UFF-FAU

May 3, 2010. FAU administrators’ concerns over the budget contradicted by recent extravagances, Raises for designated few while tuition increases and faculty salaries reach new lows.

On rather short notice (April 30), the FAU administration has called for convening another forum on the university’s budget to take place on the afternoon of May 3. The following questions were received by UFF-FAU from faculty members who feared submitting them directly to the FAU administration.

1)  FAU faculty salaries are the lowest in the state of Florida among doctoral-granting institutions. They have sunk to levels that are now below FIU and FIT over the past ten years. Why is it that area community colleges (now state colleges) have been able to manage their budgets with soaring enrollments and award faculty pay raises?  It seems troubling that these community colleges have more increases in enrollments than FAU, but are managing their funds in ways that value their faculty much more than FAU.

2)  Why is it that FAU administrators decided to expend funds on a medical school during these bleak financial times, at the clear expense of zero growth in faculty compensation and increased tuition for students?

3)  What is the FAU administration going to do about the condition that faculty at many levels within FAU are compensated at much lower levels than newer faculty being hired at FAU?  Is this a message to FAU’s more senior faculty that administrators and Trustees prefer we leave and work elsewhere? What does this suggest about how administrators value an experienced and seasoned faculty body?

4)  How does FAU justify the fact that some faculty and administrators received “salary adjustments” over the last few years (net effect of raises) and others did not?  This seems clearly to be a patronage form of governing the university. Does the administration support or condone what is essentially a system of favoritism?

5) Why is FAU continuing to add administrators and staff, but cut faculty (see the decreasing percentages of faculty at FAU at uff-fau.org)? Why are administrators not being let go? What exactly is it that administrators do that contributes to the University’s “excellence”?

6) Is the FAU administration willing to host or be involved in a budget forum where students, students’ parents, community members, media, and non-university administration affiliated budget analysts are invited to participate?

7) FAU’s 2009 Financial Audit indicates that the University’s net unrestricted assets increased by $20 million to around $92 million, and its overall assets are now estimated to be almost $1 billion. The FAU Research Corporation and Harbor Branch Institute Research Corporation have about $175 million in national and international stocks and securities, estimated at fair market value as of June 2009, shortly after equity markets had lifted from their nadir. Given these reserves how can the university administration continue to plead poverty?

May 3, 2010. In 1999-2000 FAU paid its faculty more than FIU and FIT, FAU faculty salaries are now the lowest in the state, Objective 5 of BOT Strategic Plan remains glaringly unfulfilled.

Salaries for FAU faculty fell far behind FIU over the past ten years, mainly under the leadership of former Republican Lieutenant Governor Frank Brogan and FAU’s Board of Trustees. For example, according to recently-released AAUP salary data in 1999-2000 faculty salaries at FAU were actually higher than FIU’s, but over the past ten years FIU salaries eventually surpassed those of FAU. In 2000 Full Professors at FIU earned an average of $68,200, versus $72,700 at FAU, while FIU Associate Professors made $53,000 versus $55,800 at FAU, and Assistant Professors took home $44,600 at FIU as FAU Assistant Professors made $45,400.

The figures show how FAU has clearly failed in fulfilling Objective 5 of the BOT’s Strategic Plan, “Provide competitive faculty salaries that will assure recruitment and retention of a diverse and highly productive faculty who will contribute to building superior academic programs and research capacity.”  Instead of fulfilling Objective 5, FAU has gone in the exact opposite direction. Moreover, the failure of FAU administrators and trustees to address faculty pay disparities has taken place alongside substantial pay increases for administrators and an overall increase in administrative positions.

See related post:

FAU Faculty Salaries Lowest in Florida

May 1, 2010. Time to hunker down! FAU Administrators appear to be laying groundwork for reorganization and faculty layoffs.

“’Knock-knock-knock!’ Professor Tracy, are you in?” someone calls outside my office door. “Oh, yes,” I reply. “But like most other faculty, I’m hiding underneath my desk, waiting for FAU’s reorganization, where I may or may not find myself booted from the the University plane and careening toward earth with little-if-any parachute.”

