January 18, 2007

Card-signing drive under way in all 24 colleges

 

The excitement is building in the colleges as part-time workers are signing membership cards to belong to their new association, OPSECAAT.

 

The Organization of Part-time and Sessional Employees of Colleges of Applied Arts and Technology is working to represent all 17,000 (note the new number) part-time faculty and support staff.

 

How can I sign?

 

Cards will be available for part-time and sessional workers to sign in each of the 24 colleges.  A committee in each college has been set up to sign up part-time workers.

 

To find out who to contact in your college to sign a card, please call the mobilizing office hotline at 416 448-7433 or 1-866 811-7274—or by e-mail at collegeworkers@opseu.org .

 

Confidential

 

Every card is confidential. Your employer will NOT know you have signed an OPSECAAT card.

 

Fax, phone, e-mail the government now!

 

It’s not enough to just sign a card. We also have to work to have the Colleges Collective Bargaining Act changed so the colleges have to bargain with part-time workers.

 

Now is the time to lobby the Liberal government to change the law banning part-timers from union activity.

 

There is one easy thing everyone can do. Visit www.collegeworkers.org and click on “Have Your Say.” This section provides detailed instructions you can use to contact the Minister of Colleges, the Minister of Labour and the Premier.

 

Use the texts, or put it in your own words.

 

Jan. 30 — Lobby day

 

On Jan. 30, representatives from OPSEU and OPSECAAT will be at Queen’s Park for a news conference and to meet with provincial MPPs and critics.  We’ll ask them why one group of workers—college part-time workers, is treated differently from all other education workers in the province.

 

Remember, this government will be asking for your vote in 2007.

 

Now more than ever: 17,000 workers

 

It is always hard to determine just how many part-time workers there are in the 24 colleges.

 

Last year, we estimated there were about 16, 000 part-time and sessional workers excluded from the college bargaining units.

 

At last count, there are now 17,000 individuals employed as part-time and sessional workers in the colleges. This far exceeds the 15,000 members in the faculty and support staff (full-time) bargaining units.

 

What does this mean? It means that now more than ever, the colleges are exploiting the part-timers’ status as a source of cheap labour, undermining the bargaining units.

 

It means that the colleges are less concerned about delivering quality education to their students. It means they are even more concerned about cramming as many students as they can into classrooms, and getting work from employees they don’t have to treat fairly.

 

It also means that the strength of this association will be even greater.

 

Toronto storefront opening

 

Everyone is invited to the grand opening of OPSECAAT’s  two Toronto organizing offices.

 

Drop in at the downtown office storefront at 31 Wellesley Street East Jan. 30 between 4:00 pm. and 7:00 pm. OPSEU’s North York mobilizing office at 100 Lesmill (Don Mills area) will officially open Feb. 6. Drop in 4:00 pm. to 7:00 pm.

 

Call for artists for Mayworks festival

 

Are you a professional artist working at a college part-time?  The colleges are filled with creative people who also have active careers in the arts. We want to showcase and celebrate your work at a cabaret during the Mayworks Festival of Working People and the Arts this coming May.

 

Will you give a short reading, perform a short dance piece, play a song, screen an animation, display a photograph, etc.?

 

Participating artists will be paid professional rates. The cabaret will be May 2 (date to be confirmed) in downtown Toronto, part of the 21st annual Mayworks Festival. For information about the festival, go to www.mayworks.ca ; if you want to participate in the OPSECAAT Cabaret, contact Maureen Wall at: mbwall@sympatico.ca  or 416-333-2217.