College lecturers vote to strike over ‘instructor’ roles
College lecturers are set to strike in a row over their jobs.
Members of the EIS/FELA union, including those at West College Scotland in Paisley, have voted overwhelmingly in favour of taking action to defend lecturing jobs.
In the ballot, 92 per cent of members voted in favour of striking, on a turnout of 60 per cent.
The row is over lecturer posts in further education being replaced with lesser qualified and lower paid ‘instructor’positions.
West College Scotland lecturer John Kelly, who is the branch secretary for EIS/FELA and the unions’national salaries convener, said the row had been rumbling on for over a year.
He said:“This started at Forth Valley College where 30-odd lecturers were confronted with redundancy and asked to go onto instructor grade posts. About half of them are now off sick with stress.
“The instructor post gives you no time to prepare and that’s essential, especially when doing online teaching.
“Members in Paisley are absolutely furious about this.”
John said the changing of roles hadn’t happened at West College Scotland, but members were worried Colleges Scotland, which is in charge of further education, is considering rolling it out.
If an agreement cannot be reached when the two sides meet again on Thursday, March 4, lecturers could be on strike as early as mid-March.
A spokesman for Colleges Scotland, said:“The EIS-FELA is taking its members down the route of unnecessary industrial action at a critical time when there is a need for stability and certainty within the sector as we deal with the impact of the pandemic.
“The EIS-FELA has accepted that there is no national plan to replace lecturers with tutor/assessor/ instructor roles, nor any other support staff roles, yet have still pushed forward with the ballot and the threat of industrial action.
“Tutor/assessor/instructor roles are not new to the college sector. They have been in place within colleges across Scotland for a considerable number of years to deliver a diverse curriculum which best suits the needs of the learner and the subject matter being taught.
“We are continuing talks with the EIS-FELA and have agreed to meet again in the hope that we can reach a resolution and avoid any further unnecessary disruption for students.”