And suddenly, everything is supposed to be back to normal

 Well, not normal, but as normal as they can be.

This will be my last blog for a while. I'll try to do this more regularly, but daily is kind of a drag without something interesting like the strike to talk about.

Late Sunday night, some kind of deal had been reached. Agreements were made on several governance issues, a few were compromised, and I'm pleased to say that some things that the Dark Side had been insisting on were withdrawn completely. It was agreed which issues to send to arbitration, and a rough timeline for arbitration has been worked out.

So Monday (was that only yesterday) the union called a special general meeting. We heard details about the tentative agreement, and there was some lively discussion of what had been and had not been accomplished. Then there was the vote, which was conducted online, via secret e-ballot, making use of some fancy secure system that one of our board members knows how to use. The vote was to ratify the agreement, and head back to work.

Which meant that at least for some members, classes resumed at something like 8 this morning. Gag.

I've spent the day (and most of yesterday) trying to figure out how the rest of my classes is going to go, and crafting communications to students to get ready for our first meetings back, tomorrow.

So we're not on strike anymore, interrupted classes are now back in session, and hopefully we've made some advances toward the better university we all want. And in a few months, because I guess that's how long it takes, there will be arbitration on remaining issues. Nobody got everything they wanted (in particular the College of Nursing will pursue some other means of getting what they need), some things were compromised, some things withdrawn, and letters of understanding have been settled. Or settled enough that the executive of the union unanimously recommended ratification.

So that's it. The end of #umfaStrike #umfa2021. A three-year contract (retroactive to last April), so with any luck we won't be in this position again in 2024, but at least it will be until then.

Today was the first (weekday) since November 2nd that my day didn't start (because I'm not a morning person) with the daily meeting of my strike cluster. These are people I'd never met before, from both campuses and several faculties and libraries. I know very little about most of their personal lives, and even less about their actual work (although of course I know a little about what fields everyone is in, because academics can't help but talk about their work), but union solidarity, shared experience, and if nothing else proximity and time, but I've come to think of them as good, if not close, friends. I'm going to miss them.

I hope when we get our brunch reunion planned we can all stand being in each other's physical presence ;)

Five weeks in limbo

 We awoke this morning to the news that a tentative agreement had been reached, and we'd be voting on it tonight. I just cast my vote. I won't talk about specifics because I'm not sure I have any, but eleven intensive days of bargaining (and coming up against the tomorrow deadline, after which Bad Things happen. Worse things than would happen anyway.  Much worse.) seemed to actually see more action than the previous weeks/months of bargaining. Take that for what it's worth.

Lots of governance issues agreed on, at least one kind of watered down to make it acceptable to admin. and probably others, but the things that I was most concerned about were agreed to, albeit in watered down form. A half dozen really egregious admin demands that I didn't know had been demanded were withdrawn. So while those issues aren't 'settled', at least they're off the table for life of this contract.

Salary grids adjusted, pending arbitrator decisions about actual $$$. I hope my instructor friends are happy. Some will benefit a lot from the new salary grids. Others not so much, but nobody loses anything, except potentially in the maximum potential lifetime earnings category.

What I want to point out is this is the nature of compromise. Nobody is objectively 'happy' with the result, but everybody finds it acceptable enough to go ahead with it. UMFA executive unanimously recommends ratification, thinking we're not going to do any better, and in fact chances are good we'll do pretty well in arbitration on the numbers. There is of course a significant faction of members who don't like it, feel like we've given up to much (again), want to stay on strike and really put the screws to admin, Bad Things be d*mned. So ratification isn't a slam dunk.

So two hours and change of meeting, and now we vote. Until 11:30pm. So we should know something sometime after 11:30pm. But exactly when isn't clear, but it has to be enough time so that people with 8:30am classes in the morning have time to do something about it. I don't teach until Wednesday, so I can wait to find out in the morning. Which may be when I end this daily-strike-diary nonsense.  We'll see.

Entering a second weekend of intensive post-mediator bargaining

I don't really know what mediators do, and especially I do not know what our mediator did. Readers will recall that last week around this time, the mediator declared that in his estimation bargaining/mediation had failed, recommended arbitration, and resigned. Immediately followed by some Dark Side propaganda that, although they had accepted the mediator's recommendation, UMFA had 'rejected' mediation.  Which wasn't strictly true: UMFA had rejected unconditional binding arbitration, because there are governance issues that, frankly, a non-academic arbitrator is not likely to fully understand. Which I won't go into because I'm not sure I understand them either. There is also the question of the back-to-work protocol, i.e. are we going to be compensated for all the extra work is going to be required to finish out the term and Winter, are they going to contribute to pension and health care, whether the days spent on strike can still be counted toward pension, and so on.

