Author: Scott Hannahs

On Monday after an olympic style, five-hour marathon bargaining session, our 16th, the UFF and Board of Trustees came to an agreement on changes to the collective bargaining agreement. Here are the five signed tentative agreement documents.

Opened at the behest of the Board of Trustees bargaining team, “Article 10 Performance Evaluations” with modifications for Post Tenure Review and “Article 21 Other Faculty Rights” with modifications for building air quality maintenance.

Opened by request of the UFF-FSU chapter Negotiating Team, “Article 20 Grievances and Arbitration” with modifications for new Florida Statute prohibiting arbitration in most cases and “Article 22 Sabbatical and Professional Development Leave” to allow non-teaching specialized faculty to take PDL in smaller time periods.

And of course “Article 23 Salaries” which is opened every year as required by the Collective Bargaining Agreement. These articles must be approved by a vote of the faculty and signed by the president to become part of the contract for this 2024-2025 academic year. A full summary of the changes bargained on your behalf will be forthcoming soon.

Your UFF-FSU Bargaining Team

The next step is to ratify the Collective Bargaining Agreement. You will soon receive and email with voting instructions. A copy of the entire contract with changes is here for viewing.

COVID Impact Bargaining Update

Dear Colleagues,

The BOT and UFF have come to agreement on a new Covid-19 Memorandum of Understanding to cover the period ending August 6, 2021.  The particulars are similar to those in the agreement that covered Spring 2021.  Thus, faculty still may request remote assignments, course content and course delivery materials will still be treated like any other faculty-created materials, SPCI will be administered, and the impact of the pandemic on research will be considered in evaluations through 2023.

Some differences also appear. While the default for service assignments is still that they may be conducted remotely, the Dean can specify they be conducted in person.  And while Assistant Professors employed in Spring 2020 are automatically granted a tenure-clock extension, those hired later must request an extension. In those cases, the MOU specifies that the pandemic constitutes a “personal qualifying circumstance” that applies to the provision in 15.2(f)4: “Extension of Tenure-Earning Period for Personal Circumstances.  . . . A faculty member may request an extension of one year from the chair with the approval of the president and dean or representative due to qualifying personal circumstances, before being considered for tenure.”

We are engaging in regular bargaining Wednesday this week from 2:00 to 5:00, and we would be pleased to have you join us.  Just respond to this note and we’ll send you the Zoom link.

As always, our strength in bargaining depends on our numbers.  If you are a member, thank you; it you are not, please join!  You can find the form here.

All best,
Irene Padavic and Scott Hannahs
Co-Chief Negotiators, UFF-FSU

On Wednesday, the BOT and the UFF teams met, and the UFF took the occasion to remind the BOT that our 2019 negotiations called for making last year’s $1,500 bonus a permanent base pay increase if certain budget conditions were met, which they were. We were pleased the next day to see President Thrasher’s email announcing the raise, and are proud of having negotiated the language that made the raise a reality.

During the session, we reviewed the BOT’s proposed revisions to the Covid-19 Memorandum of Understandingand are unhappy to report that negotiations are going backwards. Language both teams had agreed to in the spring MOU and had remained intact in BOT’s early August proposal is gone, replaced with language that removes faculty autonomy.  Here’s an example:

BOT’s earlier language: “During the emergency period, faculty members shall be permitted to work remotely, provided that the assigned duties are able to be accomplished remotely.”

We have two bits of news to report from this week’s bargaining.  The main topic was the BOT’s counterproposal on Article 13, Layoffs.  The teams also agreed to sign a Memorandum of Agreement guaranteeing that Promotion increases and Sustained Performance Increases will go through in early August, regardless of the status of on-going negotiations.

Guaranteed Promotion and SPI raises are great news that will allow many faculty to heave sighs of relief. Unfortunately, the BOT proposal on the Layoffs and Recall article will not have the same effect.  

You can find that proposal here.  While this document does not show changes from the UFF’s most recent proposal because the BOT did not use traditional legislative markup style (track changes), we will provide that version upon request. It’s clear that the BOT responded to none of our proposals but instead rewrote the article from scratch to include only their desired terms. Below we summarize three key differences between the BOT proposal and the language that has been in place for years.