Caucuses, Bargaining Town Halls, And Other Events

Contributed By: newsletter October 7, 2026

Raises and Benefits

If you are on a 9-month contract and your pay is distributed over 12 months, your negotiated raise will show up on your October 31st paycheck. If your pay is distributed over 9 months, your raise should be reflected in your September 30 paycheck.

Reach out if something looks amiss.

PEBB’s open enrollment in October of this year is particularly critical for all benefits-eligible employees to complete, otherwise, PEBB will drop coverage for employees and their dependents for 2027. Action is required by all benefits-eligible faculty, as this year’s enrollments will not automatically roll over to next year. Additional information is available here: PEBB benefits open enrollment is mandatory, Oct.1-31 | OregonNews.

Tenure Reduction Program

Several faculty members currently in the Tenure Reduction Program (TRP) have had their courses canceled or have had other difficulties in receiving course assignments. 

This is troubling for a number of reasons. We hope that the administration is not trying to undermine agreements in a program whose sunsetting they proposed in bargaining. These agreements allow faculty members who have dedicated their lives and careers to the institution to continue to engage in meaningful work with their students and intellectual communities. Making changes to schedules at the last moment can cause enormous anxiety because it takes medical insurance coverage away from those who were counting on it.

Please be on the lookout in your own units and academic communities for issues surrounding TRP assignments. The CBA speaks about “agreed-upon assignments” – thus, need for a particular course is a factor in determining assignments. In the future, department heads should be strategic in the courses that they assign to TRP faculty, and lean toward courses that are not likely to be canceled. Assigning introductory courses or courses required for the major could help to mitigate against possible cancellation.

Reach out to info@uauoregon.org if you have any questions or concerns and we can strategize about how to resolve them.

Caucuses

Caucuses provide space for communities of interest to talk about issues they are facing. Please join us, and let us know what your priorities are for our next contract!

  • Tuesday, October 13 – International Faculty
  • Tuesday, October 27 – Working Families
  • Tuesday, November 10 – Faculty of Color
  • Tuesday, November 24 – Pride

All Caucuses will be held at the UA Union Hall, 603 E. 13th Ave.

Bring your lunch and hang out with fellow faculty. We’ll provide drinks and snacks.

UO Internet Issues

We have been hearing about internet problems around campus, including a few faculty members losing internet access multiple times while giving zoom presentations as invited speakers. Please let us know if you have had similar experiences. Though your Union Hall has limited space, if you are in an emergency and need access to reliable internet, come on by.  

We have been in contact with administration regarding these outages. If you continue to have difficulties, please let us know and we will bring these to the attention of the administration.

“Toward a Premier R1 Public”

We have learned that the recently shared “Toward a Premier R1 Public” is considered a draft. The Provost invites suggestions and feedback about the vision document, which can be sent to: otp@uoregon.edu. We encourage all members to take a look and make suggestions, as this is a vision document that may ultimately be used to make academic decisions about the future of our university.

SEIU

While we are happy that our siblings in SEIU were able to secure a tentative agreement with the administration after 9 months of negotiations, we know that it is disheartening to be pushed to the point of a strike in order to win the most modest of concessions.  United Academics found itself in the same position in the last round of negotiations.

When we sit down at the bargaining table again at the beginning of the new year, we hope that the administration is prepared to engage in substantive conversations so we can avoid this demoralizing dynamic.

Bargaining Town Halls

Bargaining begins next term and we are looking for input from members. Please join us for a town hall and let us know what you need from the next contract to be successful at UO! All bargaining town halls are on Zoom.

  • Friday, October 30 from noon-1:30pm – Research Faculty
  • Monday, November 2 from 10-11:30 – Tenure-related
  • Thursday, November 5 from noon-1:30 – Instructional Faculty
  • Monday, November 11 from 2-3:30 – general membership

Unfair Labor Practice

In Spring of 2025, the administration terminated the positions of 11 faculty members in CAS, allegedly due to financial reasons. At that time, the administration refused to divulge the names or departments of all the affected faculty, claiming confidentiality concerns linked to the University’s Faculty Records Policy (FRP). United Academics did not take the administration’s initial “no” for an answer. Instead, we continued to insist, over several weeks, that the administration must reveal to the union the identities of the laid-off faculty. Unfortunately, the administration persisted in its refusal to turn over the names.

Ultimately, United Academics filed an Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) with the Oregon Employment Relations Board. The administrative law judge (ALJ) who initially heard the case concluded that the administration had committed a ULP by withholding the names, and ordered it to cease and desist from withholding such information in the future. However, he declined UA’s requested remedy of reinstating the laid-off faculty.

While we were pleased that the ALJ admonished the administration, we lodged objections, given that the Board had already sanctioned the administration for engaging in similar behaviors in the past with our sibling union, SEIU.

The September 24, 2026 hearing before the three-member Board regarding our objections went as well as could be expected. The Board members asked the University’s outside counsel very pointed questions about whether the Public Employees Collective Bargaining Act (PECBA) compels the administration to release the kind of information UA requested, irrespective of whether it qualifies as confidential under the FRP. The administration also tried to maintain that the annual reports provided to United Academics, which include layoff information, override our PECBA right to obtain the names of faculty members when layoffs are announced. This assertion, to use the words of the Chair of the Board, “strains credulity”.

We hope that the Board sees fit to order reinstatement of the laid-off faculty, given the history of ULPs committed by the administration over the last several years.  However, we do not expect to hear back with an official ruling for several months.

In the meantime, it is dismaying to know that the administration spent over $100,000 in outside counsel just to prepare for the initial hearing. That sum does not take into account any preparation or time spent on the most recent hearing over our objections before the Board. In the end, the administration has spent more money on defending clear violations of PECBA than the salary of almost any of the individual faculty members that were laid off. This is a clear reflection of their misplaced priorities.

United Academics Endorsements

United Academics recently endorsed Kori Rodley for Oregon House of Representatives District 7 (Springfield area) and Callee Ackland for Springfield City Council. Below is a list of all our current endorsements:

If you have thoughts about which candidates or issues United Academics should support, or if you would like to become involved in Politics Committee work, please email Luke Habberstad and Jeff Schroeder.