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The small liberal arts college is calling for a mediator, but the union wants Wellesley “to show up more often at the bargaining table and justify their positions.”
More than 100 educators at Wellesley College are striking, causing credit confusion for students while the college is calling on the union to sit down with a mediator.
The union voted to authorize their strike to begin on March 27 after nearly a year of failed bargaining. Now, it says the administration has been “surface bargaining.”
Non-tenure track faculty at the small liberal arts college initially voted to unionize as the Wellesley Organized Academic Workers, or WOAW with the United Auto Workers, in January of last year.
Annie Brubaker, a senior lecturer at Wellesley and a member of the WOAW organizing committee, said the union is bargaining for job security, increased compensation, and a four-course workload.
“They’ve held on to many articles without responding to them for many months. They come to the table without clear justifications for why they are taking the position that they’re taking,” Brubaker said. “It feels like they’re deliberately slowing down the process.”
A spokesperson for Wellesley College said the college proposed mediation on March 26, but the union chose instead to strike.
“We believe the union’s strike is premature, and are disappointed that they are denying students the opportunity to attend their usual classes,” Wellesley said in an issued statement. In a strike update, college leaders wrote that “a mediator could help move the negotiations forward more quickly by engaging in ongoing ‘shuttle diplomacy’ between the two sides.”
Brubaker said “we don’t feel we need a third party to come in and help us move toward each other.”
“We need the college to show up more often at the bargaining table and justify their positions,” Brubaker said.
After an unsuccessful bargaining session Monday, the two sides won’t return to the table until Thursday, she said.
Non-tenure track faculty want increased pay, job security, set workload
WOAW is fighting to keep a four-course workload, while the college is insisting on a five-course workload proposal. In an update Monday, Wellesley College said five courses is “consistent with the standard workload at peer institutions.”
WOAW is also bargaining to increase salaries for the non-tenure track faculty, whose starting salaries were frozen at $55,000 from 2008 to 2020. The union is also asking for “just cause” to be required if any union members would be terminated.
“We don’t have opportunities like tenure track faculty do to increase our salary over time,” Brubaker said, adding that “currently they have all the power to say, ‘oh, we just don’t want you to stay around anymore.’”
The college said the union’s compensation proposal isn’t supported by market data and eliminates the difference between tenure-track and non-tenure track faculty compensation.
“Tenure track and tenured faculty teach four courses, and, unlike NTT faculty, they undertake extensive research to meet the high standards for tenure and take on major service roles, such as chairing their departments,” the strike update said.
How is the strike impacting Wellesley students?
When the strike was announced, Brubaker said, the college immediately told students they could be at risk of not receiving full credit for their classes, instructing them to re-enroll in different classes. Credit issues could affect graduation and immigration, Brubaker said.
Some professors offered independent studies or opened their ongoing classes to students affected at the college’s request, while others said, “No way, I’m not scabbing,” Brubaker said.
“They immediately put the students in the middle of this, and were, it seemed, planning for a long term strike,” Brubaker said of the administration. The union has filed an Unfair Labor Practice complaint with the National Labor Relations Board, alleging that the college has not been bargaining in good faith.
A spokesperson for the college confirmed that the strike has affected credit hours for students, which could threaten federal financial aid and visa eligibility. The college is offering 0.5-credit courses, the spokesperson said, to help students end this semester with enough credits.
“If the strike ends quickly enough, students will not need to remain enrolled in these new classes. They will be able to return to their original classes and earn full credit,” the college said. “It is our hope that the strike will be of short duration. The College remains committed to working hard to reach agreement at the bargaining table, and several bargaining sessions are already scheduled for the coming weeks.”
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