Author: downeyt

Members of the Faculty Collective Bargaining Unit, I am sorry to have to report that the administration bargaining team’s position on faculty rights and protections is the same as it was last fall: they insist that those rights and protections, which formerly could be enforced by the grievance and arbitration procedure, be removed from the collective bargaining agreement. Instead they promise (although they haven’t written them yet) to put them in University Policy, though they… Continue reading

Members of the Faculty Bargaining Unit, Next Thursday’s Chapter Meeting, originally intended to elect officers for the coming year and to set strategy for winning a decent contract, will now have to be a victory celebration as well, for the United Faculty of Florida has won a great victory. The First District State Court of Appeals has ruled that it was illegal for the Public Employees Relations Commission (PERC) to decide that the new Boards… Continue reading

Members of the Faculty Collective Bargaining Unit, Let me start with the good news: Our colleagues in the United Faculty of Florida Chapter at the University of Central Florida in Orlando have arrived at a tentative bargaining agreement with their administration’s bargaining team. While the agreement still needs to be ratified both by the bargaining unit and by the Board of Trustees, both negotiating teams are recommending approval. UCF’s agreement is modeled on the one… Continue reading

Members of the Faculty Collective Bargaining Unit, I am happy to report that considerable progress was made at the bargaining table on Friday. With Dr. Judith Blucker leading the administration team for the first time, the union and the administration were able to reach tentative agreement on the Tenure article. Further, an aggressive schedule of three half-day and two full-day bargaining sessions before the end of February was agreed to, as well as a goal… Continue reading

Members of the Faculty Collective Bargaining Unit, When 250 of you attended the Board of Trustees meeting in November, the union asked for two things: a change in the administration”s bargaining team and a change in the administration’s contract proposals. As you probably know, over the holidays President Maidique announced that former Executive Vice Provost Judith Blucker would become the new chief negotiator for the administration. Dr. Blucker brings many years of experience at FIU,… Continue reading

Members of the Faculty Collective Bargaining Unit, We have had three sessions at the bargaining table since the Board of Trustees meeting on November 22. I know many of you are wondering whether there has been any change in the administration’s approach. Answer: not much. Most of the last two sessions have been taken up with the article on tenure. You will remember that the administration proposed adding “persistently uncollegial behavior” to “misconduct” and “incompetence”,… Continue reading

Alan Gummerson’s Remarks to FIU Board of Trustees, 22 November 2004 Good morning. The time you have granted me will go quickly, so let me cut to the chase. The faculty are angered and offended by the proposals your bargaining team placed on the table last week. These proposals constitute an extreme and radical attack on the kind of university this faculty has created over the last thirty years. The proposals are an attempt to… Continue reading

Members of the Faculty Collective Bargaining Unit, The following is a report from Prof. Lorna Veraldi, the union’s Chief Negotiator, on the administration’s collective bargaining proposal, and on the administration team’s performance at the bargaining table. A meeting to discuss this report and how to respond to the administration’s attacks on the faculty will be held Wednesday, November 17, 12:30 pm, in PC-214. Faculty who think we deserve better than what the administration is offering… Continue reading

Members of the UFF Collective Bargaining Unit, October has now come and gone with virtually no progress to report in UFF’s attempts to bargain a new contract with the FIU administration. Despite the fact that President Maidique told us “I hear you” during the “Bargain Now” sticker campaign at Faculty Convocation, there has been no discernable change in the behavior of his bargaining team. The administration’s approach is still to proceed at a leisurely pace,… Continue reading

Members of the Faculty Bargaining Unit, There is little progress to report on bargaining because the administration doesn’t seem interested in bargaining. The Chief Negotiator for the administration was only willing to meet with UFF once during the entire month of September, and then only for two and a half hours. During that time, tentative agreement was reached on a few minor details concerning the grievance process (slight revisions in previous forms to reflect a… Continue reading