Tell your story
Ontario’s community colleges have devised a wide variety of
ways to make life hard for part-time employees. Starting today, the web
site at www.collegeworkers.org will keep a running log of part-timers’
stories. Send us your name, college, and contact information, and we’ll
post your story – anonymously – on the web.
It
doesn’t have to be long – it can be one sentence if you like. Just tell
other part-timers what has happened to you.
It
doesn’t even have to be a “story.” Just tell us how you feel.
Send
your story to collegeworkers@opseu.org
or call our hotline at
1-866-811-7274 or (416) 448-7433.
The
stories below are just a sample of the stories collected at meetings
across the province. Let’s hear yours!
-
I was reading the reference to
"disposable staff" with the Colleges and thought I would share my
experience with you from when I was a student as well as part-time
staff at one of the colleges in Ontario.
I was hired to work part-time at the college while I was a student
in the two-year Secretarial Science course. A short time into the
course I was hired to work part-time for the Information Services
Department. This was over 25 years ago and it's sad to see that
their treatment of part-time workers hasn't evolved in all that
time. I was even pulled out of class when needed since I had been
trained on specialized type-setting equipment. At that time we did
all of the course calendars and pamphlets, President's speeches,
press releases, etc. Once I graduated I could never get on staff
full-time so I quit my job at the college and went to work at a
credit union, again only part-time but I had high hopes to get on
full-time. My supervisor from the college came to the credit union
and begged me to come back to work, and as naive as I was I did.
thinking that this time, since they obviously appreciated how much
of an asset I was (not), that it would result in full-time
employment eventually. At least that was what I was led to believe.
Once again, it did not. So, I again left. Time has moved on
obviously but their tunnel vision on how they should treat their
part-time workers has not. It's a sad situation that I can relate to
and my heart goes out to those in this situation. It is very
stressful.
-
I teach part time at a Toronto
college. This past summer, I was offered a full-time job
elsewhere. I talked it over with my boss at the college, and he
promised to give me enough work to make it worth my while to stay at
the college. We even had a detailed discussion about what amount of
work I would require in order not to leave. We worked out a schedule
for the summer term that had me earning close to what I would have
in the full-time job (although still without benefits).
Based on this, I turned down the
full-time work. (You can probably see where this is going.)
My boss called me the night before the first 8:00 a.m. class to tell
me that the course had been cancelled due to low enrollment. It
turned out he had known that the class would be cancelled at least
one week before he contacted me, but he waited until the last minute
– even until after I had done the prep work for the first week – to
tell me. He called back the next day to say that the rest of my
classes had been cancelled as well.
After making a deal with me to
turn down other work, he went back on his word and gave me no work
at all for this semester. I still don’t know whether this was just
the usual terrible treatment, or whether it was done on purpose to
punish me for considering other work!
-
I returned to Canada five years
ago after more than 20 years abroad. I thought I was lucky
finding a job right away at a community college. I didn’t know,
until more than half way through the year, that my job was only
temporary and that there was no one to turn to for information or
support except other what are euphemistically called “part-timers.”
I have been an English as a Second
Language teacher for 25 years. I love my work and I have no desire
to do anything else.
My situation is complicated by the
fact that we have a diabetic teenager. Diabetes supplies (insulin,
needles and test strips) cost over $200 a month. As a college
part-timer, I receive no benefits and no sick leave or vacation days
– not to mention the ridiculous rule that part-timers can only work
for 10 1/2 months out of 22. This puts a tremendous strain on the
family finances. I never know if and when I will be working or how
many hours I will receive.
My husband is an independent small
businessman. Sometimes he has enough work to support the family, but
sometimes he does not. You can imagine the difficulties. In fact at
the beginning of July, we were hard pressed to put food on the table
because neither of us had money.
Politicians like to tell us that
Canada is lucky that there are so many immigrants. The English
teacher is often the first Canadian to spend time with the
immigrants. Our job is important , we are told by those wanting to
be re-elected. Well, if my job is so important, why can’t I keep it?
