After a year's hiatus, the Peerpoint! is back. Three issues are planned for the fall semester and three for the spring. This issue's topic is Meet and Confer; i.e., our negotiations with the Administration, which is acting on behalf of the Board, concerning the RFP (Residential Faculty Policies). We invite your comments concerning the articles in the Peerpoint and issues you think we should cover. Space allowing, letters to the editor will be included in future issues. Also, if you have issues or concerns about Meet & Confer, in particular, please consider taking them directly to your campus senate. Then your campus representatives can bring them to the Faculty Executive Council for consideration for inclusion among the proposals for this year's negotiations. Let us hear from you!
MCCCD FACULTY ASSOCIATION 1999-2000 OFFICERS
WILLIE MINOR, PRESIDENT
ROSEMARY KESLER, PRESIDENT-ELECT
TOM BUTLER, SECRETARY
MARK RICHARD, TREASURER
GAY GARESCHE, PEERPOINT EDITOR
FACULTY ASSOCIATION OFFICE PHONE.....(480)731-8113
WONDERING WHERE YOUR 1999-2000 RFP IS?
Each year's newly revised RFP (Residential Faculty Policies) is typically available by now. Once it has been ratified by the faculty and accepted by the Board, as it was last May, the District prints it. Printing has been held up this year because of unilateral changes made to the RFP during preparation for printing by the District Administration, discovered by the Executive Council in July. Further investigation by the Executive Council secretary, Carrie Taylor, uncovered other unilateral changes made in the 1998-1999 RFP.
Most of the changes made outside of the Meet and Confer (M&C) process were related to Appendix B on Leaves of Absences (LOAs). During the Spring semester of 1998, the two faculty members on EBAC (Employee Benefits Advisory Committee) reported that the Administration wanted to change all employee groups' Leave of Absence policies so that they would be uniform. The Executive Council initially resisted, but ultimately agreed to the changes as long as the LOA policy remained in the RFP. The Council felt this was important for two reasons; 1) any further changes would have to be negotiated as part of the M&C process, and 2) any faculty member who felt the policy was not executed correctly could grieve it as a violation of the RFP.
Within months, the Administration proposed to the Board that the LOA policy be changed again, this time to correspond with the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA). That Act says that employees returning from a LOA must be returned to the same or an equivalent position. The wording of the RFP stated, as recently as the 1997-98 version, that a faculty member must be returned to the same position. The Administration changed the RFP to say that returning faculty would be returned to the same or equivalent position. This is an important difference. It seems credible that the Administration would regard a teaching position at any college within the District to be equivalent. Most faculty would not agree - they would want to be returned to their original campus. Furthermore, there is no necessity that the wording in the RFP exactly mirror that in the FMLA. The District must meet the language in the Act as a minimum, but is allowed to return faculty to the same position they previously held if the District chooses.
To make this change in the wording of the RFP, the Administration should have presented it as a proposal in the Meet & Confer process where it could have been negotiated. Instead, the only proposal the Administration team put forward last year was a request to remove the word, "pregnancy," as is required by law, from the RFP wording on disabilities.
Even correction of the unilateral changes to the RFP does not end this matter. The Administration has informed the Faculty Association President of its intention to decide other employee policy issues in the EBAC on which all employee groups have equal representation, and decisions are made by majority vote. The RFP stipulates in Appendix F that all faculty policies that are to be aligned with the policies of other employee groups and which are to be put in the Common Policies require the convening of the Common Policies Committee. This committee has representatives from all District employee groups. However, nothing goes into the Common Policies unless the committee is unanimous in its decision to make the change. Hence, every employee group has a veto. Seemingly, it is the Administration's intent to shift these decisions from a committee on which faculty have a veto to a committee on which faculty can be out-voted.
Until these issues are resolved, there may be a little wait until the new RFPs are printed and the new web copy is made available.
THE 1998-1999 RFP IS STILL AVAILABLE ON THE WEB AT:
www.dist.maricopa.edu/org/faculty
The link is in the burgundy sidebar towards the bottom.
Meet This Year's Meet & Confer Team
Janice Comer of Mesa Community College is the Chair. The rest of the team members are; Rosemary Kesler of Gateway Community College (also Faculty Executive Council President-Elect), Linda Larson of Mesa Community College, Denny Sheehan of Phoenix College, and Larry Williams of Scottsdale Community College.
Unfinished Business
There were several proposals made by faculty last year in the Meet & Confer (M&C) process on which there was no agreement. One proposal was to stop the practice of allowing classes with low enrollment to go forward, if the faculty member accepts a reduced load for the course. For example, if a course which could have as many as 20 students has only 10 students enrolled, the section would not be canceled if the instructor agreed to accept 1.5 hours loading for the course, rather than 3. This practice is allowed experimentally, according to the RFP, in occupational programs, interdisciplinary programs or other specialized programs. In practice, it occurs in established programs, primarily in classes taught by probationary and adjunct faculty, who are in no position to say no.
