an NYU Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, Hook reflects on competing philosophers and perspectives on how to organize academic work(ers), contrasting the views of John Dewey and Arthur Lovejoy, the first President and first General Secretary of the American Association of University Professors. Whereas Dewey was also a founding member and early officer of the American Federation of Teachers (and held membership card number 1), and strongly supported unions, Lovejoy was a proponent of professional associations as the preferred organizing model, opposing unions, and juxtaposing the idea of a job to a calling. The differing views, and the contrasting perspectives they offer on being a “professional” continue to play out in different forms in higher education. Indeed, that difference has been of ongoing relevance in the AAUP. And in a full circle moment, interestingly, this past year, the AFT and AAUP have formed an affiliation arrangement that appears to give the former the lead role in collective bargaining and the latter an ongoing, lead role in academic freedom and policy. Notably, the position that Hook comes to is an important one in looking to the future.

"I conclude from these and related considerations that intelligent choice today is not between acceptance or rejection of the principle of collective bargaining but between the different forms of collective bargaining. … [W]e must ask: under what form of collective bargaining can the academic mission best be preserved and strengthened?"

That is something for us all to consider.

Yet, as Auxter’s 2016 analysis considers, the question of whether and to what extent employees have collective bargaining rights continues to be a vexed and contested matter. In light of the Harris v Quinn and Janus v AFSCME Supreme Court decisions, effectively making all states in some regard “right to work,” Auxter provides a history of how the United Faculty of Florida, first established in 1976, has navigated this environment, and the transformations it has undergone in the process. A central part of the story is its experience and developed capacity to effectively navigate state-level politics with legislatures and governors that had anti-union and anti-faculty agendas. Given how developments in Florida are currently unfolding, that is a particularly relevant historical context with valuable lessons for action.

Joel M. Douglas’ 1981 paper, “The Yeshiva case: One year later,” addresses an earlier, defining Supreme Court decision that has had profound effects on collective bargaining in higher education. If Douglas’ perspective is of one year later, we know now its ongoing ripple effects on the bargaining rights of faculty. That is particularly true in the independent sector of higher education, where Yeshiva has inhibited the growth of tenure-stream faculty units in private colleges and universities. It is true as well of contingent faculty with influence on governance. And the ripple effect has extended into public sector higher education as well. For example, in 2010, following Wisconsin’s attack on public sector employees’ bargaining rights (excepting police and firefighters) a piece of state legislation in Ohio that was signed and then repealed in a referendum, included Yeshiva-like language eliminating full-time faculty’s collective bargaining rights if they had a role in governance.

Going back to the 1973 conference proceedings, we also have selected Margaret Chandler and Connie Chiang’s paper, “Management rights issues in collective bargaining in higher education.” The paper provides a thorough, empirical, and what can serve for us now as a baseline analysis of management rights and faculty rights in ninety-one collective bargaining agreements (seventy of which were in community colleges, reflecting the predominance of this sector in higher education collective bargaining), modeling what has become a more consistent part of the National Center’s work under Bill Herbert’s leadership. Thus, now, we see the National Center not only collecting and cataloging contracts, but also detailing and analyzing developments in collective bargaining, expanding now to include data on strikes.

From almost a quarter century later, we selected Ernst Benjamin’s 1997 paper, “Faculty, unions, and management,” which provides a faculty perspective on faculty and management rights in collective bargaining. In contrast to Chandler and Chiang’s piece, this is not a detailed analysis of collective bargaining agreement language. Rather, it offers a thoughtful take on the subject that focuses on court cases, and particularly on shared governance, which, as Benjamin says, “can and often does coexist successfully with collective bargaining, to the benefit of the academic mission of the institution.” Although it is important to place this issue in the context of the early days of debating whether shared governance in the form of faculty senates and collective bargaining can coexist, it is also a matter of enduring significance in the adjudication of faculty’s collective bargaining rights, particularly in private institutions. We also direct attention in the papers of the 1997 proceedings to the related institutional governance and partisan politics issue, which we see much of today, in the form of “activist” trustees and the role of faculty unions in response to them in governance matters, in papers by a SUNY trustee, Candace deRussy, and by UUP President, William E. Scheuerman.