These are, after all, tough times, or so we are told. Faculty and staff must once again pull in their belts, our well-compensated leaders tell us. Pay no attention to that pesky 2009 Financial Audit that shows the University’s $20 million increase in unrestricted net assets as it proceeded to terminate tenured faculty. That’s a tidy sum that would easily allow for a much-needed salary increase for Florida’s most poorly paid professors who reside in the state’s highest cost-of-living region. In fact, the administration is moving in the opposite direction, opening what will likely be a costly medical school and anxiously looking to place a whopping $60 million for a football stadium onto the University’s credit card. This is not to mention that administrator positions have grown far beyond those of instructional faculty since the early 2000s.

Augustine once remarked that hope has two beautiful daughters. One is anger and the other is courage. For most FAU faculty faced with the facts yet also demoralized and dealing with “battered faculty syndrome,” it is understandable to be hope-less. In fact, staying underneath one’s desk in these turbulent times certainly isn’t courageous, but it’s not entirely unwise either. Heck, it’s gettin’ ugly out there.

Consider the pronouncements of Interim President John Pritchett, who at a forum on the budget on April 5 told faculty that “layoffs are still on the table.” Such threats will likely be repeated at the May 3rd forum. Last October, however, Pritchett remarked in the College of Arts and Letters Faculty Assembly that if you “were to read a certain blog” (the one you’re presently reading, by the way) you’d think layoffs were right around the corner. What a bunch of alarmists—those union folk!  The Interim President continued to emphasize to those gathered that there would be no layoffs. Instead, administrators simply wanted to reorganize the university with the faculty’s helpful feedback and guidance, “from the ground up,” as they say. This was to be a collective “visioning” process, you will recall, done with the assistance of efficiency expert Susan Clemmons–”a fresh set of eyes.” We are now told by the same individual that layoffs are essentially not a matter of “if,” but “when.”

The threat of a substantial reorganization of the University leading to faculty terminations was again expressed in no uncertain terms by Pritchett at the College of Arts and Letters Faculty Assembly on April 23. At that time the faculty from that venerable FTE-generating dynamo—which, given this status, you may also recall , was to be “defended” from such personnel reductions—were told of forthcoming programs where professors would be offered “retirement incentives.” On a less generous note, the President remarked, it would be a priority to allow terminated faculty “more than 30 days notice” to find another job, short-sale their home, pull their children out of school, load up the car and Tom Joad-it out of South Florida. Yes, the unnerving prospect of being wheeled out to the curb is one of many endearing feature of “belonging” to the “FAU family.”

It is probable that such plans for reorganization and additional layoffs have gone forth in stealth form since mid-2009. You may recall that at that time the administration had to back track and regroup after the seriously botched attempt to layoff faculty in the College of Engineering. Not surprisingly, given the University’s considerable resources, administrators miraculously “found” the money to rehire these colleagues and avoid costly extralegal and legal actions. With Pritchett’s probable reappointment as provost it is almost a certainty that this planned reorganization and set of layoffs will be carried out like clockwork by FAU deans. And such a set of events, my dear colleague, may also tell us a great deal about FAU’s new leadership.

If you are an in-unit faculty or staff member I encourage you to review Article 13 of the Collective Bargaining Agreement: Layoffs. This article is by no means perfect. However, it does require that administrators follow certain procedures if layoffs are to take place, the most important of which is the matter of rank and seniority. When administrators and their highly-paid attorneys laid off faculty in Engineering in 2009 they set up bogus “functional units” to get around this element of the CBA. This was obvious even to the casual observer, and may be attempted again, so for the foreseeable future please be especially attuned to any abrupt changes in the organization of your department, unit, and/or college.

The continued planning of any reorganization resulting in layoffs will likely ensue over the summer and be implemented in fall. I encourage you to become a member of UFF-FAU for assistance in the grievance process should that avenue be necessary to protect your position and contest any wrongful termination. Please remember that you need to be a Union member for at least thirty days prior to any incident. If you choose not to go that route and you have reason to believe you may be targeted by the administration for layoff, it may be appropriate in the near future to consult with an attorney who will be able to act swiftly and vigorously on your behalf should such an unfortunate sequence of events come to pass.

