June 9, 2026 Council Update

Dear Colleagues,

In this Update:

UTFA Executive - 2026-2027

Council unanimously approved the following slate of candidates for Executive positions with a term from July 1, 2026, through June 30, 2028.

Portfolio	Name	Term Expiration
Vice-President, Salary, Benefits, Pensions & Workload (& Past-President)	Terezia Zorić	June 30, 2028
Vice-President, Grievances	Susan Wagner	June 30, 2028
Vice-President, University & External Affairs	Harriet Sonne de Torrens	June 30, 2028
Treasurer	Fabian Parsch	June 30, 2028
Chair, Membership Committee	Thom Dancer	June 30, 2028
Chair, Librarian Committee	Whitney Kemble	June 30, 2028
Chair, Teaching Stream Committee	William Ju	June 30, 2028
Member-at-Large	Kyla Everall	June 30, 2028
Member-at-Large	Arjumand Siddiqi	June 30, 2028

The following Executive members are continuing in their term until June 30, 2027: Max Mishler (Chair, Appointments Committee), Girish Daswani (Chair, Equity Committee), Rena Helms-Park (Chair, Retired Members Committee), Urvashi Chakravarty (Member-at-Large).

Jun Nogami was acclaimed to the position of UTFA President for the term July 1, 2026, to June 30, 2028. A notice of acclamation was sent to the membership on March 15. Congratulations, Jun!

We thank all Executive members for their service in advancing our members’ workplace rights.

Update on Quercus Outage

UTFA communicated with members regarding the Quercus data breach on May 12 and May 29, 2026.

UTFA sought feedback on the outage and received many responses expressing frustration and discontent with the Administration’s handling of the situation. The consistent feedback from members was unclear communication, lack of contingency planning, increased workload and student distress, concerns about impacts on student performance, SETs, PTR and promotion, and fears about compromised personal information and intellectual property.

UTFA is raising these issues with senior Administration, pressing for better planning and meaningful consultation in future incidents, and seeking agreement that any negative student evaluations will not affect members’ entitlement to PTR or promotion.

2026 Arbitration Update

A further update was provided concerning unresolved salary and benefits issues that were submitted to interest arbitration following those of May 22 and May 25, 2026.

UTFA proposed a 4.9% ATB increase to address inflation and maintain top-of-market standing in the U15, whereas the Administration proposed a 1.5% ATB increase. The central dispute between the parties is whether UTFA salaries have fallen behind comparator institutions, with UTFA arguing our members’ salaries lag behind UBC and Queen’s, despite the Administration’s claim that they remain the highest in Canada. Before the arbitration hearing, UTFA discovered that the Administration misclassified Teaching Stream faculty in the University and College Academic Staff System (“UCASS”) salary data, labeling them below assistant professor rank, which contradicted prior agreements and artificially inflated reported average salaries by over $12,000.

Compounding the disrespect to the Teaching Stream, the UCASS salary data does not include all of our members' salaries – it excludes academic librarians' and part-time members’ salaries. UTFA has challenged the Administration’s data and salary arguments in a Sur reply. Arbitrator Parmar is expected to release a decision by the end of June.

Register for Promotion/Continuing Status Review Workshop for Teaching Stream Faculty

The Promotion/Continuing Status Review Workshop for Teaching Stream Faculty was rescheduled for June 19, 2026. Register Now!