Two other papers, in 1988 Edward R. Hines’ “State support for higher education: A twenty year contextual analysis,” and in 1994, Christine Maitland’s “Collective bargaining and technology,” address issues of enduring significance. Hines’ paper offers historical perspective from Illinois State’s Grapevine report that tracks the fundamental shift in public higher education in relative declines in state appropriations versus significant increases in tuition and fees. The combined framing of a policy context in terms of an austerity agenda with climbing college costs for students has for half a century been at the center of collective bargaining negotiations.

So, too, as it is for all workers and industries, the introduction of new technologies, in this case, instructional and delivery technologies is an enduring focus of negotiations between labor and management. Maitland’s thorough empirical analysis of collective bargaining agreements nationally speaks to patterns in the workload, compensation, and intellectual property provisions that have been negotiated. The broad pattern is of provisions being more “defensive” in giving some protections to faculty and ensuring compensation and some level of claims on copyright for distance education courses than they are proactive in ensuring faculty voice in decision making around instructional technology issues. Contract language was more common and extensive in community college contracts, but overall was still limited in terms of the number of contracts with provisions and their scope. For a more current perspective, nearly two decades later, in a 2016 conference paper, “Copyleft, copyright, and copy for the public interest,” and in a 2015 JCBA article, “What are we negotiating for: Public interest bargaining,” Gary Rhoades details the more extensive incidence of contract provisions on technology issues, and offers examples of contract provisions that proactively address public interest issues surrounding technology use and training, and distance education intellectual property rights that go beyond the immediate interests of the two parties at the bargaining table.

On another matter of enduring significance, two of the papers we selected focus on contingent faculty employment. One, by Frank Cosco, in 2008, “Vancouver Community College, New models of contingent faculty inclusion,” features what for many in the contingent faculty labor movement, serves as one of the gold standards of collective bargaining agreements. It also is an example of the several papers over the years addressing collective bargaining in Canada. Further, it focuses on the institutional realm of community colleges that ironically, given its predominance in terms of union density, is under-emphasized in the papers.

A second paper, in 2015 by Karen Stubaus, “The professionalization of non-tenure track faculty in the United States: Three case studies,” details the history and current status of non-tenure track faculty, whose numbers have been expanding considerably. Through the vehicle of three cases, Stubaus provides significant insight into the different configurations by which, within and beyond the collective bargaining agreement, non-tenure track faculty have negotiated improved, more professional working conditions that have incorporated them more into the academic life of their institutions and academic units. The cases of Rutgers University, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and the University of Oregon each provide quite a different take in the configuration of the bargaining units, which speaks to significant differences in institutional history and state law. And yet in each case, similar issues are addressed.

On the issue of adjunct faculty, we also want to call attention historically to the 1982 conference proceedings with one of the first discussions of the increased use of adjunct faculty. Nancy L. Hodes, Deputy Director of the Governor’s Office of Employee Relations in New York provides a frank discussion of the political and economic rationales (“Use Justified”) for the hiring of larger numbers of “part-timers” (the dehumanizing and inaccurate term is in itself a marker of the times), entitled, “The use and abuse of part-timers-I: Casual employees, scabs, or saviors?” The companion, Part II piece is written by Nuala McGann Drescher, President of the United University Professions, who speaks to the legitimacy and quality of these faculty, and the need to strengthen collective bargaining rights and working conditions for them, integrating them into bargaining units. She also importantly draws attention to the “affirmative action” dimension of exploiting these faculty, given the larger proportions of them who are women. At this point, both contributions center a claim or a concern about the erosion of full-time faculty. To give a sense of the changing times, a recent contribution to JCBA (Rhoades, 2021) points to contingent faculty’s centrality to and leadership in the academic labor movement.