In solidarity,

James Tracy
UFF-FAU President

See related posts:

FAU’s Assets Swell to Almost $1 Billion: 2009 Financial Audit Now Available!

FAU Personnel Growth By Employee Category

April 13, 2010. Recently-released AAUP Salary Survey shows FAU languishing behind Florida Institute of Technology and Florida International University among doctoral granting institutions, Tenured female faculty at FAU now have the lowest salaries in the state.

Florida Atlantic University now has an especially noteworthy claim to statewide fame: the lowest overall faculty salaries among the state’s public and private doctoral-granting institutions, and substantially lower salaries for tenured female associate and full professors. According to the recently published American Association of University Professors 2009-10 Faculty Salary Survey, FAU is now beneath Florida Institute of Technology in faculty compensation and even further below regional peer Florida International University. In 2008-09 FIT was in last place among doctoral institutions and FAU was in second-to-last place.

FAU administrators and trustees have refused to offer even modest salary increases in the 2009-12 Collective Bargaining Agreement that is presently being negotiated, almost confirming that FAU will hold the last place spot in the AAUP rankings for the foreseeable future.

According to the AAUP data, a tenured Full Professor at FAU earns over $4,000 less per nine-month contract than her/his peers at FIT, and $19,000 less than those at FIU. Yet comparisons along gender lines illustrate an even greater gap. Full professors who are women at FAU earn $11,000 less than those at FIT, but a staggering $25,000 below their FIU counterparts.

The disparities are a bit less extreme at the Associate Professor level, where FAU faculty earn $2,800 less than those at FIT. Yet on average FAU still pays Associate Professors $7,800 less than FIU. And again, female Associate Professors at FAU are the lowest paid among all of the state’s doctoral institutions, earning on average $8,500 less than faculty who are women at FIT and $4,800 less than FIU’s female faculty.

Only at the Assistant Professor and Instructor levels is FAU marginally competitive with its doctoral-granting peers. New tenure-track faculty at FAU can expect to earn a modest $600.00 more than at FIT. Assistant professors at FIU, however, start out at $10,800 more annually. Female assistant professors at FAU actually make $7,500 more than their counterparts at FIT, but still fall behind FIU by $7,300.

Instructors at FAU can expect to make about $2,800 more annually than at FIT, but $10,000 less than FIU instructors. Female instructors employed at FAU will earn $4,800 more than at FIT, but $9,600 less than if they were working at FIU.

The bottom line is that the longer one stays on faculty at FAU the less she or he will make in comparison to peers working at other SUS and private institutions. This is even more so the case for FAU’s female faculty. The FAU administration and trustees have opposed UFF’s requests for modest salary increases, such as the 2.5% salary increase recommended by the PERC Special Magistrate in April 2009, even though FAU’s assets increased by $76.8 million in 2008-09. In fact, assets have increased along similar lines every year since 2003.

FAU has resources comparable to regional peer FIU, but as the above suggests  over the past several years the institution’s human capital has not been a priority.

See related posts:

Medical School is a Luxury FAU Can’t Afford

FAU’s Assets Swell to Almost $1 billion

April 13, 2010. Over the past several years administrative positions (AMP) have far outpaced most other categories, particularly faculty involved in instruction, FAU data suggest.

Source:  FAU Fact Book, various years. Click here to obtain more detailed information about the disproportionate growth of administrative versus faculty positions at FAU.

April 1, 2010. In June 2009 the University’s assets had increased by $76.8 million over 2008, operating revenue was up 14.6%, and liabilities decreased 1.3%.

FINANCIAL HIGHLIGHTS

The University’s assets totaled $974.3 million at June 30, 2009. This balance reflects a $76.8 million, or 8.6 percent increase from the 2007-08 fiscal year, resulting from invested funds from student collections on hand and amounts due from the State for public education capital outlay (PECO) appropriations. While assets grew, liabilities decreased by $2.4 million, or 1.3 percent, totaling $185.5 million at June 30, 2009, compared to $187.9 million at June 30, 2008.