Why do I have to prostitute myself begging for employment every few
months, wondering why I can’t get extra health care, lose money for
every civic holiday and every time I am not at work? I feel I am
entitled to be treated with respect and dignity, but with no respect
from the college, where is my dignity if I have to look for work so
often?
This is why I want to get involved
in this movement- so that I and my colleagues can have decent
working conditions just like the full-time workers in the colleges
across Ontario.
-
Some of us work part time by
choice - to care for small children, very sick children, very sick
spouses, ill parents, etc. To have been full time and making a
certain wage and then go part time and be earning 50 per cent less
for the exact same work is so unfair and demeaning. Often you are at
a low point anyhow, surrounded by very tough circumstances but still
trying to be a valuable worker and put bread on the table and keep
up your skills. Why can’t the government get this?
-
I feel lucky. I was able to
get a full-time faculty position at my college, but it took a bit of
a showdown. I started teaching part-time and sessional in 1999 to
supplement my income as an IT contractor and also because I liked
teaching. The teaching income was not enough to support myself so I
continued my contract work. The dual responsibilities to both
students and clients were difficult to juggle — it’s awkward to tell
a client, “I’m sorry your web server crashed – I’ll look at it after
my class which starts in twenty minutes.” Eventually I decided that
I would prefer full-time teaching, but there were never any
positions available. After a couple of years of asking, I finally
presented my manager with an ultimatum: I accept a full time offer
from a company in Toronto unless a full-time position opens up that
I’m qualified for. My manager offered me a deal: Stick it out one
more school year, and a position will open. He kept his promise and
I was hired the next year.
Now from my position as a
full-timer, I see that I am one of the few for whom that showdown
worked. We constantly lose talented and knowledgeable teachers who
accept full-time work elsewhere. There is a clear impact on
students: a constant stream of inexperienced teachers. They know
their subject material, but it takes experience to become an
effective teacher. As a result, there no continuity with subject
material, and an additional load on full-time faculty to support
part-timers with learning materials and coaching. There is also a
lot of complementary work that doesn’t get done because it would
have to be done by part-timers on a volunteer basis.
-
Please remove my e-mail address
from your lists. I will no longer work part-time for any college
because I’m tired of working for significantly less than minimum
wage. The courses I taught were primarily in the computer field.
Since this is a dynamic field, much time and effort is required to
keep up with the technological advances. The college does not pay
for this and I WON’T DO IT FOR FREE ANYMORE.
-
I’m
so glad you are asking for, and publishing, our part-timer stories.
I have taught at an Ontario college for four years (in addition to
teaching for a public school board and working as a restaurant server to
supplement my wages while still accommodating the college’s schedule). I
have a B.A., a B.Ed., and an M.A., and all my end-of-term course evaluations
have been excellent. I routinely get rave reviews and sincere thank-yous
from my students, because like so many others I am a committed,
enthusiastic, damned good teacher whose professional pride will not let
her limit her working hours to her paid hours. You could apply most of
the stories I’ve already read on your web site to my experience. If I
told you one or two incidents in my college part-time experience, I
would only be revealing the tip of the iceberg, so instead of sharing my
many horror stories, I will tell you how I feel.
I feel alienated. I feel professionally isolated. I feel repeatedly
taken advantage of. I feel powerless. I feel very sorry for the students
who really are cheated by the colleges’ hiring practices. I feel
extremely angry. I feel cynical. I am ready to leave the teaching
profession, despite my conviction (shared by my friends, family, and
colleagues) that I am meant to be a teacher.
Compare these feelings to how I felt when I graduated from my teaching
degree: proud, optimistic, motivated, committed to my students and
colleagues, a potential part of a team with a great deal to contribute
to my society. I was ready to lend my considerable talent and brains to
make a difference in this world.
