Lee,

I just want to say thanks for your willingness to get involved and put some
time in on this union thing (although believe me, responding to all these
e-mails is nothing compared to the time you'll put in on an organizing
drive).

I had a very positive experience with the AFT at the community college in
Illinois where I taught for 17 years before I came here.  The first
contract(which I helped bargain) included an 8% raise for the faculty.
This was a school that routinely pinkslipped all probationary faculty every
spring because of financial exigency.  Yet, the money magically appeared
after the union came in.

Frankly, I don't see what we can do here unless Tennessee passes a law that
requires universities to bargain with their faculty.  Absent that
legislation, the only way to effect recognition as a bargaining agent is to
strike.  So you are essentially heading down the road to strike by
beginning this organizing campaign with the AFT.  As you and I know, even
if 100% of our faculty joined the AFT and petitioned the Trustees to
recognize the AFT as our bargaining agent, the Trustees would turn us down
(because they legally do not have to recognize us).  Then we either strike
until they agree to recognize us or slink home with our tail between our
legs.  Having slunk home in similar fashion a number of times after
presenting to the Black Hawk College Board of Trustees a petition with
about 98% of the faculty petitioning for the AFT to represent them as their
bargaining agent, I can tell you that it can be a long and bitter struggle.
Only after the State of Illinois came in and  passed a law that MADE them
recognize a bargaining agent would they do so.  Even then, they still
refused our petitions (with a huge majority of faculty signatures),
required an election, as per the legistlation, even though we were running
against no other union except "No Agent," and then after we won 128-29,
hired the union busting Chicago law firm of Seaforth Shaw Fairweather and
Geraldine to pretend to bargain with us for nine months.  I would not
expect the UT Board of Trustees to be any less recalcitrant, and I would
not expect the heavily Republican Tennessee Legislature to pass a public
employees bargaining bill any time within the current century.

All the same, your heart's in the right place; just be sure that you know
what the realities are.

Marcia Noe
Professor of English



>Dan,
>
>Thank you so much for your communication to me of last Thursday (4/26)
>regarding unions.  Knowing you, I would expect nothing other than a
>courteous exchange of views, and that, of course, is just what I received.
>
>Please tell me if I am wrong, Dan, but I believe you have made three main
>points:
>1) Unions promote an unproductive adversarial relationship.
>2) Unions are unnecessary because everything a union could accomplish can
>already be accomplished through the Faculty Council and the Employee
>Relations Committee.
>3) Unions would only encourage us to fight over the shrinking pie.
>Instead, we should work together to increase enrollments, serve better our
>clientele, and convince the citizens of Tennessee to support education.
>
>I will not be able to adequately address these points in a single email.
>Rather, I see this as only the beginning of an on-going friendly debate
>between two colleagues who both love UTC and are deeply concerned about its
>future.
>
>Your first point actually includes two aspects -- that unions are
>unproductive, and that they, of necessity, promote an adversarial
>relationship.  Regarding your claim that unions are unproductive, I would
>encourage you, my friend, to look at the data.  That unions are able to win
>for their membership better pay and working conditions can be documented
>with data from around the world, and if you look at American universities
>that are unionized it is quite clear that the faculty and staff there
>receive significantly higher rewards.  I will provide some of these data in
>a later email.
>
>It is certainly true that unions often do promote an adversarial
>relationship, and I regret that this was your experience with the unions at
>Union Carbide and at Duke.  A union at a university may put pressure on the
>administration to change priorities and to reallocate funds, but this truly
>can be done in a way that reflects the university's highest traditions of
>civilized dialogue.  As you know, Dan, I was an administrator here at UTC
>for ten years.  I know most of the current UTC administrators.  I respect
>them as professinals, and most of them I consider to be my personal
>friends.  I don't always agree with their priorities, but they clearly are
>not the enemy.  There is a tradition at UTC of intelligent, civilized,
>respectful dialogue.  Any union we would have on this campus MUST respect
>that tradition and operate within that tradition.  I know this is not how
>unions typically operate in private industry or, tragically, at some
>universities.  But we must remember that unions are OUR tools, and we can
>make of them what we want.  I can envision a union that actually promotes
>and strengthens the very finest of our traditions at UTC.  Why not, my
>friend?  Even if it is only rarely done elsewhere, why can't we do it here?
> I think we can, and I see it as an exciting opportunity.
>
>I must respectfully disagree, Dan, with your claim that a union could
>accomplish nothing that cannot already be accomplished through the Faculty
>Council or the Employee Relations Committee.  Undoubtedly these bodies
>could function more effectively than they have thus far, but both have only
>an advisory relationship with the administration, and neither can send an
>effective message off campus.  A successful union drive at UTC, on the
>other hand, would send a very powerful message to the UT system and, most
>importantly, to the legislators in Nasville.  It would send the message
>that we simply will not be ignored any longer.
>
>You claim that instead of unionizing, we should work together to increase
>enrollments and to serve better our students and the Chattanooga community.
> You also urge us to somehow do a better job of convincing the citizens of
>Tennessee to support education.  I don't see this as an either/or
>situation, Dan.  Why don't we do it all?  I must say, however, that I think
>we are already doing a pretty darn good job of serving our students and the
>Chattanooga community, especially considering how poorly we are funded.  We
>probably can, and should, do an even better job, but I doubt whether that
>would necessarily result in more money flowing to UTC.
>
>And how are we going to do a better job of serving our clientele if we are
>losing some of our best faculty and staff?  We have already lost some very
>good people, and we are going to lose more.  Funding has deteriorated
>despite the heroic job that we are accomplishing.  I'm scared to death that
>UTC is headed for a serious decline.  The trends clearly are not in the
>right direction.  Something has to change, Dan.  Just doing a little more
>of what we have already been doing is not going to cut it.
>
>What if we had a successful union drive?  That, in itself, would send a
>powerful message to Nashville and to the citizens of Tennessee.  What if
>that union could promote a civilized dialogue that forcefully but
>respectfully galvanized and expressed the perspective of faculty and staff
>on how resources should be allocated at UTC?  And what if the union also
>helped us to more effectively communicate to the UT system, to the
>legislators in Nashville, and to the citizens of the state regarding the
>value of what UTC has to offer and why the school must be adequately
>funded?  Might not this move us in a new and more productive direction?
>
>Perhaps I'm entirely wrong, Dan.  It wouldn't be the first time.  But isn't
>the idea of a union at least worthy of serious debate?  I would hope that
>all of us -- faculty, staff, and administration -- could engage in a
>respectful dialogue about this issue.
>
>Thanks again, Dan, for sharing your views with me.  Let's keep up the
>dialogue.  I have found it immensely useful, and I hope that you and others
>have as well.
>
>Your friend,
>Lee
>
>
>Leland W. Robinson, Ph.D.
>Professor of Sociology
>Department of Sociology, Anthropology & Geography
>University of Tennessee at Chattanooga
>615 McCallie Avenue
>Chattanooga, TN 37403-2598
>   tel.:  (423) 755-4442
>   fax.:  (423) 785-2251
>   e-mail:  [log in to unmask]