As a result, the University’s net assets increased by $79.1 million, reaching a year-end balance of $788.8 million. The University’s operating revenues totaled $201.8 million for the 2008-09 fiscal year, representing a 14.6 percent increase over the 2007-08 fiscal year due mainly to a receipt of $8.8 million from the Florida Energy System Consortium. Operating expenses totaled $395.2 million for the 2008-09 fiscal year, representing an increase of 1.7 percent over the 2007-08 fiscal year (P. 3).

Download entire FAU Financial Audit in pdf by clicking here.

See related posts:

University Administrators Nationwide Cry Crocodile Tears Over Budgets

Review of 2007-08 Financial Audits of Florida Atlantic University (pdf)

March 27, 2010. SB 6 passes Senate while House counterpart HB 7189 begins ascent, Assault on Florida Retirement System stems from legislators’ burning desire to balance budget without raising taxes.

(Received March 26, 2010).

Quote of the week:

“Every success in our public schools is credited to some program with a tortured acronym crafted in the halls of Tallahassee…while every failure is laid at the feet of our hard working teachers,” Senator Charlie Justice (D-St. Petersburg) in Floor debate before casting his vote against SB 6.

Week four of the 2010 legislative session

This is how Week Four started out:  “In a galaxy far, far away, a psychopathic emperor and his most trusted servant – a former Jedi Knight known as Darth Vader – are ruling a universe with fear. They have built a horrifying weapon known as the Death Star, a giant battle station capable of annihilating a world in less than a second. When the Death Star’s master plans are captured by the fledgling Rebel Alliance, Vader starts a pursuit of the ship carrying them… the Rebels must quickly find a way to eliminate the Death Star before it is too late!”

Ok, the Star Wars comparison might be a bit over the top… Jeb Bush (the brains behind SB 6) is not a psychopathic emperor and Sen. John Thrasher (RPOF Chair and sponsor of SB 6) is not Darth Vader— and SB 6 and HB 7189 are not the plans for a Death Star.  But we could have sworn FEA President Andy Ford and attorney Ron Meyer were a little like Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi wielding light sabers against a never-ending battalion of Storm Troopers… and FEA and the locals are looking a lot like the Rebel Alliance these days!

Next week will be a short week for the Legislature due to observance of religious holidays.  The Senate and the House will be in session on Wednesday and Thursday to pass the budget bills.  We’ll let you know how that goes in next week’s Frontline.

In this issue:

SB 6 passes Senate – starts House journey as HB 7189

SJR 2 Class Size passes Senate

Retirement bills starting to move

Member lobbyists visiting Tallahassee

SB 6 passes Senate – starts House journey as HB 7189

The venomous SB 6 sponsored by the chair of the Republican Party of Florida, Sen. John Thrasher (R-Jacksonville) went to the floor of the Senate this week for a full Senate vote.  The bill passed by a vote of 21 to 17.

Voting against the bill were Senators:

Aronberg (D-Greenacres), Bullard (D-Miami), Dean (R-Inverness), Dockery (R-Lakeland), Deutch (D-Delray Beach), Gelber (D-Miami Beach), Hill (D-Jacksonville), Jones (R-Seminole), Joyner (D-Tampa), Justice (D-St. Petersburg), Lawson (D-Tallahassee), Ring (D-Margate), Smith (D-Oakland Park), Siplin (D-Orlando), Sobel (D-Hollywood), Villalobos (R-Miami), Wilson (D-Miami) (Sen. Nan Rich was absent this week).

The House version – now filed as HB 7189 — was heard in the House Education PreK-12 committee on Thursday – passing by a vote of 9 to 6.  Republican Rep. Mike Weinstein (Jacksonville) was the lone Republican casting his vote against the bill with the Democrats.   The next stop for this bill has yet to be determined – it could go straight to a full vote of the House or it could be referred to a committee or two, or it could sit in limbo as a negotiating tool for the House to get something in return from the Senate.

SB 6 and HB 7189:

·       Eliminates due process and places all new teachers on annual contracts – these contracts may be non-renewed for any reason or no reason without recourse.

·       Permits non-renewal of a teaching certificate if a teacher cannot demonstrate student learning gains in 4 of the preceding 5 years.

