1. Thank you for making UTFA’s AGM last Thursday such an enormous success! We had more than 250 people in attendance over the course of the event. Attendees made it clear that they wanted to delve further into the featured panel topic, Creating the University We Want During and After the Pandemic, and to hear more about Salary, Benefits, and Workload Negotiations with the Administration as they unfold. UTFA is planning to host related events throughout the academic year.
2. I’m pleased to announce that the revised Part-time Policy negotiated between UTFA and the Administration was passed by Governing Council on October 29th. Some highlights of the new policy include:
- Effective October 29th, the titles of part-time Teaching Stream faculty with the title of ‘Lecturer’ have changed to ‘Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream’ and the titles of part-time Teaching Stream faculty with the title of ‘Senior Lecturer’ have changed to ‘Associate Professor, Teaching Stream’. Titles for part-time faculty with tenure stream titles (Assistant/Associate/Professor) will remain unchanged.
- Other aspects of the new policy will become effective January 1, 2021.
- Part-time faculty who reach six years of successive employment and pass a review will receive a continuing appointment.
- Transitional provisions have been negotiated for part-time faculty with five or more years of employment in the same unit, including prior CLTA (i.e. full-time) employment, normally without a break in service or more than one year.
- Improved severance pay for part-time faculty with continuing employment who are terminated without cause.
- Part-time faculty will be eligible for appointment to SGS or to act as Principal Investigator under the same terms as full-time faculty, and to apply for grants provided they are otherwise eligible.
Please see our website for more information and a link to the policy.
3. A reminder of UTFA’s upcoming lecture by Professor Matthew Shenoda titled The Stakes of “Diversity” in Higher Education Today, taking place via Zoom on Thursday, November 5, 2020 at 4 p.m.
In this webinar, Professor Shenoda, Associate Provost for Social Equity & Inclusion at Rhode Island School of Design, critiques the traditional ways “diversity, equity, and inclusion” have been instrumentalized on university campuses and speaks to the ways in which we must centralize academic, intellectual, and curricular engagement in order to transform campus spaces as they relate to issues of anti-Blackness and race.
Register here, or for more information go to our website.
Thank you for your ongoing support.