I hope the summer has been nice to you and that you’re holding up okay considering the world right now. This is a bit long, but please read. It’s all super important.
I’ve been helping to organize our union for years, and since November I’ve been to almost all the bargaining sessions. I’m writing to urge you to attend the next two bargaining sessions this Thursday 8/7 from 10-1 and Tuesday 8/26 from 10-1. You can attend in person or over zoom, although I have to say the in person experience is a lot more fun. I’ll be in person at both of these. If you haven’t observed our Bargaining Committee in action, it’s astounding to see what they are doing on our behalf. In a university that can feel fragmented and siloed, I leave bargaining sessions feeling connected and stronger.
RSVP to observe bargaining Thursday, August 7
As for me, in the midst of a terrible moment in this country and the world, this feels like a small thing I can do to make the world a little bit better. I know that if I’m stronger (better pay, less workload, etc…) I can help more people.
Please RSVP as soon as you can, and then bring two colleagues!
In this session we will be presenting articles on compensation and salaries! I know many of you have been waiting for this. The BC will also likely present a lot of interesting data that surprised even me when I first saw it. Here’s one piece of salary information that stunned me: our average salary is more than $60,000 a year less than our tenure-track colleagues: $109,888 vs. $170,527! And here’s a fact that enraged me: women contract faculty members make 10% less than our male colleagues, even adjusting for rank and years of service. We need a contract that will fix these inequities.
We’re not going to get the salaries we deserve unless we get a strong contract, and we need everyone, especially this semester, to start showing up. As you know, we have been bargaining in good faith with the administration since November, and for the most part they are not coming to the table to meet our demands. I know this can feel disheartening or that we haven’t been making progress, but this is the way the NYU administration works. Every union on campus has been through a very similar experience.
This semester we are going to be escalating in many ways, and we need everyone to show up to as many of these escalations as possible. If we don’t have a strong showing, the administration isn’t going to give us what’s fair and right.
We are all devoted teachers and amazing writers, artists, scholars, and researchers. As we move into the semester, we are going to need to prioritize union work as much as we can. If there’s a rally, bring your students and teach them about the structure of the university (I have a lesson plan for that, I can share!). When one of us asks to speak to our faculty, remember we are all the union, and we all need information and support. Be nice to us because we are you and we’re working hard for all of our lives to be better! (Tricky sentence structure there lol).
Fun fact! Did you know that now that we have a union, our jobs are safer than ever? It’s true, legally NYU is not allowed to change the terms of our contracts while we are bargaining. If they try, we have the means to stop them. Contact us and we will connect you with a Weingarten-trained contract faculty person to help you. I’m not sure everyone knows that our union is already working to protect us in this way, so I wanted to share this important information with you.
Lastly, I definitely need your help! Thanks for reading this far, and please let me know if you have questions or want to step up and do more. There are all kinds of jobs big and small, for the shy and the bold, the fearful and the loud, and the tired and the energized. Respond to this email to get more plugged in.
Thanks for reading and I hope to see you Thursday!
Carley Moore
Clinical Professor
Liberal Studies