·       Links learning gains —measured by a means yet to be determined and end of course exams that don’t yet exist— to teacher pay and recertification. Performance appraisals will be required to be based upon 50% student learning gains.

·       Prohibits recognition of years of service or advanced degrees in determining teacher salaries.

·       Ensures that the National Board Certified Teacher program will end in Florida by requiring individuals to be NBCT certified by July 1, 2010 and stipulates that bonuses will be paid if funding is available and if they are continuously employed in a public school.

·       Ends college grant and loan forgiveness programs for critical need areas.

·       Will lop off 5% of districts’ state funding to be held for performance pay, but first the funds will be used to develop the tests and processes to determine learning gains.  It amounts to about $900 – 950 million.  In essence, all teachers are paying for the cost of test development and performance awards which may become due under SB 6.

·       Shifts more and more control away from local school districts to the state, removes local decision-making by elected school boards or through collective bargaining on matters which relate to wages, hours, terms and conditions of employment.

·       Carves out any school district receiving $75 million or more in private grants so they are exempt from complying with the provisions of the bill until July 1, 201.6

In previous alerts and Frontlines, we did not adequately thank those who testified against SB 6/HB7189 – they all did a fantastic job! Our thanks to:

·       Ron Meyer for his impassioned testimony against the many ill-conceived premises of SB 6

·       Rich Templin from the Florida AFL-CIO speaking as a parent against the bill

·       Candace Gautney -  a 5th grade Science teacher from Ruediger Elementary School in Tallahassee

·       Melissa Olson – a 5th grade Writing teacher from Ruediger Elementary School

·       Jennifer Barnhill who teachers in Tallahassee at the PACE Alternative Center, Special Education/Emotionally Handicapped

·       Jason Flom from Cornerstone Learning Community

·       UTD President Karen Aronowitz and her many members who were part of UTD’s Target Tallahassee group

·       The many teachers and parents who turned in speaker cards to the committee from all around the state, but we were not able to get all their names

There is no way to adequately describe what they said and the intellectual and emotional impact their words had on that committee and those who sat in the audience!

SJR 2 Class Size passes Senate

The Senate passed SJR 2 – the 2010 legislative scheme to renege on class size reduction.  The House version HJR 7039 could be placed on the House session calendar at any time.   A 3/5 vote of the full body (all 40 members), or 24 votes was required for passage of SJR 2 to place the proposal on the November 2010 ballot. The final vote was 26 to 12; one Democrat voted for the Amendment – Senator Ring (D-Margate) with the Republicans… and one Republican – Sen. Alex Villalobos (R-Miami) voted against the bill with the Democrats.  Note: two Democrats were absent – Rich and Bullard.

Voting against SJR 2 were Senators:

Aronberg (D-Greenacres), Deutch (D-Delray Beach), Gelber (D-Miami Beach), Hill (D-Jacksonville), Joyner (D-Tampa), Justice (D-St. Petersburg), Lawson (D-Tallahassee), Smith (D-Oakland Park), Siplin (D-Orlando), Sobel (D-Hollywood), Villalobos (R-Miami), Wilson (D-Miami) (Sen. Nan Rich was absent this week).

The proposed amendment would keep class-size caps at the school average and then allow schools to add three extra students in the kindergarten to 3rd grade level and five extra students at grades four through 12.

Here’s what the bill could do to our classrooms:

·       In 2002-03 Pre-K-3 averaged 23 students. Now 16 students.  If the amendment passes classes may have 21 students.

·       In 2002-03 Grades 4–8 averaged 24 students. Now 19 students. If the amendment passes classes may have 27 students.

·       In 2002-03 Grades 8-12 averaged 24 students. Now 22 students. If the amendment passes classes may have 30 students.

That moves past the sought-after “flexibility” right on over to “gutting” the class-size provisions voters approved eight years ago.

Retirement bills starting to move

As the 2010 Legislative Session begins to hit its full pace, we’re starting to see only a few of the 29 filed retirement related bills – plus a few more committee bills – pick up traction.  The really bad bill HB 1319 has fallen by the wayside – although we have to be on the lookout for any of its provisions popping up in other bills through the amendment process.