Arbitration, in the best case, can take months, so not having a back-to-work protocol settled before arbitration would be a huge pain for everyone, including the arbitrator, since we'd go back to work basically immediately and anything back-to-work-wise probably won't be remotely relevant when we get a decision from the arbitrator. So it sounds like that's what is at the top of the list to get settled.

I'm rather fascinated by the apparent sequence of events that surrounded the last bit of mediation. I only have the word of certain members of the collective agreement committee, who advise the bargaining committee, and whatever information put out by the union (which again, may be true, but possibly not strictly true at first blush). Before the mediator came in, bargaining seems to have occurred face-to-face, that is with the union's bargaining committee and the Dark Side's bargaining committee (who appears to be headed by a non-academic lawyer--who it must be said, specializes in labo(u)r and employment law--who reportedly was not only the designated speaker for the committee, but apparently the principle 'voice'), facing each other across a table and yelling at each other.*

When the mediator was hired (at mutual acceptance--the mediator is also a non-academic lawyer, but specialized in public-sector labor law), the model appears to have changed. Readers of this blog will recall my assumption, that the introduction of the mediator involved the same two committees facing each other over a table and yelling, but with the impartial mediator keeping a rein on things. This appears to not be the case.

Mediation, at least the last bit of it, involved the union bargainers and the Dark Side bargainers having separate meetings with the mediator, and the mediator conducting 'shuttle diplomacy' between them. Well, according to sources in the union, the mediator somehow failed to completely or fully represent the offer to the Dark Side, which readers of this blog will recall was followed by a refusal to counter by the Dark Side. Exactly what the mediator did or did not communicate, or how, is not clear to me. But the result appears to have been that the Dark Side was not fully presented with a reasonable attempt at compromise, and thus declined to counter.

I do not in any way suggest that the mediator was negligent or partisan. I do suggest that somewhere between UMFA and the mediator, and then the mediator and the Dark Side, Something Went Wrong.** At a town hall, we learned that the president of the university and the president of the union met shortly after the mediator's report. The union indicated that they did not want to go to unconditional arbitration, and instead wanted to continue to bargain out some issues at the table. The president of the university was apparently surprised by this, and immediately called to inform the bargaining committee, essentially, 'cancel your weekends; we're going back to the table'.  There followed a long, exhausting weekend of intensive face-to-face bargaining.

Reports from friends in the union suggest that, while there was nothing settled and the gulf(s) remained wide, that weekend was the first time in a long time that they felt like the Dark Side was actually willing to bargain, and consider compromising on some things. This intensive bargaining continued all this week and will continue this weekend.

So what I find interesting is that the mediator was brought in after weeks (months?) of face-to-face bargaining. And in spite of expertise and experience, and no doubt Herculean labo(u)r, didn't seem to broker any kind of substantial compromise. Remove the mediator (and setting aside his, in my opinion, alarming recommendations), and 'suddenly' we seem to really have bargaining. No idea if arbitration became the common enemy, or the mediator's report made this clearly the last ditch effort for both sides, or what. But there we are, or were.

Both sides appear to agree on at least some issues that can be sent to the arbitrator, and so can concentrate on the remaining governance issues, including (especially?) the back-to-work protocol. So with slightly less stuff (and generally less overtly costly stuff) the subject of nine days (by the time we get to Monday) of intense, face-to-face meetings, I'm feeling a little more optimistic that the end may be in sight, and that we can still avoid the 'nuclear option' of being forced into binding arbitration (on all issues, and quite possibly the final-offer style of arbitration) after 60 days. 

So hopefully by Monday there will be some kind of News to share. Keep your fingers crossed, prayers flowing, practice gratitude and empathy, and try, like me, to get a good rest this weekend.

*This is the dramatic, made-for-TV version, of course. I assume in real life it was a perfectly respectful and collegial exchange.

**As someone who is currently writing a textbook about communication breakdown, I think this is going to be a fruitful example, at least for the next couple terms I teach communication disorders, while the strike is still looming in people's minds.

Thirty-one days hath Strikevember

"Striketober" is more mellifluous, and I refuse to consider "Strikecember" at the moment, but here we are.  Today is day 31 of #umfa2021 @umfastrike, and everyone is feeling it. During the strike I've been trying to keep to this blog, daily, on strike matters and not my usual personal inanity. But today is/was odd, and I want to talk about it. So as I say, here we are. 

