Author: cucfastaff

This is the third in a series of CUCFA’s FAQ’s about the UAW strike. The first set of FAQs is available here. The second set is available here. Q1: Who will be responsible for the grading when the strike is resolved? A1: If a settlement is reached before the end of the current quarter/semester, your existing ASE may be able to complete the grading, but only if it fits within their contractual workload limits. If a resolution is not reached until the next quarter/semester, an agreement about grading may be part of the settlement between UC and UAW. If not,…

Dear Colleagues, On Thursday, December 1, Senate faculty received a potentially misleading email from the President’s Office of the University of California, titled “Regarding Faculty Rights and Responsibilities,” and signed by Provost and Executive Vice President of Academic Affairs Michael Brown. This communication fails to distinguish between being on strike and declining to pick up struck labor. It is the case that the university may dock pay for any faculty on strike, although it is unclear precisely how they would enforce that policy. Faculty pay can only be docked for the period during which they choose to strike, not for…

Dear colleagues, We have entered the second week of the UAW multi-unit strike. CUCFA is inspired by our fellow academic workers represented by UAW, who are fighting to create a UC where everyone can live with dignity in the place they work. We reaffirm our message to President Drake sent on November 11, 2022, with over 1,400 Senate faculty signatures, that urged him to direct his staff to engage in good faith bargaining. We join 100 UC departments, programs, and committees that publicly expressed their support for striking academic workers. They have written letters of solidarity, with some committing not…

The AAUP has conducted surveys for its Annual Report on the Economic Status of the Profession and is now publishing some results on their Academe Blog. Earlier we had linked to their first post from that data, which examines the impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on faculty salaries and benefits for both tenure-line and non-tenure-track faculty. Their second post based on that report is now up and it explores contingency and administrative growth. “The steady rise of contingent faculty appointments and the growth of administration in higher education present a significant threat to academic freedom and shared governance.”

The AAUP has conducted surveys for its Annual Report on the Economic Status of the Profession and is now publishing some results on their Academe Blog. Their first post based on the report examines the impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on faculty salaries and benefits for both tenure-line and non-tenure-track faculty. “Key findings include: 55 percent of institutions implemented salary freezes or reductions. 28 percent of institutions eliminated or reduced some form of fringe benefits. Almost 5 percent of institutions terminated the appointments of at least some full-time tenure-line faculty members. Almost 20 percent terminated the appointments of or…

USD is a private institution and so is not bound by the First Amendment, but it is required to live up to its promises to abide by the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure. USD law professor Tom Smith is being investigated by his university for posting and online comment criticizing the Chinese government on his personal blog. Details are at theFire.org.

Just weeks after the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) filed suit against Haskell University President Ronald Graham for refusing to approve the newspaper as a student organization and for shorting its account over $10,000 in funding following critical coverage of the university, FIRE now reports that President Graham has attempted to limit free speech rights of faculty, by forbidding them from expressing opinions about the school’s administration. Details are available in a Fire Newsdesk article.

The protection and furtherance of academic freedom is a core value of the AAUP. We must always be wary of attempts to silence those who may disagree with us,regardless of how inane, illogical, unscientific, fantastic, or politically unpopular (or popular) their views may be. In today’s Academe Blog, John K. Wilson discussed a recent controversy concerning the Hoover Institution, a partisan political think-tank at Stanford University. The controversy erupted after three conservative members of the Hoover Institution asked that the faculty and the student newspaper be prevented from publishing views contrary to their own. They wanted censorship. Wilson provides a…

An AAUP investigating committee looking into governance issues at eight institutions has now concluded interviews with the principal parties at each institution and is drafting its report. As reported in Academe Blog, the first finding they will report is that we are in the midst of the worst crisis in academic governance in decades.

The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Public Affairs Advisory Committee is preparing to bring scientist’s concerns to lawmakers and administration officials next year. In preperation for that work, thwy are conducting a survey to more clearly understand what those concerns are. Please take a few minutes to complete the online survey before January 15th.