Letters to the Editor
I have taught part-time music at Cabrillo College for 31 years at the maximum number of units. I am a bit dismayed about the 80 percent cap (“Convention votes to raise part-time workload cap to 80 percent,” Spring 2018) because that means that the colleges can now cover more classes with underpaid part-timers.
AFT resolution supports $7,000 per three-credit course for adjuncts
One of the more talked about resolutions passed by the biennial AFT Convention this July was Resolution 15, which calls for AFT to support City University of New York adjuncts in their quest to achieve through “actions, demonstrations, and advocacy,” a minimum of $7,000 per three-credit class. The resolution, which passed with resounding support and no opposition, also supports this minimum in “all other AFT locals’ campaigns for fair adjunct pay.”
CFT State Council approves resolution reiterating support for statewide health insurance for part-timers
On May 5, the State Council approved a resolution put forth by the CFT Part-Time Committee, calling for CFT to sponsor legislation “to establish a permanent healthcare program for part-time faculty and their dependents.”
CFT legislative efforts yield parental leave for part-timers and more funding for full-time positions, paid office hours and pay equity
If there were perhaps one way to describe the legislative campaign waged by CFT this year as it regards both part-timers and the community college system, one could say it was “spirited.” Despite the sea changes proposed for the entire system, the union still won improvements for part-timers.
Part-timers are still sticking with their union
On June 27, the storm clouds were gathering.
The Janus v. ASFCME decision had just come down from the U.S. Supreme Court in a 5-4 ruling, overturning 40 years of legal precedent and marking the abrupt end of union fair share, or agency fee, for public employees. Now non-union members who benefit from the hard work of unions who still represent them at the bargaining table would no longer be required to pay their fair share.
Plan your local campaign now for Campus Equity Week
The month of October is once again time to give special attention to part-time faculty issues. Officially, Campus Equity Week is the week of October 22-26, but what’s more important is that campus communities get the word out this fall before the legislative process begins.
Support paid office hours for part-time faculty
Send a letter to Gov. Brown asking that more money be put in the State Part-time Office Hours Fund. These letters work. A similar campaign last year helped secure a $5 million increase in the fund, an increase of over 70 percent. That said, the state fund only matches about 10 percent of paid part-time office hours funds, which is why office hours funding is either limited or non-existent in most districts.
Los Rios wins top award for its Part-Timer’s Almanac
There are adjunct survival guides out there which give basic union info, and perhaps maybe where the copy machines are located on campus, then there’s The Part-Timer’s Almanac, which is perhaps the most comprehensive, adjunct-oriented union publication put out by a local union ever.
Yes, Virginia, adjuncts can get unemployment benefits
Even if you have received a tentative offer of employment for the next semester, you are entitled to apply for unemployment benefits over the break immediately upon completion of your last working day of the semester.
Adjunct instructors are considered at-will employees, because despite the “tentative assignment offer” one may receive, this is not legally considered a “reasonable assurance of employment.”
Membership drives in the community colleges mean more adjunct power
The forthcoming Supreme Court ruling in Janus vs. AFSCME poses a serious threat to union strength. Any union is only as strong as its membership base, and when unions have higher percentages of the workers in its unit as active members, they are stronger at the bargaining table, and better able to protect its workers from violations of their rights.
Convention votes to raise part-time workload cap to 80 percent
At this year’s CFT Convention, delegates passed Resolution 15 calling for the CFT to support changing the workload cap in a community college district to 80 percent of a full-time equivalent load, effectively allowing part-time faculty to teach up to 12 units.
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.
One by one: Organizing team signs up part-time faculty
Why does anyone join the union? …because someone asks them
Member organizers from local unions throughout the state joined forces at Palomar College to meet one-on-one with part-time faculty agency fee payers who had not yet signed their union cards — and asked them to join the union.
Former part-timer chairs Assembly Higher Ed Committee
Teaching background brings understanding, nuanced solutions
Community College Council President Jim Mahler says having Assemblyman Jose Medina as the new chair of the Committee on Higher Education is a gold mine.
National Adjunct demonstrations sweep the country
Precarious employment issue re-emerges in national spotlight
National Adjunct Walkout Day began at UC Santa Cruz with lecturers lined up behind the large puppet of “Saint Precaria.” They then walked through the wooded campus to the amused response of students.
French language school staffs choose AFT as their union
Workers at three Bay Area private schools gain a stronger voice in the workplace
When math teacher Cheryl LaBrecque joined the staff of the French American International School in San Francisco in 1999, the preK-12 school was small and “things worked better.” Staff members “had a closer relationship with administration,” she says. Since then, it has become “more corporate, more top-down, more about money.”
CFT releases statewide study of part-time faculty pay
Collaborative union effort leads to promising new tool for bargaining
A new CFT study has, for the first time, ranked compensation for part-time faculty throughout California and found that salaries vary dramatically across the state.
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