In general, I'm in good spirits, strikewise, though of course we're all tired, emotionally and physically, and anxious about a) reaching an agreement (or going to arbitration, or some combination thereof, which seems to be the current Best Case Scenario) and b) getting back to work. This last introducing a bunch of other anxieties, since we still have to get through the last six or so weeks of our classes, final exam period, and start Winter term's classes, all without an obvious break, except for the week between Christmas and New Years. Which will be welcome, but at the moment we're looking at curtailed exam periods, elimination of much of the midterm break for the winter term, and probably some displacement of Spring and Summer term hours. But what will be will be, and we'll cope, one way or another.

But strikewise, we seem to be very aware of the issues that motivate us in this strike (recruitment, retention, university quality, and so on), and additionally many of us are paying attention to our historical position. If you recall in 2016 we were really the first public sector union subjected to the provincial meddling in negotiation. Seeing our situation, several other unions refused to settle for inadequate negotiated outcomes, and remained without a contract for years following.

Now, we seem to be the first major Canadian university faculty association to go on strike.  I've been trying to keep track of who else is in bargaining right now, but York University in Toronto seems to be the U15 university that's closest (both negotiation-wise and calendar-wise) to going out. (Update: Turns out York isn't in the U15.) York's union in question actually doesn't represent full-time faculty, like UMFA, but contract (sessional) instructors, graduate student instructors, TAs, and so on.  In 2018 CUPE 3903 went on strike for 143 days, apparently the longest academic strike in Canadian history. For context, the Winnipeg General Strike of 1919 was 43 days. Due to Manitoba labour law that can force both sides into binding arbitration after 60 days, we won't go anywhere near that.  By my count, day 60 is December 27th, possibly the 29th depending on if you count the holidays we will have crossed (Remembrance Day and Christmas).

But I have some personal inanity to talk about, which is that this morning I was late to my cluster meeting because, well, after the alarm went off I managed to doze off again. All things considered a couple extra hours of sleep wasn't a bad idea. And I do feel tired, physically and emotionally. But I draw strength from my cluster-mates and the justness of our cause.

Another open letter to the chair of the Board of Governors

Dear Ms Hyde:

Today is December 1^st and the strike continues beyond the date any of us expected, let alone hoped. I want to begin this by thanking you for your personal response to my previous letter. In this time of seemingly increasing distance it was nice to feel some kind of personal connection to a stranger.

But as I say, the strike continues. Throughout negotiations, UMFA has put forward proposal after proposal, and has been met with at best minimal movement from the administration's bargaining team. Members involved and who have reported their impressions of bargaining and mediation, have indicated that much of the rest of the administration's side don’t seem to be as active participants in the process, and that the head bargainer, Ken Maclean, seems to be perhaps the only consequential voice on the admin side.  Mr Maclean is of course a specialist in labor and employment law, but as an outside litigator how familiar is he with the day-to-day activities of a university?

Employers and educators are finally beginning to realize that a focus on STEM education and outcomes, which seem to be at the forefront of ‘market-driven’ and ‘employer-focused’ educational philosophies, are inadequate in the long term. Many writers opine that the true value of STEM education is the focus on creative problem solving and critical thinking, not the factory-output of competent engineers and technicians. Lately, I have been seeing reference to STEAM educational values—science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics—recognizing that traditional university disciplines, rather than being valueless to the marketplace, haave always produced the critical thinkers and problem solvers that employers need now and into the future.  Acquaintances in industry have often said that ‘they can teach them to run the machines and work the numbers. What we can’t do is teach them to read and write’ in illustration of exactly this point. They do not know what skills will be most in demand in five-to-ten years, let alone further along, any more than they (or we) know where the next medical breakthrough or entrepreneurial success will come from. But it will definitely come from someone well practiced in critical thinking, not just numbers and existing solutions.

I speak for no one but myself, but it seems to me that ‘negotiation’ is by definition give-and-take. No one is necessarily 100% pleased with the outcome, but the result should be some kind of ‘acceptable’ middle-ground. It seems that Mr Maclean has shouldered the burden of some arbitrary (or provincially sponsored) line in the sand, and dug in his heels to protect it,, perhaps ignoring even the wisdom of the rest of his team in doing so. He and the bargaining team have not demonstrated fair and good-faith bargaining, as reflected in compromise. If there is any truth in this, regardless of the source of the limitations on the bargaining team’s activity, they do the university community a grave disservice and endanger the long-term health of the university.

This, in my long-winded way, is my way of asking that, as a matter of inexpressible urgency, the Board provide new direction to Mr Maclean and the bargaining team, to look forward to the long-term health of the university, the robustness of the university community and our ability to recruit and retain energetic and imaginative faculty, and our ability to deliver on long-term needs of ‘the market’.

Respectfully
robh 

Robert Hagiwara
Department of Linguistics
Currently on legal strike