On May 1 the College of Engineering and Computer Science created four new units in addition to departments based on the University’s ongoing Project Vision with the impression that these new “functional units” would increase efficiencies. Instead, it is now known that these new units were designed to target tenured faculty.
On May 29 Dean Karl Stevens laid off five tenured faculty assigned to the Undergraduate Programs unit. The basis for the layoff was a claimed excess in the unit of 16 faculty compared to the apparently understaffed Graduate Programs/Research unit with 43 faculty.
UFF filed grievances on behalf of four of the five laid off faculty in addition to a chapter grievance asserting the right of UFF to enforce the Collective Bargaining Agreement. The grievances proceeded through the grievance process with the University denying the faculty members’ and UFF’s claims at each stage. In July the University offered each of the laid off faculty, each of whom was to lose their job on August 8, an extension of that notice until the end of the Spring 2010 semester. Then, beginning in August, the University offered three of the laid off faculty alternative employment. While UFF is happy to see these faculty reemployed, this gesture by the University can only be seen as hollow. In all of the cases the condition of alternate employment has come with strings. Each has been denied the right to have a lawyer or advisor review the offer before signing, all have been required to drop their grievance as a condition of alternate employment, and more importantly, the University has ruled against rescinding layoff in each case, preserving their alleged right to create fictitious units to eliminate any faculty member they want – tenured or not.
Currently, the case of one laid off faculty member who has not received reemployment is proceeding to arbitration. In this case the University has stalled in meeting with UFF to select an arbitrator despite numerous requests from UFF for a meeting. While UFF chapter grievance is moving towards arbitration we first have to contend with the University’s challenge on whether UFF can file grievances on behalf of the collective faculty. This issue should have already been heard by an arbitrator, but again the University is turning a deaf ear to UFF requests to set up a meeting to select an arbitrator.
-UFF-FAU Grievance/Contract Enforcement Committee