November 25,2024
—11/25—
Co-Lead Negotiator Dr. Ashley Farmer opened the session with a response on the administration’s negative response to mediation. Ashley cited section D from Administrative Code 80.1130.30 (d), that states “Mediation will automatically be invoked by the Board upon request of a party 45 days after bargaining has begun in units for which exclusive representatives have been newly certified or 45 days prior to the scheduled start of the forthcoming school year.” Ashley asked why that does not apply to our situation. Mark Bennett said it did not because the Union had not yet made this request to the Illinois Labor Relations Board. This is technically correct because we first attempted a collaborative approach with a joint mediation request. However, when the Table Team went into caucus, we immediately submitted the official request to the Illinois Education Labor Relations Board.
We presented counters including a package on Grievance, Nondiscrimination, Professional Ethics and Workplace Bullying, and a package on Disability Accommodation and a Memorandum of Understanding on proactive measures related to disability.
Grievance:
In Grievance, we continue to hold on language that decisions based solely on academic judgment are not grievable. Bennett asked for clarification on what is solely academic judgment versus what only has academic judgment as part of it. Dr. Keith Pluymers noted examples such as tenure and promotion and evaluation where the outcome may not be grieveable but that the process would be. We are concerned that for processes involving academic judgment and procedures their language would prevent grievances even if the procedures were not followed. If we agree to their language, we can foresee situations in which an administrator could violate the contract and use a “get out of grievance free” card by claiming their decision was ‘academic judgment.’
We aim to prevent that scenario from taking place. We are holding on to our ability to grieve when procedures and policies are not followed. We rejected their timeline for updating the grievance with supplemental information in Step 2, instead proposing a slightly longer timeline to make sure we can fully collect all relevant information. We also held on the grievance not being declared null and void by the Employer if the Union doesn’t provide supplemental information on their timeline. We should be able to move forward with the grievance even if we do not submit supplemental information. We continue to hold on a Union rep being present at a Step 2 meeting to ensure deadlines are met. We also added language to protect a member who self-represented themselves in a grievance in Step 1 but moves to have the Union help them subsequently. We also continue to hold on to the right of our members to benefit from a settlement that affects them even if they were not already part of the grievance.
Nondiscrimination:
We then moved on to nondiscrimination. Ashley noted we had a hard time moving on this but that we have matched their language. This significant movement is contingent on them accepting the principles of our Grievance and Arbitration proposal. We also noted that we would withdraw Workplace Bullying and Professional Ethics contingent on the Grievance and Nondiscrimination proposals.
Disability:
Next, we dove into the Disability proposal, which we noted is about protecting our members requesting ADA reasonable accommodations but also expecting the University to go beyond the minimum requirement. Bennett continues to harp on an example of where complying with the ADA would violate someone’s rights under the collective bargaining agreement. They asked if they could violate the contract to give someone an accommodation. We stated that is not our intent. Dr. Debbie Shelden noted that our proposal is asking the university to be proactive in addressing accessibility issues even if there is not an accommodation request for a specific member. We did accept their language on 5 workdays to initiate the interactive process to discuss accommodations. We also required formal communication about the matter, to which they asked what qualifies as formal communication. We offered examples such as an email to your ilstu account. We also moved to require 15 days to establish a timeline for decision on and implementation of an accommodation. Our goal is to ensure our members know when they can expect accommodations.
Keith Pluymers did note that our new language allowed for circumstances where a member delay would impact the timeline. We also held on to the employee not being adversely affected in terms of employment if there's a delay in accommodations. We are still holding on to our language for members with a permanent disability not being required to prove their disability over and over again, a burdensome and sometimes expensive requirement some of our members have faced. Bennett continues to bring up the issue of those with a degenerative disease and wanting to know if they could ask for documentation if the disease gets worse or changes. We noted that such changes could be addressed by re-engaging in the interactive process. We also raised our concerns about our members with disabilities that are not always recognized as such being caught up in the employer’s use of the words “not normally” in admin’s language on who might need to resubmit medical documentation.
We also still have our Memorandum of Understanding for proactive measures related to disability. Ashley noted that their complaint about this extending beyond our unit does not hold up, given we have other tentative agreements on issues that affect more than the bargaining unit. Ashley responded to their other concerns in the section. Bennett claims it would be difficult for the administration to specify money spent to help with disabilities, given it is not a line item on their budgeting.
Workload:
We finally saw a bit of movement from admin on Workload. They have now included Milner Library in the Workload proposal but noted that it would be in a separate section. We have been arguing against their prior position of addressing Milner in a separate article, and we believe this admin movement resulted from the power of our action on November 20, as well as the support our members have shown for Milner at multiple bargaining sessions.
Admin stated that workload policies should be developed in the same shared governance procedures as the ASPT. They also want the policies to be approved by the dean and Provost. They claim we have an unreasonable timeline given departments do not have workload policies currently. They claim our proposal does not give the administration a role in the workload policy. They also provide for a maximum of 24 credit hours or the equivalent for teaching along with other professional obligations such as advising, committee work, and professional development. The policy also allows reductions to occur for research and creative activity, administrative responsibilities, and service responsibilities. The Milner language matches their previous separate Milner Library proposal. Their proposal for assigned duties states that there cannot be a fixed amount of time or formula. They also say the needs of the program factors into the decision and that it is dependent on the approval of the dean.
Admin added a section on faculty accessibility related to responsibilities outside of regularly scheduled classes and that there are a required number of office hours. Administration's big addition, however, is their note that for each 3-credit hour course, we need to have 1 hour of in-person office hours, and these 3 hours of office hours need to happen on 3 different days a week in our campus office. They also state that we should be accessible outside of office hours but still in person to meet students as well. They stated that they are not agreeing to our credit hour equivalents because they don’t think it can address the difference between departments even though they noted it's clear we made an attempt to do so. Ashley asked if their language about credit hours being similar to our language, but they maintain it is different. They raised an issue with our math stating each credit hour equivalent of 37.5 hours is too much for the ways we are using it. They raised that our proposal gives 3 credits of release time to prepare the tenure packet, and they don’t believe preparing that packet takes the 112 hours allotted in our proposal.
Conclusion
After the presentation and discussion of the counters, teams went to caucus and had a long sidebar, but they did not return to the table. Many thanks to 30+ members who attended bargaining. These shows of our solidarity strengthen us. We are not too tired to show up, not too tired to continue the fight for the contract we deserve.