The current system is not the only reason I have changed, but it is
certainly a major reason. Good work, Ontario Ministry of Training,
Colleges and Universities – you’ve really transformed my future, and the
futures of all my potential students who will now never know me,
since I am leaving.
-
I
am a part time support staff person,
and I’d worked at the college for 14 months. Last year I requested some
unpaid time off, which was approved. When I came back to work, I was
told that there wasn’t a job for me to come back to. The work didn’t
disappear. It “morphed” into another job which they hired someone else
for while I was away. I asked my supervisor whether I’d done something
wrong and was assured that my work was above standard. I asked if it was
a budget issue, and was told it was not. In fact the person hired was
being paid more than me. They couldn’t give me a reason!
-
I’m a part time faculty member. I got
a call from one college on Sept. 3 for a class starting on Sept. 4. I
was asked: “Do you have a degree? How comfortable are you talking in
front of people? OK? Good, you are hired.”
-
We are always given the sense that we are
begging for work. At the end of November, I have to ask: “What about
teaching in January?” And then we’re not called until the last minute.
One time I was woken up at seven a.m. on the first day of classes and
was told “Come in quick! We need you!”
-
I had an idea for a new course and
was told, “Go ahead. We don’t know if we will be able to pay you, but go
ahead. It’s a great idea.”
-
I’ve been teaching part time for 18
years and am getting about half of what others get paid. I cannot do
it any longer.
-
I’ve been teaching for three years at
one college. At times I’ve been called one week before the course starts
and told what I’m teaching. Now I’m a sessional at another college and I
teach 15 hours a week. I share a computer and there is no desk for me.
-
I’m a Library Technician and have
worked at the college for almost four years. I started at 24 hours and
after two years they reduced my hours to 12, but they kept changing
them. First they had me on a yearly contract, then they started renewing
it every semester. Now they renew my contract every two months.
-
I’ve applied for several full time
positions and, on one particular occasion, after they had given the
position to the manager’s son, I was told: “Oh, I didn’t know you wanted
full time work!”
-
We are told that we can come to
department functions - staff picnics and so on, but that we won’t be
paid to be there. For the annual Christmas dinner, we have to pay if we
want to go. Everyone else gets it free.
-
I find it unbelievable the way courses
are assigned. I started with a five hour contract in September, then
was asked to fill in and teach another three hours, so now I’m partial
load. Now I’m back to begging for hours again. Two managers both said
there is nothing available for January, yet there are two courses
scheduled with no teachers assigned. I saw an ad in the local paper for
these courses, and yet I am available.
-
I waited 40 minutes after I found out
that my father had died, so that I could inform my class, I did that
because my supervisor asked me to, and because I was concerned I might
lose my job.
-
I taught part time for 15 years and
did more than 450 hours more than I was being paid for, when you take
into consideration preparation, marking and follow up. I had no rights
and no guarantees that I would be rehired for the next semester.
-
I teach ESL and am being paid $20 an
hour less than I make for the same job at a university. The college
offered me classes at two campuses, but by the time I paid for gas and
parking, and considering travel time, it was almost not worth it. I find
that insulting.
-
I was asked to teach two courses, but
they found out they had enough students to add one more class. Instead
of hiring me, they hired someone else with fewer qualifications, so they
would not have to pay me at the partial load salary.
-
The part-time support staff at our
college get laid off from mid-December until early January, while
full-timers get paid for the entire break. We also get laid off for the
summer months, especially in the library.
-
If a part-time instructor is sick, he
or she doesn’t get paid. But when the college calls to say a class is
cancelled, there is no compensation for all the preparation work that
has been done for that class either. Once I was called an hour before my
6:30 to 9:30 class regarding the cancellation of that class. I wasn’t
paid for either the prep work or the teaching,
-
I was handed the course outline and
the text for a class one day before the class was to begin. The college
exploits the loyalty, responsibility and commitment that part-timers
feel, and yet there is no reciprocity when it comes to hiring for full
time positions.
-
When we bail out the college by
taking a course at the last minute, they are very happy, but when it
comes time for the next semester, they treat us like lepers.
