WE WILL NOT BE DIVIDED

A response to the university’s move to exclude non-TT faculty and librarians from our union

We are stronger together.

In a classic union-busting move, the university seeks to divide us rather than unite us. The administration has filed an objection to FAM’s proposed bargaining unit, which includes all full-time faculty (tenured, tenure-track, TCPL, and librarians). The university says that the unit should only comprise tenured and tenure-track faculty, claiming that we do not form a shared “community of interest” with other full-time faculty.

The objection’s purpose is clear: to divide and delay Miami faculty’s union. But we are a faculty united in support of our educational mission, our right to equitable pay and working conditions, and our right to organize—and precedent suggests that the State Employment Relations Board will support our proposed bargaining unit.

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In their objection filing, Miami administration claims that:

• TCPLs’ “primary duty...is to instruct students.” But isn’t educating our students all faculty’s primary mission? That is, the administration argues that the most important mission we all have — the reason for Miami’s existence  — is a reason TCPL should be excluded from our union. 
  
  
• TCPL are paid about 50%-80% of what tenure-line assistant professors are paid, and don’t have job security. That is, low salaries and precarity are cited as reasons to exclude them, despite their often having the same credentials as T/TT and—in fact—similar due process rights. (Note that the university’s figures for TT salaries in CAS, offered for comparison, look too high.)
  
  
• VAPs are “seasonal or casual employees.” This claim hinges on reporting data only from the last three years, when VAPs were let go at a far higher rate than usual.
  
  
• Librarians don’t “conduct…scholarship” as a necessary part of their work — although to be promoted and continue in their jobs, Miami explicitly requires them to do it.  

Please read the administration’s full objection. This hierarchical and exploitative view of faculty is precisely why we need a union. All of us share a commitment to teaching and learning, and all of us deserve a living wage and fair working conditions. We are stronger together.

Your work as an educator at Miami is valuable and necessary and your voice matters. FAM will fight this indefensible effort to undermine the union.

In solidarity,
Faculty Alliance of Miami