One of the papers we selected addresses another employment segment, graduate employees, that, as with contingent faculty, has experienced dramatic increases in the growth of new bargaining units in the 2000s, as detailed in Bill Herbert’s 2016 JCBA article, “The winds of changes shift: An analysis of recent growth in bargaining units and representation efforts in higher education.” The 1999 conference paper, “The Current Status of Graduate Student Unions: An Employer's Perspective,” by Daniel J. Julius provides a turn-of-the-century summary of graduate employee unionization. He offers an extensive review of national patterns and issues in relation to this realm of organizing, from a management perspective as well as of someone who has published on these issues. The timing of this review is noteworthy, as in the next two decades graduate employee unionization proliferated, particularly in the private sector, as the National Center’s Bill Herbert’s 2016 JCBA piece, “The winds of changes shift,” documents. Moreover, the subsequent decades have seen several NLRB rulings and reversals, as well as state-level employment board rulings that have also influenced patterns of graduate student unionization. Further, that realm of organizing and negotiation has seen a significant expansion of the sorts of issues addressed in collective bargaining, centering social justice issues, a point nicely captured in another paper we refer you to, Jon Curtiss’ 2015 history and discussion of important current issues, in bargaining for one of the earliest and most important graduate student unions, the Graduate Employees Organization at the University of Michigan.

On the latter matter, we have selected two papers that address social justice issues. The first is a 1993 paper by Rachel Hendrickson, “Sexual harassment on campus and a union’s dilemma.” It is part of an entire section of papers on discrimination, including several papers on the Americans with Disabilities Act and on pay equity. Hendrickson offers an analysis of national data on collective bargaining agreements, first noting that relatively few address sexual harassment in any great detail, and then providing some examples of contracts that in contrast contain extensive language. As well, she walks through the various questions that surround how to address sexual harassment in relation to the campus policies and procedures that are being developed and applied outside of collective bargaining. Notably, Hendrickson closes by encouraging labor and management “to institute training for all supervisors and faculty and to provide it on an ongoing basis.” That suggestion is all the more relevant today, three decades later. It is also notable that although much attention is directed in the paper to campus-based processes, one of the almost universal demands of graduate and postdoc unions today, after decades of largely unsatisfactory experience of institutions’ handling of such matters, is for access to independent external arbitration in matters of harassment and discrimination.

A decade earlier, the 1984 conference also had a series of papers on sex discrimination. Although it is not as focused on collective bargaining, there are some good contributions, including an overview by Bernice Resnick Sandler addressing the “times that try men’s souls.” There are also contributions on case law, and on comparable worth and grievance claims. A paper that is focused on collective bargaining is Nina Rothchild’s case study of the Minnesota experience in relation to the state’s collective bargaining law and comparable worth legislation.

A second paper we have selected on social justice issues is a 2015 conference paper by Derryn Moten, of Alabama State University, addressing social and labor justice in the context of HBCUs, in “The history of collective bargaining in higher education: The case of HBCUs.” In an historical review of HBCUs that intersects with racial justice and class-based justice through unionization issues, Moten calls our attention to the fact that Howard University was the site of the AFT’s first higher education affiliate, Local 33, in 1918 (though it disbanded in 1921).

In a revealing analysis of anti-labor laws and policy in the Reconstruction years, and in the 20^th century with anti-strike and “right to work” laws in Alabama, Moten intersects labor history with the history of Jim Crow and White Supremacy in the South. The lessons for the academic labor movement in intersecting workplace and social justice should be clear. In addition to pointing to those HBCUs in which faculty are unionized (in most cases, with AAUP affiliates), Moten bookends his piece with two historical quotes. The first, from 1920, is about White paternalism and HBCUs, “Neither the prestige nor the income of any Negro college has ever been appreciably augmented by the administration of a white president,” relating the point to desirable working conditions as well. Moten sets up the second quote with a forward-looking call to current Black presidents and faculty of HBCUs in relation to respecting and not fighting the collective bargaining efforts of employees: “[G]iven the racial history of HBCUs, it might seem ironic that the fight has moved from a struggle between Black folk and White folk over equitable treatment to a struggle where Black folk fight with Black folk over equitable treatment.” The last line of Moten’s paper is a Frederick Douglas quote, “Power concedes nothing without a demand.” Fast forward 100 years, after Moten’s article, and the non-tenure track faculty at Howard University have done precisely that, successfully unionized, affiliated with SEIU Local 500, and signed collective bargaining agreements in 2022.

