Hundreds of faculty, students and community rally for a fair contract NOW!

Posted on May 15, 2015 by AFT 2121

On Wednesday, City College faculty, students, and community supporters rallied at four campuses across the city to demand a fair contract. Over 500 people participated to hear speakers address the disparity in faculty wages and administrator salaries, as well as instructional and student support need vital to the future of City College. Half a dozen labor and community groups spoke in support of AFT 2121’s contract platform, including Community Housing Partnership, San Francisco Labor Council, and Young Workers United.

Tim Killikelly, City College instructor and president of AFT 2121, explainedthat “we need a comprehensive plan to rebuild our college. That includes having a living wage for our faculty. How can CCSF continue to attract and retain high quality faculty when it pays the lowest of the Bay Area community colleges?”

“Faculty are on the ground every day, supporting students to be successful and to reach their goals,” said CCSF Student Trustee Shanell Williams. “It’s unacceptable that they’re not getting fair wages.”

 “How do we keep students in our college?” said Kung Feng, lead organizer at Jobs with Justice. “We need to keep classes open, not cut them.”

Faculty, students and community leaders are asking whetherCCSF’s administration has their priorities in the right place. In the past four years, the portion of money going to
administrators has increased 29%, while spending on faculty has gone down 9%. CCSF faculty are being paid 3.5% below 2007-08 levels in a city that’s increasingly unaffordable for teachers, low-income workers and the middle class. AFT 2121 demands a fair contract that sustains the livelihoods of faculty as well as instructional and student support needs vital to the future of City College of San Francisco.

At the Negotiations Table

On Wednesday, AFT 2121 put forward proposals on Salaries and Compensation, Rebuild CCSF-Enrollment Recovery Initiative, and Relief for Full-time Faculty with Underloads

Our Salaries and Compensation proposal included:

– Restoration to 2007-08 salary level
– Restoration of frozen salary step of 2009-201
– Restore COLA and increase salaries to restore us to above the median of Bay Ten community colleges
– Full-time extra pay parity and parity for part-time faculty

Our Rebuild CCSF – Enrollment Recovery Initiative proposal included the following:

A joint management-AFT Enrollment Recovery Initiative that would marshal the efforts of the faculty together with those of administration to:

– Identify programs with growth opportunities including course offerings likely to attract students to CCSF.
– Conduct market research to identify prospective students from the whole San Francisco community.
– Use research to develop an overall plan for outreach to prospective students with specific targets: discipline/program specific e.g. prospective computer science students, theater arts students, etc.; high schools, public and private; community-based organizations; neighborhood canvassing/leafleting.
– Develop a research-based, effective media messaging and community based outreach campaign.
– Restore outreach department in student development.
– Recruit faculty coordinators with experience and ability to help lead outreach efforts. Provide necessary release time.
– Recruit volunteer efforts of faculty in campaign.
– Offer alternative assignment working on the campaign to faculty who suffer class cancellations or program cuts.
– Consider possibilities for securing additional funding

Full-time Underload Proposal

For the duration of the current contract, management agrees to provide voluntary alternative assignments to full-time faculty who suffer under loads due to class cancellations or program cuts. Such assignments could include working on the joint management-union enrollment recovery initiative.

Other Issues from the Negotiations Table

While the most contentious and thorny issues between our union and the District remain there has been some progress on some other issues.

We have reached agreement on the following:

– Agreement with District on updating categories of protected groups under nondiscrimination provision.
– Agreement on new language ensuring that faculty on sabbatical qualify for salary step advancement.
– Agreement with District on clarifying short-term union leave for AFT reps and access to faculty mailboxes.

Although no agreement has been reached on the items below there has been positive movement on the following:

– Faculty use of District email.
– Assessing shortening timelines of student complaint procedure.
– Mutual interest in pursuing study of the viability of a compressed academic calendar. Discussed how to plan calendars in advance and synch calendars with SFUSD.