The administration M&C team argued that this is typically done for courses that would be part of an instructor's overload. However, consider the following scenario. Suppose an instructor typically teaches five three hour courses as his/her semester load. If one of the sections has low enrollment, the instructor might be asked to accept a reduced loading of 1.5 hours for the course. That could mean the required 15 hour per semester load is not met, so the instructor has to accept an overload course. It then might easily appear that the reduced loading is for the overload course, when the overload would not have been necessary but for the reduced loading.
Most appointive (tenured) faculty would not accept such an offer since it would mean teaching six classes, rather than five. However, many probationary faculty members would feel that they must accept what amounts to forced or pressured overtime since it is their supervisor that is making the request.
The faculty M&C team, on instructions from the Executive Council, offered a compromise on this issue. Rather than eliminate the practice, faculty were willing to allow it to continue as long as the Faculty Senate President of the campus was informed that such a request had been made and accepted. The hope was that faculty would be in a better position to gauge the extent to which this RFP provision was being abused. The administration team did not accept this compromise.
Under these circumstances, faculty's best alternative is to fall back on strict enforcement of the current RFP wording. The RFP, in 5.3.4, requires that experimental loading be approved by the Vice Chancellor Academic and Student Development in consultation with the Vice Chancellor Quality and Employee Development. In the absence of that approval, incidences of reduced loading should be grieved.
Occupational Program Coordinators
Another proposal discussed in the Meet & Confer process last year related to Occupational Program Coordinators. The faculty proposal had two parts. First, it requested that the title, Occupational Program Coordinator, be changed to Occupational Program Director. Second, it requested that the way Program Coordinators are compensated be changed.
The rationale for the change in title was that these faculty members often must meet with prospective employers of the programs' students. These employers expect to make arrangements with individuals who can speak for the college and/or district. While Program Coordinators can do this, the name, directors, conveys this authority better than coordinators does.
Initially, the administration M&C team was receptive to this change. Later they demurred. They indicated that there are "directors" among MAT employees who have higher salaries, and that this would be problematic. Since faculty have their own salary scale, the source of the problem was not clear. There was no further movement on this part of the proposal.
The second part of this proposal had to do with how Program Coordinators are compensated. The RFP states in D.2.1. that "faculty members who are responsible for coordinating approved occupational programs may receive remuneration or reassigned time as determined by the College President." Since Program Coordinators typically do create schedules, staff sections, evaluate adjunct faculty and carry out other administrative functions, it seemed appropriate that they be assured of compensation and that there should be more uniformity in the way Coordinators are compensated.
Last year's proposal laid out a system that would compensate Coordinators by the number of programs administered. Unfortunately, this would have rendered a change in the RFP in which it would have been possible for both the chairperson and the program coordinator to be compensated for the same program. Currently, the chairperson cannot receive compensation as both chair and Program Coordinator (as per RFP; D.2.3). Not surprisingly, the administration M&C team rejected this proposal out-of-hand.
If faculty resubmit this proposal, it might be better to propose compensating Coordinators by the number of course sections administered, rather than by the number of programs administered. Such a change would not eliminate RFP; D.2.3., and therefore corrects for the possibility that both the Chairperson and Coordinator would be compensated. It has the additional advantage of automatically adjusting compensation for the size of the program.
Clearly, faculty will have to rethink our strategy if we choose to pursue this issue.
...Other Unfinished Business...
Here are a few other issues that faculty proposed last year, but which remain unresolved:
This Issue Can't Be Ignored
Members of the Professional Growth Committee have appealed again to the Faculty Executive Council to ask in Meet & Confer for District compensation for their members. The ProGro members have a particularly heavy workload evaluating sabbatical, summer project and travel requests. Some committee members receive reassigned time paid for by their campus administrations. The feeling of the committee is that District should pay for this district-wide administrative function, and that fairness and uniformity is what is required.
Thanks Due to Ron Hill
The Faculty Executive Council would like to extend its thanks to Ron Hill for his years of service as Chairman of the Professional Growth Committee. Thanks, Ron!
FYI
When you receive your 1999-2000 RFP, please look at Appendix E, which shows the faculty salary table. (Admit it. You always look at that first.) You will see that there are two columns numbering the salary steps. One column is numbered from zero to eleven, and is the numbering system used in RFPs for the last several years. The second column is numbered from one to twelve, and is the numbering system which will be used in all future RFPs. This change was required to accommodate the Peoplesoft human resources computer system adopted by the District this year. The Peoplesoft system does not allow a zero step. The Faculty Executive Council has asked President Willie Minor to ask the District administration to send faculty a new Residential Faculty Contract that shows the faculty member's step relative to the new numbering system.
Confusion In the Faculty Ranks
This year all District employees received a 2% salary increase. With respect to faculty salaries, this was a particularly good 2% in that it was calculated as a percent of each faculty member's salary, rather than as a percent of the base faculty salary.
Faculty at the top of the pay scale have been inquiring about the additional 1% for District employees called "redliners". Apparently, top step faculty assumed that this increase was to be a repeat of the increase that they received on July 1, 1997. In fact, there are no "redline" faculty members. This term refers to non-faculty employees who have had a reassignment that puts their salary outside of the usual pay scales. Hence, top step faculty did not receive an additional 1% this year.
Here's An Idea Or Two!