Finally, we have selected Nicholas DiGiovanni’s 2015 paper, “This much I know is true: The five intangible influences on collective bargaining.” It is among the most downloaded items from the website. And in many ways, it encapsulates the gestalt of academic collective bargaining. Based on nearly four decades of experience, DiGiovanni speaks to the intricacies and subtleties of the bargaining process, each round and cycle of which is somewhat unpredictable. Focusing on the process and performance of negotiating at the table, he identifies five factors that are part of the contingency of how the bargaining will play out—history, expectations, the nature and character of the players, timing, and catharsis. It is a profoundly practical reminder that for all the formal, legal dimensions of the process, collective bargaining is a human process, in which cultural and affective influences play out.

Finally, as a preface to the Baker’s Dozen of exemplary proceedings papers republished in this Volume, Daniel J. Julius has provided a contemporary commentary and a perspective on some academic collective bargaining “small world” observations spanning 50 years of National Center conferences.

We sincerely hope that you enjoy Volume 14, honoring the National Center’s 50^th anniversary. We hope as well that this issue (as do the journal, the annual conference, and the Center) serves the goal of enhancing our collective future by sharing and circulating the collective experience, expertise, empirical analysis, insight, and wisdom of our contributors and community. For that is at the heart of the National Center’s mission and work.

Eds.

Op-Ed:

A New Foundation, Revisited by Richard J. Boris

Articles:

Protecting Academic Freedom Through Collective Bargaining: An AAUP Perspective by Michael Mauer

In the Beginning, Long Time Ago: A Brief History of the National Center’s Origin and Evolution by William A. Herbert

Power Despite Precarity: A Conversation with the Authors, Joe Berry and Helena Worthen by Gary Rhoades

Centering Anti-Racism and Social Justice, Toward A More Perfect Union: A Conversation with the Authors, Cecil E. Canton and Charles Toombs

by Gary Rhoades

Practitioner Perspective:

Factors that Led to Crossing the Picket-Line: An Autoethnography of a Faculty Striker by Giovanna Follo

Proceedings Materials:

50th Anniversary: Proceedings of the National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions by Daniel J. Julius

The Academic Mission and Collective Bargaining by Sidney Hook

Management Rights Issues in Collective Bargaining in Higher Education by

Margaret K. Chandler and Connie Chiang

The Yeshiva Case: One Year Later by Joel M. Douglas

State Support of Higher Education: A 20-Year Contextual Analysis Using Two-Year Percentage Gains In State Tax Appropriations by Edward R. Hines

Sexual Harassment on Campus and a Union's Dilemma by Rachel Hendrickson

Collective Bargaining and Technology by Christine Maitland

Faculty and Management Rights In Higher Education Collective Bargaining: A Faculty Perspective by Ernst Benjamin

The Current Status of Graduate Student Unions: An Employer's Perspective

by Daniel J. Julius

New Models of Contingent Faculty Inclusion by Frank Cosco

The Professionalization of Non-Tenure Track Faculty in the United States: Three Case Studies From Public Research Institutions: Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, University of Illinois At Urbana-Champaign, and University of Oregon by Karen Stubaus

This Much I Know is True: The Five Intangible Influences on Collective Bargaining by Nicholas DiGiovanni Jr.

The History Of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education: The Case of HBCUs

by Derryn Moten

Collective Bargaining and Labor Representation for Higher Education in a “Right to Work” Environment by Thomas Auxter

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.

