A hearing on FAM’s bargaining unit composition is set for December 12-13 in Columbus, and a decision on the bargaining unit and election will follow.
As you likely know, despite state-confirmed supermajority support for FAM, Miami’s administration has objected to the FAM bargaining unit, seeking to exclude TCPL, Visiting Assistant Professors, Librarians, Instructors and research/teaching staff from FAM’s proposed bargaining unit. Miami administration want the bargaining unit to include T/TT faculty only, claiming that the groups do not share a “community of interest” as educators. FAM rejects the spurious assertion that we are more different than alike. A hearing on FAM’s bargaining unit composition is set for December 12-13 in Columbus, and a decision on the bargaining unit and election will follow. Meantime, Miami can still drop its objections at any time. Keep the L.U.V. (Let Us Vote!) pressure on! Display your FAM swag, share the community ally petition, and join the caravan heading for the Columbus hearing.
The university doesn’t decide the bargaining unit; SERB does.
The objection’s purpose is clear: to delay, divide and demoralize Miami faculty’s union. But the fact that 9 out of 10 faculty unions at state institutions in Ohio include non-tenure-track faculty suggests that the State Employment Relations Board will support our proposed bargaining unit.
We are one faculty and we will not be divided.
No matter the outcome from SERB’s decision regarding the bargaining unit, FAM is committed to supporting you in organizing a union and getting a contract. We believe we are stronger when all employees are covered under a collective bargaining agreement.
We are stronger together.
The work of educators not on the tenure track at Miami is valuable and necessary. All faculty voices matter, and FAM will fight the administration’s indefensible effort to divide us. Together we will defend our educational mission, our right to organize, and our rights to equitable pay and working conditions.
Building a union committed to equity and justice requires inclusion.
FAM aspires to create and promote a community in which all faculty and librarians (whatever their status, demographic or discipline) have a voice and a stake. Non-tenure-track faculty are shaping and co-creating FAM governance, policies, and practices in partnership with other faculty and librarians to generate democratic policies and structures tailored to the Miami setting. While those in precarious positions need the support a union will provide, we all need one another: the power of a union—and the power to win a great contract—lies in solidarity.
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