SJAC Information Report #6

August 7, 2014
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At the end of this bulletin, and posted on our website, you will find UTFA’s revised proposal for modernizing the Memorandum of Agreement (MoA).

The MoA lays out the relationship between UTFA and the Governing Council of the University of Toronto. It specifies how terms and conditions of employment (both monetary and non-monetary) for faculty and librarians are negotiated. The MoA and our proposal to change it deal with matters fundamental to all of us as academics and as employees of the University. Given its importance, we urge you to read this message and the proposal carefully.

The proposal is a significant compromise by UTFA from our previous position that all terms and conditions of employment for faculty and librarians be negotiable, with access to binding arbitration if necessary. The compromise outlines a new and needed approach to addressing matters not now formally negotiable, either because the current MoA ignores these matters altogether, or because it leaves them “parked” as frozen policies. Matters now ignored or frozen include vital non-monetary policies that shape the content of our work as academics, including, for instance, procedures guaranteeing faculty and librarian involvement in academic restructuring initiatives (omitted from the current MoA) and academic freedom and appointments policies (frozen by the current MoA). The compromise proposal involves a non-binding but public and transparent facilitation and independent Fact-Finding process for addressing such matters. We believe it would, if accepted, represent a significant improvement from the status quo.

Read the rest of this report by downloading the PDF below.

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