New Book: Contingent Faculty and the Remaking of Higher Education:

A Labor History, edited by Eric Fure-Slocum and Claire Goldstene

Job Postings:

Open Staff Positions with the California Faculty Association

Working for CFA

A union of 29,000 tenure-track faculty, coaches, librarians, and counselors, CFA is seeking candidates with a strong knowledge and background in racial and social justice work. Candidates who have relevant experience (formally or informally) and can translate that into the range of job responsibilities listed below are strongly encouraged to apply.

CFA is proud to be a member-run union and believes in employing hard-working and creative staff whose talents complement those of our elected leadership. 

CFA is an Affirmative Action Employer. Women, People of Color/Native People, members of the LGBTQIA+ community, and people with disabilities are strongly encouraged to apply.

CFA complies with federal and state disability laws and makes reasonable accommodations for applicants and employees with disabilities. If reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and/or to receive other benefits and privileges of employment, please contact searchcommittee@calfac.org.

Job Postings

General Manager

The General Manager (GM) manages and directs union activities and staff in accordance with CFA bylaws and policies established by an elected Board of Directors. In addition to working with member leaders and staff to develop goals and strategies to meet desired outcomes, the GM has day-to-day general responsibility for implementing policy and overseeing plans in all program areas, including Representation, Collective Bargaining, Government Relations, Communications, and General Administration. The GM also has oversight responsibility to the CFA Board to ensure the adequacy and soundness of the union’s fiscal budget. 

The GM manages a staff of approximately 50 employees (including 9 managers) based throughout California in the CFA Sacramento Headquarters and on the 23 CSU campuses. The GM serves as the liaison between the staff and governance operations of CFA. The GM represents the union, as appropriate, in its relationships with the CSU administration, legislators, affiliates, community alliances and in the public on local, state and national levels. The GM reports to the CFA President.

The ideal candidate will have the following:

• Proven record of accomplishment in collective bargaining and administrative processes;
• Proven skill and experience in strategic thinking, organizational development, campaign development and implementation, and long-term planning;
• Strong and demonstrated commitment to intentionally advancing racial and social justice transformation in CFA, the union movement, the university, and beyond; Ability to work creatively, strategically, and in consultation with union officers, member leadership, and senior staff to develop CFA programs and campaigns, including coordinating, planning, and managing implementation;
• Demonstrated skill, experience and acumen in building and managing staff teams;
• Strong demonstrated skills in motivating and inspiring staff Requirements:
• Extensive management experience in a union, political, nonprofit, grassroots, or higher education association;
• Five-year minimum staff management experience;
• Five-year minimum experience developing and implementing campaigns;
• Familiarity working with union officers and member-based committees; 
• Experience bargaining or administering collective bargaining agreements;
• Excellent written and oral communication skills;
• Ability to establish priorities and manage multiple activities with attention to detail and accuracy;
• Bachelor’s degree;
• The GM is required to devote full time to the position and works a non-standard work week including evenings and weekends when required;
• Frequent travel within the state and some limited travel outside the state;
• Valid driver’s license, an automobile for business use, and proof of minimum insurance coverage;
• Ability to lift 25lbs; subject to reasonable accommodation.

Initial interviews will begin August 2023

Salary/Benefits/Location: CFA offers a fully paid benefit package including medical, dental, vision, SEIU defined benefit pension plan and generous paid leave. Salary range for this position is $190,000 – $205,000 commensurate with experience.

Representation Specialist

Location: Northern or Southern California (remote working from home with occasional travel)

This position primarily handles grievances and discipline appeals at the Level II and arbitration stages. Given the nature of our work as a union and the responsibilities of this position in particular, we are looking for a candidate with the capacity to communicate across many lines of difference, with the ability to handle conflict and challenges with steadiness, and the capacity to craft innovative outcomes that honor various individual needs.

CFA takes an organizing approach to representation. As a result, the Representation Specialist plays a key role in identifying and developing local and statewide representation issues and strategies with an understanding of how these issues connect to chapter and leadership development. This work is performed in collaboration with the Representation Team and CFA organizers assigned to CSU campuses.

