Faculty, colleges head back to bargaining
Students at Algonquin College may have their fall term extended to make up for time lost during the strike by faculty, says college president Cheryl Jensen.
In a letter to students, Jensen said the college will try to avoid extending the end of the school year, too, but that depends on how long the strike lasts.
However, Jensen said it’s good news that Ontario colleges and the union representing 12,000 striking faculty will return to bargaining Thursday.
The Employer Council representing 24 colleges asked the mediator in the bitter dispute to bring the two sides back to the table as the strike heads into its third week.
Jensen said she is “hopeful that progress will be made soon.”
It’s a sentiment shared by several hundred thousand students across the province who have had their classes cancelled since the strike began Oct. 16. Student leaders have pressured the Ontario government for an end to the strike. An online petition demanding a return of tuition fees for every day of lost classes has 120,000 signatures.
Premier Kathleen Wynne and Deb Matthews, the minister responsible for post-secondary education, have declined to intervene in the dispute, but have urged both sides to return to the table.
That happens Thursday, the same day faculty from across the province plan to rally at Queen’s Park.
“This strike has gone on for too long,” read a statement from Sonia Del Missier, the chair of the bargaining team for the colleges.
“We need to end the strike and get our students and faculty back in the classroom. We can reach a settlement quickly and have classes start again early next week.”
The council said it would make no further comments.
The chief negotiator for the Ontario Public Service Employees Union, JP Hornick, said she’s looking forward to seeing what management has to say. The mediator made it clear to both sides that there is no point in a returning to bargaining until they were ready to make a shift in position, she said.
Another member of the bargaining team for the union, Mona Chevalier, said it’s premature to say a deal can be reached and classes resume next week.
“We don’t know if this is about creating false hope or this is because they decided to move from their final offer,” said Chevalier, who is a counsellor at La Cité college in Ottawa.
The full-time professors, “partialload” instructors who work seven to 12 hours a week, counsellors and librarians are striking to increase the number of full-time faculty and increase faculty involvement in academic matters. As negotiations resume, attention is turning to how students will make up for missed work when the strike ends.
Colleges say they have contingency plans, but final details depend on how long the strike lasts.
Algonquin has announced some details for apprentices in the trades who alternate between working at jobs and studying at college.
The apprentices who had completed seven weeks in an eightweek training block when the strike began were told that faculty can calculate a pass/fail grade based on the work they have completed. Apprentices who were in Week 1 or Week 2 of a program will pick up where they left off later, while courses for some other apprentices will be postponed until the winter or spring session.
That gives an indication of the complexity of making up course work in the many programs offered by the colleges.
The Employer Council has emphasized that no Ontario student has ever lost a semester because of a strike. There have been three strikes by faculty since Ontario’s college system was created 50 years ago. The average length of those strikes, including weekends, was 23 days. The current strike enters Day 18 on Thursday.
Previously, one strike ended when the government legislated faculty back to work, while the other two disputes were settled after both sides agreed to arbitration.
In all three cases, colleges found a way to salvage the semester for students.
In some cases, semesters were extended, Christmas break shortened and spring break cancelled.
A key issue in this dispute is the situation of “partial-load” instructors. The union has requested an
We need to end the strike and get our students and faculty back in the classroom. We can reach a settlement quickly and have classes start again early next week.
increase in the number of full-time faculty to a ratio of 50/50, as well as an increase in job security for the partial-load teachers, who must re-apply for jobs every semester.
By the union’s estimation, about 70 per cent of the faculty at colleges are part-time staff in various categories. The management side counts not heads but teaching hours, arguing that 49 per cent of “teaching contact hours” are taught by full-time teachers. It says the union’s proposals, including the 50/50 ratio, would cost Ontario colleges an extra $250 million a year and inhibit hiring flexibility.
The last offer by the colleges included a wage increase of 7.75 per cent over four years.
By the end of the contract, that would bring the salary of a fulltime professor to between $66,555 and $115,378; and for a partial-load instructor to a range of between $88.92 and $154.26 an hour.
Another key issue is the request by the union that faculty have more say in academic decision-making, including course content, delivery and evaluation of students. Management has refused, saying faculty are critical to academic decision-making but can’t be the “exclusive voice.”