FACE Bill: A Call for Solidarity

Editor's Note: Please welcome Jennie Smith from Philadelphia Community College to FACE Talk as our newest contributor. As you can see from her first post, she is a committed contingent faculty member activist who is working hard on staffing issues and we are glad to have her perspective and contributions.

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At a time in PA when we have FACE bills introduced in the House and Senate and are hopefully poised to get some legislation passed, I am dismayed at the lack of solidarity among higher education’s part-time and full-time faculty. We are ready to make some real progress with this legislation, and in-fighting is not going to help our cause. We need to be the “union” that we profess to be. Part-time faculty deserve parity, but we also need to demand that more full-time faculty positions be created. Let’s not advocate giving up an obvious gain to our faculty; that’s the administration’s usual stance—not the union’s.

I am a part-time faculty member and have been involved in the parity movement from its inception in PA. I was an organizer of the part-time faculty at Bucks County Community College, negotiated the first contract for part-time faculty at Bucks, and served there as a union leader.  Currently, I am Secretary of the Faculty and Staff Federation of Community College of Philadelphia and a part-time faculty member at that college. I worked on the parity issue with leaders from Bucks County Community College, Montgomery County Community College, Community College of Philadelphia and Temple University. I was a speaker at AFT PA conferences and was the 1998 AFL-CIO Labor Day speaker to promote the issue of parity. Throughout my career as a union leader, the full-time faculty with whom I worked was instrumental in helping the part-time leaders at critical junctions.

When we organized the part-time faculty at Bucks, the advice of the full-time faculty who helped us was indispensable and the risks they took to help us were commendable.  When we negotiated our first contract, we needed their guidance and experience. They spent many hours at the bargaining table with us fighting for a contract that was not theirs. When writing the parity legislation, full-time faculty from all of those colleges met repeatedly with and advised the part-time leaders at a point when the only issue on the table was parity for part-timers.  I was amazed at their commitment on an issue which did not involve them directly.  Through these full-time faculty members, I learned what it was to be in a union.  Solidarity and concern for the working conditions of all is essential to that union's progress.  Anyone who does not think that way is not worthy of being in a union and is a liability to that union.

The part-time faculty needs the support of the full-time faculty, and they need ours to accomplish our joint goals. The FACE legislation should help both groups equally. The AFT has done its job to advance the needs of all its higher education faculty members with this legislation. I would expect nothing less from such a democratic, fair organization. The bill is a comprehensive remedy to the abuses and cost-saving measures that have been taken in higher education to the detriment of all faculty. The issues that face full-time and part-time faculty are inseparable, and the legislation is essential for students to be served by a faculty who are a well-paid and stable workforce, and who are invested in the college where they teach.

This tactic of divide and conquer is what administrators use to cause faculty to be their own worst enemy.  It causes dissension and loss of momentum.  Legislation that includes all faculty is only fair because this is a two-sided issue.

It is naive to think that without a steady majority of full-time faculty at a college, the administration will not gain an upper hand over faculty in general, especially over a part-time faculty who often has other jobs, and whose members come and go. When we organized the part-time faculty at Bucks, some part-time faculty who were not dependent on the income, did not have enough interest to join the union, let alone support a strike, lead the union, or back union leaders. It is this group of part-time faculty, those with outside jobs or interests, which the administration is quick to point to when parity is discussed. Therefore, those part-time faculty who do depend on their pay as part-time teachers need those full-time faculty who also have everything invested in the college.

We need them to hold the union together with us, hold the governance structure together with us, and to join with us when we defend our rights in negotiations. In fact, it's these fully-committed full-time faculty and fully-committed part-time faculty who can be the best allies because they both place demands on the administration for better pay, benefits and working conditions. The part-time faculty often needs the strength of the full-time faculty's numbers, yet another argument for increasing the amount of full-time faculty.

At union meetings, approximately 90% of the faculty in attendance is full-time faculty, along with a few committed part-time faculty members. The rest of the part-time faculty either cannot attend the meetings because of other jobs or classes, or they are not interested. That's just the reality. Breaking ties with these equally committed full-time faculty would be cutting off the part-time faculty’s main support, and not being concerned about the dwindling number of full-time faculty would weaken the role all faculty have.

All part-time faculty, whether the college is their main source of income or not, deserve parity.  However, those who will make progress happen will be the fully-committed faculty, part-time and full-time.  They have the motivation, they will do the work, and they will bring the others along, but they need each other's support.

By being short-sighted, demanding parity and letting the full-time faculty’s numbers decrease, we would be subjugating ourselves to the administration in the long run.  Excuse the analogy, but does this not sound like selling your soul to the devil:  sure you have more cash, but at what cost ethically or politically?