Community College Articles

Article Part-time faculty By Geoff Johnson
Legislative Action

AB 897: Raising the cap and reducing freeway flying
First Person

The term “freeway flyer” has for years been synonymous with California part-time community college teachers. Since 1968, California part-timers have been legally restricted to teaching a faction of a full-time load in a given community college district, and then generally paid only for their instructional hours. The rationale for this rule was that it allowed administrators more flexibility to deal with the drop in student sections from the fall to spring semesters, and at the same time, a way to get out of paying healthcare and retirement benefits.

Article CFT Convention Part-time faculty
Education Issues

Delegates reaffirm support for part-time faculty participation in shared governance

While the issues of pay inequity, the lack of job security, and access to health benefits are major challenges that plague part-time faculty —collegiality, inclusion, and connection with their campuses and fellow faculty are also important for a part-time faculty member’s long-term involvement with a particular institution. Key to increasing adjunct involvement and connection in the California community colleges is increasing both the opportunities for and compensation of part-time faculty participation in shared governance.

Article Part-time faculty
Legislative Action

Paid maternity leave: AB 500 empowers female educators, staff and their families

Pregnancy is a medical condition that requires women to take time off either to deal with the pregnancy itself and potential complications, to recover from child birthing, or bond with a child, which often requires far more than a just the few weeks that many female adjuncts may have in accumulated sick leave. It is not an illness, like a cold, nor a disability like throwing out your back. It is a temporary disability specific to women and needs to be treated as such.

Article Local Action Part-time faculty
Collective Bargaining

Local union gains for part-time faculty, and remembering Sam Russo

Grossmont-Cuyamaca wins paid office hours, additional pay for office-campus assignments

After a 26-month negotiations deadlock which was only broken with the election of union-friendly governing board members, the AFT Guild, representing both part- and full-time faculty in the San Diego and Grossmont-Cuyamaca districts, was able to settle its contract with the Grossmont-Cuyamaca district.

Article Local Action
Local President Stephanie Rosenblatt and Cerritos faculty members organize to demand equity at the board of trustees meeting.

Cerritos College Federation takes a stand for healthcare

Cerritos faculty are taking a stand for equity.

“Right now our college doesn’t provide any sort of health benefit to part-timers,” explained local President Stephanie Rosenblatt. “Most of the districts around us provide at least some sort of reimbursement scheme, in which part-time faculty are reimbursed at even a minimal level for their healthcare premiums.”

Article

Part-timer health benefits: The successes and challenges ahead

Among the many challenges that part-time, or contingent faculty face, health care benefits, or rather, the lack thereof, has been one of the most significant.

According to Bloomberg, healthcare is the leading cause of bankruptcy in the United States, and in spite of the passage of the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, in March 2010, the number of bankruptcies attributed to healthcare costs tripled in 2017, while the general rate of bankruptcies fell overall.

Article Accreditation
Education Issues

Quest for fair accreditation ends in union victory


CFT and ACCJC agree on key points in legal settlement

Since the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges made its appalling decision to terminate City College of San Francisco’s accreditation four years ago, AFT Local 2121, the faculty union there, and the CFT have fought back through legislation, lawsuits, political pressure and protests.

Article Accreditation ACCJC
Education Issues

Fair accreditation: The long arc of our successful campaign

How a rogue agency damaged colleges in Compton and San Francisco

The Accrediting Commission of Community and Junior Colleges, a private 19-member panel that oversees community colleges in California and Hawaii, has been much in the news over its threat to pull City College of San Francisco’s accreditation — a battle the union and college recently won with the January 13 news that its accreditation is fully restored for the next seven years.

Article Part-time faculty Reemployment Rights SB 1379
Collective Bargaining

New law brings reemployment rights for part-time faculty

Successful CFT-sponsored legislation calls for districts to negotiate

Community college districts will soon be compelled to negotiate what CFT-sponsored legislation calls “reemployment preference for part-time, temporary faculty.” The landmark provisions require districts to negotiate with the union in order to receive significant funding available from the state Student Success and Support Program.