Greetings, my excellent colleagues,This new academic year at the University of Oregon brings a bit more change than usual, such as a new athletic league, a new Provost, new programs beginning in UO Portland, and a record number of new faculty.We’ve also seen changes to the Executive Council of United Academics:Kate Mills (Psychology) is our new Executive Vice President. Kate’s enthusiasm and can-do attitude will be key for her work on the Contract Action Team to coordinate and ratchet up all of our individual efforts during these final months of negotiations on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement.Ed Wolf (Music) is…

My Experience at the 2024 Democratic National Convention Last month, I had the privilege of attending the 2024 Democratic National Convention in Chicago as a delegate for Oregon. I was pleased to see the strong union representation throughout the event, indicating that labor was welcomed and respected at the Convention. In addition to the excitement of the main events and speeches, I valued the chance to connect with fellow rank-and-file unionists-making new friends, sharing stories, and reaffirming our solidarity in the fight for working families. I also had the opportunity to meet with leaders in the labor movement, including AFT…

Every regular term of the academic year the University of Oregon publishes a course resource page, which includes some ready-made materials to launch courses. Part of this is a “starter syllabus” which has a general outline plus a lot of sample language folks can use when preparing a syllabus. Fall Term resource webpage Starter syllabus webpage The University Policy section of the starter syllabus, starting on page 13, has a few different examples of language for: Access and Accommodations Accommodations for Religious Observances Your (Students’) Wellbeing Basic Needs Respect for Diversity Academic Integrity Student Experience Surveys (Designated) Reporting Obligations Academic…

Our Fight for Fair Salaries Your bargaining team meets with administration again this week on Thursday, September 26th, from 12:30 to 3:30pm. Please note that we will gather in Lillis 112 – right down the hall from the room we typically meet in. We will present several articles, including Article 26: Salary. We have pored over the data underpinning the administration’s most recent proposal and have developed our counterproposal based on, and in response to their data. We anticipate a robust conversation about compensation during the session. We will also present our counterproposals on review processes for tenure-related and Career…

Your bargaining team met with the administration once again on August 26th for our final session of the summer.  Though we continue to make progress on several non-economic articles, we continue to engage them on several points of contention that your team feels are important to improve our current contract. One of those sticking points concerns the grievance process. United Academics hopes to codify a time frame in which faculty members can engage in what we have called an Independent Conflict Resolution Process. Oftentimes faculty members do not immediately seek out assistance from their union when problems arise, and they…