These changes to FRS are prompted by the legislature’s burning desire to find more ways to balance the state budget without raising taxes.  As you well know, to balance the budget over the past 3 years they have been making huge cuts to state funding for education, public safety and human services … the one thing they haven’t touched is – you guessed it – the Florida Retirement System (FRS).  So get ready for another promise to be broken by our elected leaders.  Here’s a quick rundown on one moving through the process:

SB 2022 by Sen. J.D. Alexander (R-Lake Wales) was voted out of the Senate Ways & Means Committee Thursday.  FEA opposes this bill.  The bill changes the FRS from a non-contributory system to a contributory system by requiring each active member of the FRS to contribute 0.25% of gross salary to fund retirement benefits, effective January 1, 2011.

This bill impacts every active member of the FRS, the Senior Management Service Optional Annuity Program, the State University Optional Retirement Program and the Community College Optional Retirement Program.

Senators voting in opposition to the bill were: Gelber, Hill, Justice, Lawson, Lynn, Sobel, Wilson, and Deutch.

This contribution rate applies to both FRS defined benefit plan participants and investment plan participants.  Public testimony in opposition to the bill emphasized the points that the 0.25% contribution rate is merely the camel’s nose under the tent, and the employee contribution will, in effect, be a tax free loan to the state.

After Sen. Evelyn Lynn (R-Daytona Beach) asked the bill sponsor “what does this bill do for teachers?”  Alexander responded: “It requires them to make a 0.25% of gross pay towards their FRS retirement plan which means that if they make $45,000 per year, their annual contribution would total $112; and if they make $75,000 per year, their annual contribution would total $187.50.”

Senator Gaetz (R-Niceville) insisted that this was the only way to raise funds to make FRS actuarially sound.  Senator Alexander replied that he wished they didn’t have to make these tough decisions — but the Legislature has to balance the budget.

Member lobbyists visiting Tallahassee

Big thank you to all our visiting member lobbyists!  It was quite a week! If this was their first time in Tallahassee they certainly got a view of the legislative process they won’t soon forget!  Thanks to: Alachua, Brevard, Miami-Dade, Hillsborough, Lake, Leon, Martin, Orange, Pasco and Pinellas!

Questions? Call FEA Public Policy Advocacy at 850.224.2078

Thanks to all those who contributed to this report: Debi McDaniel, Pat Dix, Kevin Watson, and Ron Meyer.

Thursday, March 18, 2010, 4:05 PM

Legislative leaders are moving rapidly to pass a bill, HB 1319 (Grady), that could cut your Florida Retirement System pension in half. By changing rules about how pensions are calculated, they can cut your average yearly pension from $30,000 to $15,000, for example.  Tell your legislators to vote against HB 1319.
(See pdf of HB 1319 below for details.)

Legislators are also preparing to destroy tenure (continuing contracts) for K-12 teachers when they vote on Senate bill 6. (See link to FEA analysis of SB 6 below.) This bill abolishes continuing contracts for teachers (earned after a probationary period), places them on annual contracts, and makes both reappointment and pay raises contingent on test scores of students.  School boards will actually be punished in funding if they pay teachers more for earning advanced degrees rather than rewarding teachers for test scores of students. Tell your legislators to vote against SB 6.

Over time, the economic effect of SB 6 will be to eliminate graduate programs in education when funding is taken away for advanced degrees, and make it impossible to adequately fund undergraduate education degrees by imposing unfunded mandates (expensive reporting mechanisms) to check on test scores of graduates. In other words, it is an attack on the funding and potential enrollment in public universities and colleges at the same time that it is an attack on teacher tenure and professional achievement. It severely jeopardizes recruitment of both faculty and teachers when legislators strip away professional compensation and restrict the academic freedom of educators by abolishing tenure.

Moreover, if legislators abolish tenure for K-12 now and get away with it without resistance, we can expect higher education will be next — losing tenure and finding ourselves subjected to the latest testing scheme to decide if we have the professional standing to continue. Contact legislators now to stop attacks on the conditions of employment of educators. The loss of professional standards now will make it impossible for us to retain and recruit both teachers and faculty in the future.