The ideal Representation Specialist will have experience as an advocate and be skilled in identifying contract violations, filing grievances, representing employees facing discipline, representing members in arbitrations, and writing post-hearing briefs. Experience handling unfair labor practices is also useful in this position. Excellent research and writing skills are required.

The ideal candidate will also possess the ability to work and thrive in a team environment. These abilities include communicating effectively with others, and recognizing, understanding and respecting different viewpoints.

Applicant must be a self-motivated, deadline-oriented individual with a willingness and desire to learn new skills and work with people in academia and in labor unions. 

Essential Job Duties

• Represent members and the union in contractual grievances and discipline matters at the Level II and arbitration stages.
• Possess excellent verbal and written communication skills.
• Write and file post-hearing arbitration briefs.
• Draft and agree to settlement agreements with the CSU.
• Capacity to work independently, handle multiple projects simultaneously, and meet strict deadlines.
• Demonstrated ability to infuse anti-racism and social justice work into the everyday work of CFA.
• Work collaboratively and strategically with CFA officers, members, interns, and staff on membership and bargaining campaigns as well as political campaigns that require Get Out The Vote (GOTV) duties at election time.
• Work remotely primarily (home office with union-provided computer, printer, phone, etc.) with occasional travel and weekend work.

The ideal candidate will have the following degrees and experience:

• Juris Doctor degree is preferred, but applicants with bachelor’s degrees and/or other graduate studies and degrees shall be considered if other experience equips applicant to perform the assigned work.
• Previous union experience and/or experience with worker representation and advocacy.

Other Requirements:

• Possess valid driver’s license, an automobile for business use, and proof of minimum insurance coverage.
• Proficient with MS Word, Excel, Outlook as well as Zoom and other teleconferencing platforms.

Financial and Administrative Services Support Coordinator

SUMMARY: This position is responsible for providing administrative support to the CFA financial and administrative operations. Specific duties may include, but are not limited to, the following:

Duties and Responsibilities include:

• Ensure timely payments of accounts payable by posting routine invoices; promptly forwarding all financial mail; posting approved invoices; processing staff expense forms; printing checks; and mailing payments to the appropriate parties; assists with bank reconciliations.
• Maintain accurate records of accounts payable by properly recording all payments; ensuring that staff expense claims are accurate and are accompanied by appropriate documentation; matching checks with the necessary back-up documentation before presenting them for signature; filing all documentation appropriately.
• Compile information and generate reports, including but not limited to the following: Affiliate reports, American Express reports, lobbying and political reports, staff activity reports, and chapter reports. Assist with government and tax reports, and annual audit.
• Ensure proper distribution of CFA funds by calculating and preparing monthly chapter dues rebates; preparing checks, as necessary, in the appropriate amount for the various programs maintained by the organization.
• Ensure accurate and prompt collection of CFA’s funds by preparing invoices and sending them to affiliates, outside agencies, staff, chapters, and any other necessary parties;
• Ensure successful small group meetings by scheduling; tracking attendance; duplicating materials; arranging meetings logistics; and providing administrative support at the meeting site;
• Other duties as needed.

The ideal candidate will have the following knowledge, skills, and abilities:

• A strong commitment to advancing racial and social justice transformation in the union movement, the university, and beyond;
• Skill and experience in strategic thinking, organizational development and long term planning;
• Ability to work independently, handle multiple projects simultaneously and meet strict deadlines;
• Excellent time management and communication skills;
• Ability to work collaboratively and strategically with CFA officers, members, interns and staff;
• Ability to travel for extended periods (up to 1 week) during events; and
• Ability to work long and irregular hours, including evenings and weekends.

Requirements:

• Three years accounting or bookkeeping experience; demonstrated proficiency in using QuickBooks and Excel
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills
• Must demonstrate discretion in handling sensitive information.
• Ability to be a “team player” and work with a variety of administrative/professional staff and elected member volunteers.
• Ability to operate generally used office equipment and to use familiar computer software (i.e. word processing, spreadsheets, web browsers, email)
• Ability to learn and communicate CFA organizational structure and policies
• Ability to handle a heavy workload in a fast-paced environment with minimal supervision
• Ability to lift 25 lbs; occasional travel and weekend work required.
• Must authorize and pass background check.
• Typing proficiency of 50 wpm
• Strong commitment to racial equity and social justice.

