March 15, 2006
College presidents
try to “buy time” while they think of a plan
Ontario’s
college presidents don’t have a plan to help 150,000 college students
finish their semester.
In ads
today, the presidents announced details of their “Semester Completion
Strategy.” Except, uh, without any details.
While
promising that all colleges would make sure students get their
semester, the ads say little else. And around the province, college
presidents have very different ideas about what the strategy means.
While
Algonquin president Rick Gillett said Monday that management would
teach classes if necessary, Mohawk president MaryLynn West-Moynes said
it would not happen on her watch.
“That’s
not my intention here,” she told the Hamilton Spectator. “It’s
disrespectful to students that we wouldn't recognize the calibre of
professor required.”
In
Peterborough, Sir Sandford Fleming president Tony Tilly agreed, saying
that having managers instruct and mark was “neither workable, nor
desirable.”
In
London, Fanshawe president Howard Rundle said, “Management people will
be able to help out, but there is also non-striking part-time faculty,
online courses, and options with final exams."
In
Thunder Bay, Confederation president Pat Lang implied that the
Completion Strategy was about planning what happens once the strike
ends. “We’re just
starting to pull those plans together now and for us it’s important to
have those conversations with our faculty once they come back,” Lang
told the Chronicle-Journal.
“Obviously we hope the strike doesn’t go on, but what
we’re really trying to do here is buy time,” Seneca president Rick
Miner, chief spokesperson for the presidents, told the National
Post.
OPSEU bargaining team chair Ted Montgomery doesn’t
think much of the presidents’ “strategy.” He said the quality of
programs at every college would be “seriously compromised” if
management attempts to complete the semester without faculty.
“The only way to a successful semester completion
strategy is for the colleges to return to negotiations with a revised
offer that addresses quality of education issues,” Montgomery said.
For a round-up of news stories about the strike on the
web today,
click here.
All systems go for
Toronto rally
Striking
college faculty and their supporters are all set to rally and march
through downtown Toronto Thursday morning.
At least
1,000 strikers will be coming in on buses from out of town to join
sisters and brothers from Toronto-area colleges.
The rally
starts at 11:00 a.m. at Yonge-Dundas Square. A march to the Ministry
of Training, Colleges and Universities (900 Bay Street, at Wellesley)
begins at 11:45.
The rally and march will
feature lots of fun and live music at both ends. Confirmed speakers
include John Cartwright, head of the Toronto and York Region Labour
Council, OPSEU president Leah Casselman, NDP MPP Peter Kormos, Jesse
Greener from the Canadian Federation of Students, and Ted Montgomery,
chair of the OPSEU faculty bargaining team.
For more
information, including travel arrangements, striking college faculty
members should contact their local strike headquarters. Other friends
and supporters should contact OPSEUdirect at 1-800-268-7376 or (in
Toronto) (416) 443-8888.
Untangling
management spin on college salaries
By Paddy Musson
and Phil Cunnington
The
strike by Ontario college faculty is not about salaries.
When
talks broke off March 6, the two sides were not far apart on wage
costs. Management was offering wage hikes of three per cent a year,
more or less. The union was seeking four per cent a year, more or
less.
When the
strike ends, salaries will rise by three or four per cent a year, more
or less.
The real
sticking point in these talks is quality. The union wants smaller
classes, more faculty, and more faculty time for each student. It’s
what the Rae Commission recommended. It’s what Premier McGuinty
insisted on when he promised $6.2 billion in new money for
post-secondary education.
Nonetheless, college management can only talk about one thing. The
colleges say, ad nauseam, that their offer will bring salaries
to $94,277 by 2009.
They keep
repeating this number to make it look like the strikers are rich and
unreasonable. If only!
Right
now, the starting salary for a college instructor is $32,077 a year
(Yes, you read that right). Getting from the bottom to the top rate of
$54,459 takes 10 years.
The
starting salary for professors, counselors, and librarians is $44,285
a year. (Yes, you read that right). Getting from the bottom to the top
rate takes 18 years.
The top
step on the salary grid for professors pays $82,299. However, just 27
per cent of faculty are actually at this level. Most teachers,
counsellors, and librarians are nowhere near it.
College
management uses the $94,277 number to imply that hiring new faculty
costs too much. In fact, new faculty start at or near the bottom of
the grid. Sadly, college hiring practices over the last decade mean
only about 14 per cent of faculty are in the bottom half of the pay
grid. As senior faculty retire, a steady influx of new hires would
actually bring average salary costs down.
A
realistic estimate of the cost of a new hire is $70,000 a year,
including benefits. For $70,000, students and taxpayers get the
services of a well-schooled professional who can help turn Ontario’s
young people into skilled, effective participants in today’s knowledge
economy. It’s good value for money.
Besides
trashing the strikers, management’s fixation on full-time salaries
serves another purpose: to hide their exploitation of part-time
faculty.
About
2,000 of the 9,100 striking faculty members are “partial-load”
faculty, teaching seven to 12 hours a week. They are paid by the hour,
and only for the hours they teach. They don’t get paid for course
preparation. They don’t get paid for course evaluation. They don’t get
paid to talk to students outside of class.
Partial-load faculty are far from well off. A typical partial load
professor with 10 years service, teaching nine hours a week, 32 weeks
a year, would earn just over $23,000 annually.
“Part-time” faculty are even worse off. About 6,000 part-timers are
teaching one or two courses at our colleges.
Part-timers are not on strike. Because of an inexplicable oddity of
Ontario law, they can’t unionize. As a result, their pay rates are
unregulated and vary widely. Many students are surprised to learn that
the prof who prepares their course, answers their e-mails, meets them
after class, gives feedback on assignments, and decides their mark is
earning the princely sum of $120 a week – for a credit course on their
transcript.
Another
800 or so “sessional” professors are also paid by the hour, for
in-class time only. They may actually teach full-time, but sessionals
are barred from unionizing, too. They’re underpaid and overworked as a
result.
The
demand by faculty that college management hire more faculty can only
help part-timers and students. A full-timer with reasonable
class sizes who is paid for all of the 44 hours a week he or she works
has more time for preparation, evaluation, and student feedback. That
means a better learning experience, and a better education, for each
and every college student.
Which, by
the way, is what the strike is really about.
Paddy Musson
(OPSEU Local 110, Fanshawe College) and Phil Cunnington (Local 558,
Centennial) are co-coordinators of the OPSEU provincial strike
committee for college faculty.
Click here to
download a printer-friendly version of this article .pdf.
Harvie Johnstone (ret.), a veteran of the
1984 faculty strike, on the picket line at Georgian.