Sincerely,

Tom Auxter
President, United Faculty of Florida

February 17, 2010. “Educational reform” measures put forth by Florida’s Council of 100 business leaders and endorsed by GOP power broker Jeb Bush require scrutiny in historical context.

When considering the recent proposals comprising “Closing the Talent Gap,” put forth this month by Florida’s Council of 100,  it is important to keep in mind the dramatic political and structural changes to Florida’s State University System that have occurred over the past ten years. An oft-overlooked or forgotten chapter of Florida higher education’s recent past should be kept at the forefront of our thinking so that we may place the United Faculty of Florida and SUS’s plight in proper perspective. Central to this is  the quasi-privitization of the state’s public universities, termed “devolution,” that took place under Jeb Bush’s governorship and the successful move to destroy the statewide collective bargaining framework existing between the United Faculty of Florida and Florida’s Board of Regents.

Florida is part of the “Old South,” and one of the South’s legacies is a hostility toward independent worker organization that can be traced, without too much imagination, to the antebellum era. In the face of broad unionization throughout the US northeastern, mid-west, and western states during the 1940s and 1950s, American corporations sought to relocate to areas where there was less unionization and the deck was stacked against organizing through anti-labor laws. Like many of their counterparts in the Old Confederacy after passage of the anti-labor Taft-Hartley Act, Florida legislators moved to make it more difficult for workers to form unions through implementation of “right to work,” or “open shop” laws. At institutions where a majority of workers managed to vote union representation into existence, such laws allowed employees to opt out of paying dues even though they were members of the bargaining unit and received the protections and benefits of representation. UFF’s present organizing efforts are rooted in attempts to work within the framework of these very laws designed to undermine worker power and solidarity that a strong union can provide. Our organizing efforts are never-ending.

The UFF membership’s resolve to maintain its capacity as a statewide faculty union was dealt a heavy blow in the early 2000s. The Board of Regents that oversaw the SUS resisted a handful of powerful legislators’ attempts to build law schools at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University and Florida International University, and a medical school at Florida State University. Infuriated at the BOR’s recalcitrance, Governor Bush and an unusual coalition of Republican and Democratic state legislators moved to abolish the BOR and decentralize the SUS. The result was that each institution was placed under the direct oversight of a separate Board of Trustees.

This decentralization of power to BOTs was in close accord with the national Republican Party’s mission to privatize public institutions and run government “like a business.” The move was also an obvious attempt to weaken Florida’s teacher and faculty unions, which have been strong supporters of the Democratic Party. Bush made sure the eleven new BOTs were loaded with pro-business Republican donors, a practice reconfirmed in  BOG Chancellor and Bush associate Frank Brogan’s October 2009 BOT (re)appointments. These trustees, many of whom do not possess a full understanding of public higher education and would just as soon farm out university instruction to unqualified “private contractors” (adjuncts), are indifferent if not hostile toward public employees’ unions and collective bargaining.

The governance changes were used by the new BOTs as a basis to end bargaining that, since the UFF’s establishment in the mid-1970s, took place between UFF and the BOR. The BOTs argued unanimously that they were no longer bound by the statewide agreements. In response, with the aid of our parent organization, the American Federation of Teachers, UFF mobilized and collected thousands of authorization cards from large majorities of faculty to recertify each UFF chapter as a bargaining agent with their respective BOTs. At eight universities faculty support for recertification of UFF was 65% or more and the BOTs at these institutions voluntarily recognized UFF. At FAU 70% of faculty members who were approached signed cards for recertification. University of West Florida and Florida State University held out for elections where UFF went on to win 90% or more of the ballots at each institution. The University of Florida’s BOT refused to recognize UFF until 2005, when an appellate court decided in the Union’s favor (Fiorito and Gallagher, 2006).

The radical move to decentralize was tempered in 2002 when Florida Governor Bob Graham’s voter amendment mandated a Board of Governors to administer SUS affairs. In contrast to the BOR, however, power exercised by the BOG takes a backseat to the BOTs. (The BOG Chancellorship being occupied by Bush’s former Lieutenant Governor is a curious new development that deserves close scrutiny.) In light of the above, the aforementioned package of “educational reform” proposals put forward by Florida’s Council of 100 and vigorously endorsed by Bush must also be looked at with major reservations, particularly by public educators. For example, the moves to strip K-12 teachers of tenure–or to otherwise make tenure meaningless–is a policy already being tested in the SUS. Further, the document’s buzzwords, such as “accountability” and “efficiency,” often translate to jeopardized academic freedom and an increasingly deteriorating educational experience for students.

