Community College Articles
Community College
News and stories of interest for full-time and part-time faculty teaching in the community colleges.
Freeway Flyers: Local action & quick news
Santa Maria part-timers negotiate numerous improvements
Part-time instructors at Allan Hancock College negotiated an 8 percent pay increase over the next two years starting this spring when all part-time academic employees received a 4 percent salary increase. They will get a 2 percent raise this fall and another in fall 2016. In a tremendous boost, service faculty (counselors, librarians, and nurses) received an additional 20 percent pay increase.
New CFT bills create minimum job security standards, strengthen the 75:25 regulation
Job security and due
process for part-time faculty
AB 1010 (Medina, D-Riverside)
This bill calls for the establishment of minimum standards for part-time faculty job security. If enacted, it would require all California community colleges without a collectively bargained contract that provides equivalent or stronger job security and due process rights to establish a seniority list for part-time faculty rehire.
Loan forgiveness program may bring relief
Last year, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) made headlines with his “Adjunct Faculty Loan Fairness Act,” a bill that would have made it much easier for part-time faculty to benefit from the federal Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, designed to encourage graduates to pursue a career in public service by offering loan forgiveness for those working full-time in government or the non-profit sector.
Paying for time but not for space: The need for a “room of one’s own” on campus
FIRST PERSON | Linda Sneed
We all know that our work takes place not just during scheduled class meetings, in classrooms on college campuses. We work in many times and places: early in the morning, through mealtimes, and late at night; in our cars, on public transportation, on our phones and personal computers, at home, in coffee shops, in public libraries.
Lessons learned: Wronged Peralta part-time instructors rehired
Sociology instructor Cynthia Mahabir is back in the classroom. What did it take to get her there, after her district mysteriously refused to honor its contract with faculty and rehire her after 17 years of teaching at Laney College?
Judge rules accreditor acted illegally in terminating City College of San Francisco’s accreditation
January 16, 2015—Today the CFT hosted a press teleconference call to discuss Superior Court Judge Curtis Karnow’s ruling in “The People vs. ACCJC.” Participating were CFT President Joshua Pechthalt, Assemblymember Phil Ting (D-San Francisco), AFT Local 2121 President Tim Killikelly, and Shanell Williams, student trustee at City College of San Francisco. Here are the highlights.
Perspective 2015
October 2015
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Freeway Flyers: Local action & quick news
ACCJC has taken part-time jobs from San Francisco
With City College of San Francisco still in limbo status due to unfair sanctions from the Accrediting Commission for Junior and Community Colleges, nearly 150 part-time faculty have lost their jobs in the past couple of years and few, if any, part-time counselors have been rehired.
AFT Convention forms Part-Time Caucus
Part-time and contingent faculty throughout the United States now have a stronger voice in our national union with the formation of a Part-Time Caucus at the AFT Convention in July.
Several California part-timers are helping shape this tool to influence AFT priorities and connect part-timers nationwide.
Two new laws will benefit part-time faculty in California
Improved transfer of unused sick leave
Assembly Bill 2295 (Ridley-Thomas, D-Los Angeles) makes it easier for part-timers to transfer unused sick leave from a previous community college employer to a new one by extending the transfer period from a mere one year to three academic years.
CalSTRS offers more assistance with service credit reporting
By Sharon Hendricks, Los Angeles College Faculty Guild and CalSTRS Board Member
To help part-time faculty understand how districts report service credit and to ensure they receive all service credit they have earned throughout their teaching careers when they retire, CalSTRS has opened new centers in Irvine, Glendale, and Santa Clara, staffed by benefits counselors trained to navigate part-time-faculty issues.
Join CFT campaign for office hours pay, full-time positions
How can we get more state funding for office hours, equal pay for equal work, and new full-time positions that that will benefit existing part-time faculty? CFT is calling on part-timers and their allies to urge the governor to include line items in the state budget dedicated to these essential improvements.
Advocate for our interests in providing equal education opportunities for students by writing directly to Gov. Brown and others who influence the state budget. Ask the governor and the Department of Finance for these new resources:
Rehire rights: Long-time instructor describes pain of losing assignment
Outpouring of faculty and student support
What happens when your employer disregards your contractually negotiated rehire rights? Part-time instructors at Oakland’s Laney College recently found out. One of them is Cynthia Mahabir, a sociology instructor and Part-Time Representative on the executive board of the Peralta Federation of Teachers.
West Valley-Mission faculty choose AFT/CFT as their union
Independent association affiliates, brings 750 teachers better union representation
Citing disrespect by their district and low pay as motivation, more than 90 percent of faculty at the West Valley-Mission Community College District casting ballots in the November 19 representational election chose to affiliate their previously independent union with AFT/CFT.
Reinstate CCSF’s elected Board of Trustees immediately
By Joshua Pechthalt, CFT President
A guiding principle in our democracy is that the people govern by electing their representatives to office, whether it’s the president of the 7th grade homeroom, local school board, mayor, president of the country or any other elected office. The American Revolution of 1776 cast aside the authority of a monarchy to govern and put that power in the hands of the people, however incomplete it was at that time.
“The People vs. ACCJC”
A day-by-day report: October 27-31 and closing arguments December 9
Day One: October 27, 2014
San Francisco—After kicking off the day with a spirited early morning demonstration outside the San Francisco Superior Court building, about a hundred City College of San Francisco faculty, students and community supporters moved en masse into the courthouse to attend the opening day of the trial to keep the college open.
More transparency required at community college accrediting agency
By CFT President Joshua Pechthalt
A bipartisan, unanimous vote in the Legislature doesn’t happen every day. So it’s worth noting that Assembly Bill 1942, for fair community college accreditation practices, recently passed 36-0 in the Senate and 74-0 in the Assembly.
Tri-Counties Labor Council honors two local presidents
Two CFT members were named Labor Leaders of the Year by the Tri-Counties Central Labor Council: Steve Hall, president of the Ventura County Federation of College Teachers, and Debra Stakes president of the Cuesta College Federation of Teachers. Congratulations Steve and Debra!
Faculty protest class cancellations caused by ACCJC sanctions
Two lawsuits and a trial move forward; governor signs CFT transparency bill
The trial to determine if the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges acted unfairly when it pulled City College of San Francisco’s accreditation will go ahead on October 27. In the meantime, San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera won a victory when the trial judge ruled on September 19 that accreditors “violated controlling federal regulations” by having an unbalanced evaluation team, with only one academic representative to evaluate the college in 2013.
Community college accreditation on trial
September 30, 2014—Over the past two years AFT Local 2121, representing faculty at City College of San Francisco (CCSF), and the California Federation of Teachers, representing 25,000 community college faculty around the state, have been embroiled in a life and death battle to save CCSF from disaccreditation at the hands of the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges (ACCJC).
The expensive and exhausting effort has taken place in the courts, the legislature, the state budget process, at the bargaining table, in the news, and in the streets.