The election for a union for adjuncts at Tufts will be a mail ballot. Ballots will be mailed September 11th and are due back on September 25th. The ballots will be counted on September 26th.
To assess the needs, concerns and priorities, we are conducting a preliminary bargaining survey. Take the survey here: http://action.seiu.org/page/content/tufts-survey/
Tufts University Adjunct Faculty on their Way to Forming a Union with SEIU
BOSTON— Adding to the drumbeat that began at an April 2013 union symposium with contingent faculty from 20 Boston-area colleges and universities, adjunct faculty at Tufts University have now filed for their union election to join Adjunct Action, a project of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).
Tufts adjuncts will vote by mail ballot starting on September 9 and the National Labor Relations Board will count the ballots on September 26. Bentley University adjuncts will also vote on whether to form their union with SEIU in September.
“It is thrilling to be moving from isolation to collaboration in which our individuality is treasured even as we discover how we benefit from working together,” said Rebecca K. Gibson, a lecturer at Tufts University and a member of the organizing committee. “Winning the election is the next step. With a union we will have equal representation at the bargaining table.”
July 19, 2013 Letter from the Organizing Committee to the Tufts Faculty:
| Dear Colleagues,We part-timers just got great news. In record time we’ve won our right to have a democratic vote for our union. We’ve just heard from the NLRB that our application to hold to an election has been approved. That we’ve been able to accomplish so much in such a short time shows the extent of interest in addressing our issues as a community.Ballots will be mailed to each of us at our home address this September 9, due back September 25, and counted on September 26.Winning the election is the next step. With a union we will have equal representation at the bargaining table. With a union, we will have the power to negotiate the terms of our ongoing employment. With a union, we’ll have the ability to solidify those benefits we have enjoyed (and which, as we’ve seen, can otherwise be rescinded at any time.) We will achieve a level of transparency and redress that has been lacking. With a union we will have the power to negotiate for what we deserve.If you support these values, you need to vote for the union! Eligible voters include anyone who has taught as an adjunct at Tufts during the Fall 2012, Spring 2013 or Fall 2013 semester(s).Together, we can build our organization and begin to have a real voice as part time lecturers at Tufts.Have a wonderful rest of the summer. We’ve already come a long way. Now we’ll need everyone’s help to go the distance.Any questions? Let us know. Todd Ricker, campaign director for Adjunct Action, is available at 617-981-4150, and eager to hear your thoughts and questions this summer and as the semester begin.Yours,
Robert Burdick |
Tufts Files for an Election
Earlier this week Tufts adjuncts filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board to hold a union election. The election, a mail ballot, is set for September.
“It is thrilling to be moving from isolation to collaboration in which our individuality is treasured even as we discover how we benefit from working together. We are part of a world we didn’t know was there,” said Rebecca K. Gibson, a lecturer at Tufts University and a member of the Organizing Committee.
We’ll have more details soon.
Email from Adjunct Professor Andy Klatt to the Tufts Community:
| Dear Colleagues,Here’s hoping that everyone is having a healthy and happy summer. I’m writing to encourage interest and participation in our organizing campaign to provide union representation to part-time Lecturers at Tufts.Working as a part-time Lecturer in the Department of Romance Languages has been satisfying in many ways and for a number of years our compensation was adjusted upward annually to reward seniority and match the increased cost of living.It was no surprise that our pay was frozen along with that of many other university employees when the financial system was on the brink of collapse in the fall of 2008. What has come as an unwelcome surprise is that nearly five years later we remain the only university employees whose salaries remain frozen at 2008 levels, and no raises or cost of living increases are on the horizon. Indeed, we were informed at a meeting last October that cost of living adjustments are a thing of the past; a new pay structure is to be put into place and will include no pay increases ever after eight years of service.This announcement by the university administration was insulting and disrespectful, but it was in keeping with the nationwide trend to depress wages and salaries for all but the highest paid administrators and executives. Universities across the United States have been increasing tuition and fees dramatically and transferring most teaching duties to part-time and non-tenure track faculty with the idea that we are desperate to cobble together a living and will be willing to accept whatever is offered without putting up any resistance.As recently as the late 1970s, nearly 80% of college level teaching in the country was done by tenured or tenure-track faculty, while today a comparable percentage of instruction is performed by contingent or adjunct faculty with little or no job security, scant participation in the life of the institution, and greatly diminished compensation. At Tufts we are called Lecturers. The deterioration we have experienced in our standard of living coincides with steadily increasing inequality in the United States over the same 35 years, contributing to the country’s democratic deficit. Only a minority of Americans today believe they have a say in the decisions that shape their lives. As long as our pay, benefits, and conditions of employment are determined at the whim of the university administration, we too will be left out of the decisions that affect our work lives and the lives of our families and our communities.The university has made its position clear: Our pay is to be reduced by attrition and eroded by inflation. Some day, when administrators decide to make even deeper pay cuts, eliminate our benefits, or degrade our work lives in other ways, we are to have no say in the matter. But we don’t need to take this assault lying down. Our alternative is to organize and participate as equals in negotiating our conditions of employment. When we do so, the Tufts administration will be obligated by the National Labor Relations Act to respect us as partners in the employment relationship, and implicitly in the educational mission of the university.In the words of legendary civil rights leader and Distinguished professor in residence at American University Julian Bond, “The right to organize and bargain over working conditions is fundamental… I encourage you to seize this opportunity and support your fellow professors and sign a union authorization card today.” But I leave you with the words of Albert Einstein in his statement upon becoming a founding member of the faculty union at Princeton University in 1938: “I consider it important, indeed urgently necessary, for intellectual workers to get together, both to protect their own economic status… and no less importantly in the interest of society as a whole.”Please join us and sign a union authorization card today. Soon we will win our right to bargain collectively and take the first steps in the arduous task of making participatory democracy a reality in our lives. It’s the right thing to do and I know you’ll feel really good about it.Respectfully,Andy Klatt Lecturer, Department of Romance LanguagesP.S. To sign an authorization card to join the union, click here. For more information on the adjunct organizing campaign visit www.adjunctaction.org |