-
We can never relax. We feel that any
time the manager can say: “Pack your bags, you’re gone!”
-
I never know what days I’m going to be
working, and it is stressful not knowing!
•
I have been teaching at the college part time for two years now, and
also for a board of education. I am unionized at one place but not at the
college where I put in more working hours.
I am not paid for committee meetings, workshops, activities, etc.
Sometimes, I find it a pity since I do not participate and I miss the
opportunities of building relationships with my colleagues and my
students.
One semester, apparently, someone made a mistake. I was hired as a temp
and I enjoyed a full salary and working conditions in line with my skills.
Since then I was told that it was impossible to repeat because classes I
taught have already been given to others. Was that a good strategy to keep
me?
I must work the hours I miss on public holidays, sick days and so on.
Why do I tolerate such nuisances? Because I like to teach and want to have
a full-time position one day. It may never happen. It is not a lack of
classes to teach. The problem is the system presently in place which
deprives students of good teachers. It is really discouraging.
•
I’ve been a teacher at the college for 14 years and have applied for
several full-time teaching positions. Each time I have been turned down,
someone on the hiring committee invariably calls me a couple of days later
to find out if I can teach a course the following week because she’s
desperate for an instructor. So, apparently, though I’m qualified to
teach, I’m not qualified to be full-time. That makes no sense. (Of course,
if I declined, I know I’d never get another teaching job at the college
again.) This creates an atmposphere of resentment, and ultimately the
students are the ones who suffer.
•
I spent 3 years working in Human Resources for a large organization in
B.C., where one of my duties was to post job positions for at least five
different union affiliates. Full-time and part-time staff were paid
equally, and even though the benefits differed, part-time staff were still
eligible. Now, I am part-time support staff at an Ontario college, and I
cannot grasp any reasoning why full-time staff are compensated more than
part time staff. Have Ontario’s colleges taken a step back, when the rest
of the country have advanced two steps? Read the headlines: “We do not
value our part-time workers as we do their full-time colleagues, but we
fully expect them to work as hard and diligently for less pay with no or
little benefits!” How do they expect to retain or attract experienced
staff? How do they expect to keep morale high? Where is the incentive?
Where is the justice?
•
After 20 years of part-time teaching, with a few sessionals thrown
in, I have lots of stories to tell but will share only a few right now.
After teaching a course for several years, I realized that the existing
course manual was outdated and contained misinformation. I spent over 20
hours putting together a detailed proposal for a new manual. The proposal
was approved by the department co-ordinator, with the condition that the
new manual would be completed and I would be compensated during the Fall
term. This agreement was in keeping with department budget and would still
have the manual ready for the Winter term. In September, the department
co-ordinator pulled me aside at a meeting to tell me that I would no
longer be teaching the Winter course and therefore did not want me to
rewrite the manual. I received no compensation for work that had already
been done. After teaching a wide variety of courses over 16 years and
having written several other manuals, I now refuse to teach any lecture
courses that involve unpaid preparation.
Over 5 years ago there was a full time position posted for the department
in which I had already been teaching part time for 15 years. I met with
the co-ordinator and department chair to discuss the position. The posting
was for a teaching instructor. I was told that an instructor was not
involved in course development, did not make decisions on curriculum and
basically taught what ever was put in front of them. At that time I had
been writing manuals and developing course curriculum as a part time
instructor and was not interested in this particular position. I was also
told that there was little chance that this posted instructor position
would lead to a professorship because it was a completely different level
position. Within less than a year, the department chair unilaterally
decided that the newly-hired instructor (who does not have a university
degree) would all of a sudden become a professor. I approached the
department chair to challenge this unilateral decision to be told that he
had the power to make these decisions whenever he felt.
It
seems to me that each department keeps the salaries of its part time staff
a secret. When I started teaching at the College 20 years ago I was paid
$70 per hour (partial load). After five years was told that the COLLEGE
POLICY was to no longer hire partial load staff so I had to stay within
the six-hour limit to be considered part time. The salary for this
position is $30 per hour. What are other part-time people paid?
