Report on Informational Meeting Held 2/28/2013

The main purpose of today’s blog post is to report on our informational meeting held for faculty on 2/28.

Let me start by saying that the weather, both the fact that the meeting had to be postponed and the fact that the weather the day of the meeting was a bit poor, tended to reduce attendance at the meeting.  That is unfortunate but not in our control.  The attendance at the meeting was about 25 people, including NEA staff and faculty members who were presenting at the meeting.  That made for a small group but we had quite a good presentation and a spirited question and answer period at the end of the presentation.  The powerpoint slides are linked for interested faculty to examine in the links at the right.

In addition to the Q&A, the presentation included four main areas:

·        Background of the MSU Faculty Association

o   The discussion here focused on the history over the past several years leading up to the MSU Faculty Association, including the report to the Faculty Senate in Fall of 2010 referenced in the links to the right.

o   The bottom line of the report was a unanimous recommendation from the Ad Hoc Committee investigating unionizing that the advantages of unionizing outweighed the disadvantages.

·        Statistics from the Listening Campaign: What did Faculty actually say?

o   One-on-one visits with individual faculty by union members (faculty) asking both: (1) what are your concerns in your job and (2) What is your opinion of MSU faculty joining together to negotiate a binding collective bargaining contract with MSU?

o   Approximately 20% of all full-time faculty at MSU have been visited to date.

o   Top Concerns included: (1) Faculty shared governance (70% of interviewed with that concern), (2) Increase salaries (66%), Better University Administration (56%).  The full list is available in the presentation.

o   With respect to the question about MSU faculty joining together the results showed 76% of respondents with a positive opinion, 6% with a negative opinion, and 22% who did not know enough.  Note: Some faculty answered both positive/negative and “don’t know enough”, so the totals do not add to 100%.

·        What are the Benefits of Unionization and Collective Bargaining?

o   The main benefit is an enforceable contract that cannot be unilaterally changed by the either party.  Note: the Faculty Handbook is not an enforceable contract but could become so via collective bargaining.  See the Faculty Senate Report on Unionization for more discussion.

o   Other benefits include: Due process, fairness, mutual accountability, contracts tailored to our campus.

o   Collective Bargaining in Missouri legally requires good faith bargaining by both parties.

o   Common Elements of Faculty Collective Bargaining Agreements

·        Employee rights, salary and benefits, tenure and promotion, workload, academic freedom, grievance procedures, intellectual property, sabbaticals, merit pay.

·        Next Steps – What is the MSU FA going to do going forward?

o   Continue Listening campaign

o   Build membership and support

o   How can you get involved?

·        Participate in the listening campaign – contact an MSU Faculty Association member/officer to have a visit from a member. 

·        You can also help by talking to your colleagues.  We are interested in having small meetings with faculty from different departments/colleges as well.

·        Join MSU Faculty Association (there is a Spring special.  Join now and pay no dues until September.)

·        Serve on MSU FA committees.

·       Become an MSU FA leader.

Information from the Question and Answer Session

The following includes a selection of some of the questions and answers from the Q&A session but does not include all of the discussion.

Q:        How were the 20% of the faculty selected for the listening campaign?

A:         During and immediately after the report to the Faculty Senate in the Fall of 2010, members of the Ad Hoc Unionizing FS Committee received emails from interested faculty members.  These faculty formed the basis of the original contact list.  Thereafter, the list was expanded, mostly randomly, to include all colleges/departments.  The goal is to eventually talk to as many faculty as possible.

Q:        What steps are necessary for the union to gain recognition from the university? How many members are needed?

A:         No specific number of members in the MSU Faculty Association is required although membership is necessary for a successful organizing campaign.  One of the purposes of the listening campaign is to determine interest and support for the faculty.  As you can see, to date we have very positive results.  If a third to half of all faculty indicate support then we can move to a card campaign. 

Q:        What is a card campaign?

A:         A card campaign is where faculty are asked to sign a card.  A signature would indicate that the faculty member wishes for the MSU Faculty Association to be their exclusive representatives for collective bargaining.  Faculty signatures from the card campaign must be certified by a neutral third party (e.g., League of Women Voters) but are anonymous to the MSU administration.