This history is willfully forgotten by administrators and trustees at FAU and other state universities, many of whom calculated that UFF would be incapable of reviving itself after the SUS’s decentralization. The sentiment is reflected in remarks such as, “UFF ‘represents some faculty at [ABC] University.’” Keeping in mind this recent history, such an assertion should be recognized for what it is: an attempt to mislead those of us who’ve forgotten or are unaware of our institutional and historical positions in the struggle to preserve the profession’s autonomy. Without question faculty at FAU and throughout the SUS desire independent representation before their administrations and Boards of Trustees, even though the legacy of Old Dixie allows them the opportunity not to pay for such representation.

In solidarity,

James Tracy
UFF-FAU President

Fiorito, J. and V.C. Gallagher (2006) ‘Renewal in the United Faculty of Florida: class war in paradise?’ Labor Studies Journal Vol 31,No 3:39-64.

February 1, 2010. FAU Eminent Scholar and UFF take on administrator’s headstrong efforts to disrupt established and productive research program.

Dear Colleagues,

I’m Lester Embree, the William F. Dietrich Eminent Scholar in Philosophy. This is to tell you something about my recent experience with the union.

The summer before last, the new dean in the Schmidt College asked me to volunteer as an example by teaching an extra section in the economic bad time for the university. I agreed on the expectation it would be a third course taught the following Spring and that I would remain free in the Fall to attend conferences overseas, as I had done frequently for 10 years and from which many my recent publications have come.

My chief responsibilities as Eminent Scholar at least used to be extensive research primarily and professional service secondarily. I have always received the highest annual evaluations. My two-course-per-year teaching load was agreed to when I was hired in 1990 and was maintained for 19 years by six deans in a row (the shelf life of deans in my college is short). It is a complicated story, but when the extra course was scheduled for the Fall rather than the Spring, thus disrupting my travel and research program, I protested, ultimately “un-volunteered,” and was then assigned against my will to teach then not one but two additional courses and thus that my traditional teaching load was doubled.

During this time, I was offered to teach a short course in Taiwan for $15,000 and proposed to use that money to fund five (5) adjunct-taught sections in my place, but my offer was declined and I began to suspect that more than I could see was going on, but I have not yet figured out what it is.

Long a member of the union, I turned to it for help. Doug Broadfield, the UFF Contract Enforcement Chair, helped me bring a series of grievances, but to no avail. Then we sought support from the union on the state-wide level for “Binding Arbitration.” Since that involved the investment of substantial money, it was not sure to be agreed to, and I was delighted when we received agreement with the reason that this was no way to use an Eminent Scholar.

Binding arbitration is quite a process. Ultimately the case was lost. All along we knew that our chances were at best 50/50, yet I had the ultimately futile hope that the university would settle rather than embarrass itself by treating a top performer this way.

What I am sharing here are two documents used in the arbitration process: “The Disruption of my Program of Research and Professional Leadership” I wrote to introduce myself to Bruce Nissen, whom I had not yet met and who was coming to lead my union representation. I now confess to have gotten carried away while analyzing my c.v. and coming to see that I had accomplished far more at FAU than I had previously recognized. Please excuse the seeming immodesty, which is not usual for me.

The second document is the “Final-Union-Brief” prepared by Dr. Nissen. Most simply put, it is beautifully intelligent and articulate in arguing my case. I am confident that my academic colleagues will recognize what a fine effort the union made on my behalf. (And one can wonder if the university will find it easier in future to recruit eminent scholars now that it is a matter of public record that it is clearly willing to break repeatedly reaffirmed agreements after practically 20 years of top performance.)

In sum, I’ve done what I was hired to do, but FAU has let me down.

To finish the song line: “I’m sticking by the union because the union stuck by me.”

In solidarity,

LESTER