•
I am an alumna of the college and have been a part-time employee
with a non-post-secondary program for close to a year. Upon gaining
employment with the college, I was just happy to get a job.
I have a great coordinator who told me not to get too excited over the
wage. I did not quite get it until the end of August when my contract was
completed and I did the math.
Because I walked in and was handed course outlines and nothing else, I
spent an average of 25 hours per week prepping for the two courses I
taught all summer. On top of the prep, I also dedicated plenty of free
time to the students for tutoring and extra help. I still offer the same
extra help now because in the end it is the students who suffer. I recall
having teachers who were in the same position as I am in now and they were
never available for help. My grades suffered in those courses and that is
not something I want my students to face. To supplement my income I have
attempted to find work at the college in a support staff position.
Although I come with high recommendations, I do not get a call for an
interview, even when I apply for positions posted with the faculty I work
in. Amazing, isn’t it? A Dean’s List graduate who is a part time faculty
member cannot even get an interview for a position, for which she
qualifies, at the same college from which she graduated. I feel as though
I have been labelled an outcast.
•
I have been a part-time instructor in Civil Technology for seven years
teaching six hours a week.
The worst thing that has happened to me of all is the lack of
consideration in letting me know that the program software had changed. I
instruct a highway design program of which they changed the program not
once but twice. I had no idea the change has happened. The preparation for
course notes, approximately 60-70 pages, are technically wasted
(unusable). I had to learn the highway design program on the fly with the
students, which is not fair for me or the students. The students deserve
better.
The college has currently gone to paperless paystubs and I found out Feb.
14, 2006, thinking that someone was taking my paystubs because the college
negelected to tell me this. No respect.
•
“It was there that the... lawyers proved that the demands lacked all
validity for the simple reason that the banana company did not have, never
had had, and never would have any workers in its service because they were
all hired on a temporary and occasional basis.”
- from One Hundred Years of Solitude by Nobel Prize winner Gabriel
Garcia Marquez
The
colleges like to talk about “empowering” everyone, but have treated
contract workers like migrant workers for decades.... Faculty who have
done great jobs for five years or more (in this time they have applied for
the own jobs 15 times – the colleges contrive to collapse jobs for two or
three weeks between semesters to avoid paying for holidays) almost NEVER
are hired for full-time jobs. I believe that the HR departments of all
colleges have a POLICY that contract faculty are by default not considered
for full-time jobs....
There are almost no academics in any managerial position above
coordinator. The management model is an ersatz, failed 1980s-style Enron
model in which “directors” strut through an EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION as if
it were their corporate fiefdom.
HR at the Colleges has contrived that contract faculty continuously apply
for their own jobs. There is just enough time between these jobs – with no
pay – that EI is impossible if the job is lost....
Over several decades, HR and upper management have contrived that at least
half of the work needed is done for free. In most departments, the
students being “empowered” will have far more secure jobs and be paid more
than the faculty teaching them! This is what I call “empowerment”. When
the actual time needed to present a course is used, most contract faculty
are working for about $20 per hour. Continuous Learning faculty “prep
rooms” have about 50 banker’s boxes on shelves in a 15-square-metre room;
this is the “office” for this faculty. Management likes to say of this
faculty that they do it for “love of teaching....”
Ontario has let this issue –which is a human rights issue –evolve over a
long time, incrementally, to the point where it is ruining the quality of
education in colleges. Contract faculty I know used to say that the “car
wash model” was that used by HR at the colleges. I have looked into this,
and now think that, with tips, the car wash attendants hired off the
street make about the same $ and are not subjected to continuous insult
and disrespect.
Regards,
A
banana company worker
Got something to say about the way your
college treats you?
Send
your story to collegeworkers@opseu.org or call our hotline at 1-866-811-7274 or (416)
448-7433.
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