Below is a letter that CUCFA President Constance Penley sent to Academic Senate Chair Mary Gauvain about her letter in opposition to Assembly Bill 1550, legislation that CUCFA supports:
Dear Chair Gauvain,
I write to you about your letter to Assemblymember Jim Cooper in opposition to AB-1550 because I want to understand the concerns you express in that letter. You may remember that the Academic Senate created the Faculty Associations to serve as its political arm. The FAs and the AS work best when they agree. The FAs support AB-1550. I would be happy to meet with you and Vice Chair Horwitz to discuss our differences and more fully understand your concerns.
One concern you raised was that AB-1550 threatens shared governance because “Senate members would then potentially be in the untenable position of having AS faculty, who manage and supervise instructors, represented alongside these same non-AS instructors.” But the AS already comprises faculty who manage and supervise other AS faculty. Faculty serve as department chairs and on promotion committees all the time and still coexist with other Senate faculty in the department they chair or to whom they have granted or denied promotion.
Another issue was that instructors “serve a different function than AS faculty.” This claim presupposes that the sole purpose of AB-1550 is to move lecturers into the Academic Senate, but the bill’s language does not mention lecturers. The purpose of the bill is to allow unionized workers to retain their union representation if the university moves them into the Academic Senate. The Regents should only add appropriate job titles to Standing Order 105.1a, but that is an issue to be taken up with the Regents and is not relevant to a discussion of AB-1550. Moreover, lecturers with security of employment are already members of the AS, so there is no way to draw a general distinction between lecturers and the Academic Senate.
Finally, you voice concern with the language in AB-1550 that would prevent UC from creating new job titles with substantially similar duties as represented employees. You say this would “put the Senate in permanent stasis, prohibiting its ability to modify eligibility.” But it does not do this. If UC and the AS want to modify eligibility, they can do so. The only new limit is on creating a new eligibility category that is the same as an existing class. In that case, the remedy is simple–just add that class into the AS (they would, of course, bring their union representation with them). This language is only in the bill to prevent UC from creating a new, unrepresented job title that did the same work as a represented class of employees as a way to eliminate union representation.
I think the concerns you listed in your letter bear further discussion. I would like you to reconsider the letter you wrote in opposition to AB-1550. Again, I would be happy to discuss this issue with you further.
Sincerely,
Constance Penley,
President, Council of UC Faculty Associations
and Professor of Film and Media Studies, UCSB