Q:        What happens after a successful card campaign?

A:         For private employee unions in Missouri, a state agency would oversee an election of all faculty for the union to represent employees.  For public employee unions in Missouri no specific procedure is in place to secure the union the right to exclusively represent faculty at MSU.  Recent court cases suggest that the card campaign itself might be enough to secure the right to exclusive representation although an election may also be necessary.

Q:        Even if faculty vote for Collective Bargaining, why would an employer (MSU in particular) be obligated to bargain with the union?

A:         A 2007 Missouri Supreme Court ruling gave public employees the right to collective bargaining based upon the state constitution.  A series of Missouri Supreme Court cases since 2007 have found both that public employers must have a process in place to recognize unions and must also bargain in good faith.  FYI, if employers refuse to have a process (an election) in place to recognize a union, then the MO Supreme Court has found that a card campaign will be substituted for that process.  Note: Bargaining in “good faith” is commonly interpreted by the courts as parties being willing to make progress towards a contract.

Q:        Who is eligible to sign a card and/or vote in an election for exclusive representation?

A:         All full-time faculty at MSU Springfield.  Other groups, such as per course faculty and graduate students normally will organize separately.  Often times the impetus for organizing on a college campus comes from one of these groups rather than the full-time faculty.

Q:        Administrations come and go and there is good reason to have agreements like CB for consistency.  But there are state legislative issues that add a lot to our problems. How do we organize without upsetting the state legislature and thereby making it even worse for us?

A:         The NEA has effective national and state lobbyists to help with such issues, including funding higher education.  For example, the Missouri NEA helped the MSU Faculty Association to lobby Governor Nixon on MSU board appointments, including submitting names of potential Board members and for a general philosophy that would result in board members that had more positive attitudes toward faculty.  A refusal by the legislature to act on some issues, however, may sometimes be positive (e.g., as discussed above, successful card campaigns may actually substitute for an election for exclusive representation.)

Q:        A fairly long and detailed question asking generally about whether the national NEA will over-ride the local chapter (MSU faculty) on issues.  The basis for the question was an understanding that MSU faculty would tend to have a better grasp of a large number of issues than the state or national NEA.  How does the NEA interact with the faculty locally and how will we be allowed to decide such issues locally?

A:         The contract that is negotiated as part of the collective bargaining process is between the local faculty represented by the MSU Faculty Association and the university.  The NEA is not directly involved in this bargaining, although they do provide support including training, advice on bargaining and access to a national database of higher education contracts at other universities. Second, a Collective Bargaining Agreement does not cover everything.  For example, issues regarding curriculum are rarely part of a collective bargaining agreement.  Faculty control the MSU Faculty Association negotiating team and what the union wants to go into the CB agreement.  Finally, the final enforceable contract must be ratified by the faculty.

Q:        Public employee unions in Missouri cannot strike, so where would the bargaining strength of a MSU union come from even if the faculty did support unionization?

A:         Most importantly, the strength of the union comes primarily from the collective action of the faculty.  MSU faculty collectively have an enormous amount of power at MSU both because faculty have tenure and because they are the primary providers of MSU’s product, education of students.  Also important is that the collective bargaining process helps the faculty through the MSU Faculty Association to build a productive relationship with the administration, which also gets things that it wants in the CB agreement.

Q:        Is Missouri now/in the future a right to work state?  The implication of the question was how Missouri being or becoming a right to work state would affect collective bargaining in the state.

A:         The answer started out with what it means to be a “right to work” state.  In a right to work state non-union members cannot be forced via a collective bargaining agreement to pay either union dues or a portion of “union dues”, usually referred to as a “fair-share” to help defray negotiation and enforcement costs.

No, Missouri is not a right to work state.  There have been past attempts for to pass right to work legislation in Missouri, which have always failed.  There is no legislative action currently ongoing to become a right to work state.  Although this does mean that collective bargaining contracts in Missouri may have “fair share” clauses (see above) in contracts the NEA does not include such clauses in their contracts.  Hence, non-union faculty at MSU would pay no dues or any “fair share” portion of dues.