Other Requirements:

• Valid driver’s license, an automobile for business use, and proof of minimum insurance coverage.
• Ability to lift 25 lbs.

Salary/Benefits/Location: CFA offers a fully paid benefit package including medical, dental, vision, SEIU defined benefit pension plan, and generous paid leave. This position is covered by a collective bargaining agreement; salary range is $62,201.35 – $83,175.41 commensurate with experience.

To apply send cover letter, resume, and references to searchcommittee@calfac.org.

Campus Service Representatives – NorCal & SoCal

The CSR responsibilities are communicated by the CFA campus Field Representative and will work in coordination with the CFA Chapter Executive Board’s, which organizes and represents approximately 29,000 faculty, librarians, counselors, and coaches.

General Summary

The CSR is a non-exempt part-time position.

The position ensures that the California Faculty Association’s (CFA) new member recruitment and organizing goals are executed through the work of the CSR and chapter that they are assigned to support. Overall, the position will support and help add capacity to well-functioning ongoing priorities for new member recruitment and organizing support.

Rate of Pay: $25.00 hour

Hours Per Week: 19 hours per week.

Working Days/Hours: Monday-Thursday 10am – 2pm, Fridays 2pm-5pm

**Any alterations to the scheduled days/hours must receive prior approval by the Field Rep

Job Functions and Essential Duties

Recruitment of new members:

• Daily hall walking campus buildings to engage in recruitment discussions with non-members – nonmember target lists and tracking form provided during bi-weekly check ins
• Provides welcoming experience and exceptional service to non-members

Required meeting attendance:

• Attends monthly membership organizing committee meetings
• Attends monthly luncheons, workshops, and other activities – coordinates with OM to identify rsvp’s of non-members to engage with during the event
• Attends 2^nd Executive Board meeting of each month to provide report progress made in chapter goal of recruitment
• Events/activities in which membership organizing committee has scheduled for the upcoming month
• What has been successful for recruitment and what has not

Optional meeting attendance:

• 1^st Executive Board meeting of the month
• Events, workshops and activities where no nonmembers have rsvp’d

Reporting:

• Friday bi-weekly – turn in tracking form from prior weeks and workplan for upcoming week to field rep and chapter president
• Friday 3pm bi-weekly check in with field rep (and occasionally chapter president) – meeting will be to discuss and review progress on recruitment goals using tracking form, workplans and hall walking scheduling for the upcoming weeks, overcoming any obstacles to recruitment
• Weekly check-in with regional organizing director and team meetings

Office Organization and Administrative/ Clerical Duties (when needed):

• Keeps track of all conversations with nonmembers with dates, times, issues/concerns and follow up, if any, that is needed
• Communication with Executive Board members who have volunteered to assist in activities as to time, date, location i.e. tabling event, appreciation event, etc.
• Communicates to Field Representative if supplies are needed i.e. membership cards, pens/pencils, paper, binders, etc.
• Updates and maintains the CFA bulletin boards in each campus building with membership recruitment materials

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• Excellent verbal, written and interpersonal communication skills.
• Ability to work independently and under general supervision, and to handle multiple projects simultaneously. Effective organization and time management skills.
• Ability to work collaboratively, creatively and strategically in a team environment, including CFA officers, members, interns and staff.
• Ability to learn and communicate CFA organizational structure and policies
• Attention to detail and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to communicate professionally with nonmembers, members, staff, students and leadership.
• Ability to follow verbal and written instructions.
• Ability to work independently and under general supervision to meet required tasks/duties.
• Possess high integrity and demonstrated ability to handle highly confidential information
• Effective and appropriate communication with members, staff, administrators, and supervisors.
• Ability to lift 25 lbs. (subject to reasonable accommodation).