Dear UC Senate Faculty Colleagues,
We are UC Senate faculty and members of the Council of University of California Faculty Associations (CUCFA) writing to ask you to sign a Pledge of Solidarity with Our Lecturer Colleagues throughout the UC system as they negotiate a new contract.
The University of California is dependent on the 6,800 lecturers it employs: they teach one-third of undergraduate hours across the system, and on some campuses more than half. Three out of four lecturers work on short-term contracts with no job stability, no fair and consistent evaluation process, and no contractual assurance that they’ll be considered for renewal. Their median annual salary is $19,067, even as UC campuses are located in regions with some of the highest costs of living in the country. Most departments would not be able to mount their curricula without the skilled labor of these dedicated educators.
The quality of undergraduate education at the University of California depends upon ALL of its faculty, lecturers included. Our lecturer colleagues’ precarious working conditions are our students’ learning conditions.
We support the lecturers’ fight to strengthen job stability, improve wages and benefits, and ensure fair compensation and workload that reflects their training, experience, and contributions to the UC. Stabilizing the teaching workforce would not only be fair and just, it also would benefit UC students who deserve this investment in high-quality education. (For more information, see UC-AFT’s campaign website.)
For the first time in over 20 years, and after 2 years of negotiations, our lecturer colleagues, represented by UC-AFT, have voted with an overwhelming majority of 96% to authorize a strike. As Senate faculty, we stand in solidarity with them.
The Pledge linked to below lays out a number of actions you can take, including honoring the lecturers’ picket line should they go out on strike. The signatories to this letter are not calling on Senate faculty to vote to strike. Rather, we want to inform you that we have a free speech and HEERA-protected right to honor our lecturer colleagues’ picket line (see FAQ).
Please click HERE to read and sign the pledge, checking the boxes indicating how you will stand in solidarity.
For more information, click on this FAQ, contact CUCFA or your Faculty Association, and check out UC-AFT’s campaign website.
With appreciation and in solidarity,
CUCFA Executive Board
Update: On Monday, September 20, CUCFA held a virtual town hall with lecturer leaders to answer any questions faculty had about a possible strike this quarter. A video of that meeting is available at: https://youtu.be/ESrHp51t4io.
Note: We are grateful for all the comments people are posting here, but doing so is not the same as filling out the official pledge form. Please do follow up by filling out the official pledge form.
I support the lecturers and their modest demands. The UC should not perpetuate an exploitative model for itself, but that is now fundamental to the way the university works.
I stand in solidarity with the lecturers and support their demands. Their work is critical to the functioning of the university and they deserve our respect and just rewards for their labor.
I stand in solidarity with lecturers.
I stand in solidarity with my faculty colleagues, the UC-AFT lecturers. Everyone will benefit when we treat them with respect and give them the rehiring rights they are requesting.
Solidarity is the most beautiful word. And our lecturers deserve it.
I stand proudly in solidarity with lecturers, who do the vital teaching, research, and service work and deserve fair compensation, benefits, and security.
I stand in solidarity with UC AFT and our lecturer colleagues
I stand in solidarity with lecturers.
I stand in solidarity with lecturers.
I stand in solidarity with our lecturer colleagues and urge the administration to negotiate in good faith towards fair compensation.
I stand in solidarity with our lecturers.
I stand in solidarity with our lecturer colleagues and urge the administration to negotiate in good faith towards fair compensation.
I stand in solidarity with our UC lecturers.
I stand in solidarity with our hardworking, committed and courageous UC lecturers.
Our lecturers serve our students daily with good faith and commitment. I stand in solidarity with them and ask the university administration show equal good faith in negotiating a just contract.
I absolutely stand in solidarity with UC lecturers. They work tirelessly to provide excellent education and support our students, in spite of shamefully low pay and employment precarity.
Our lecturers deserve institutional support, job security, and fair compensation for their labors. I stand in solidarity with them and call on the UC administration to to deal fairly and generously with them as they negotiate a new contract.
I stand in solidarity with the UC lecturers.
How do I sign? I stand with their modest demands. They will strengthen our intellectual and educational mission by encouraging more stable communities with one another and with our students.
Lecturers make a huge contribution to the University’s mission yet are expected to maintain themselves
under the most precarious financial circumstances. The University owes them the highest respect as well as
adequate remuneration for their important contributions.
I stand in solidarity with the lecturers. This job class is taken advantage of by essentially all university systems. California, as is the case with many things, should use its vast influence to initiate progress for social justice. Paying the lecturers the modest increase for which they ask should be an obvious move.
In solidarity with our lecturers.
As an alum of the UC system (PhD 2008), I know how much the work of lecturers improve the educational experiences of students. Their demands are very modest and should be met so as to make the university a place that values knowledge over exploitation.
Thank you all for your thoughts on the Senate Faculty Pledge to Stand in Solidarity with University Lecturers. Please be sure to sign the pledge. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfM5n38ZKL7KkjcKfdWJ6GeyiBnzS4L8QiQlrbaPRL62wN8PQ/viewform
I stand in solidarity with the UC lecturers.
I was on the picket lines the last time the UC-AFT struck. I was a part-time lecturer at UCSB teaching for any department that would give me a class. Now as Senate faculty at UCR, I am in full solidarity with all UC lecturers.
The UC administration is despicable and money-grubbing, exploiting workers in direct proportion to their perceived lack of political and economic power.
I stand in solidarity with the UC lecturers. They play a vital and determining pedagogical role for our undergraduate and graduate students and programs. We are deeply indebted to them and the contributions they offer to the university community.
I stand in solidarity with our lecturers .
I stand in solidarity with our lecturers. They play a vital and growing role in undergraduate and graduate education.
I stand in solidarity with our lecturers.
I stand in solidarity with the lecturers.
I stand in solidarity with the lecturers who are exploited and subjected to poverty wages and forced to join the increasing masses of the precariat.
Shafting lecturers continually means devaluing the educational project in the US as a whole, and reflects our cultural misalignment with the ‘business ontology’ as well as our rampant anti-intellectualism.
I stand in solidarity with the lecturers.
I stand in solidarity with the lecturers.