Chris Hachey on London Fuse
On Wednesay, at 12:01 A.M., the UWOFA may decide to officially go on strike. UWOFA represents all full-time non-clinical faculty members, and all part-time non-clinical faculty members teaching a minimum of one full course. What this means is, for the most part, classes will be cancelled for thousands of UWO students.
The UWOFA, who have been negotiating since May, and without contracts since June, are disputing with the UWO Administration over sweeping and monumental changes to how professors will have to behave, and how students will learn in their classrooms.
As posted on the UWOFA website:
The UWO Administration has proposed a series of linked articles that would institute ‘performance management’ techniques governing Academic Responsibilities, Conflict of Interest and Conflict of Commitment, Annual Performance Evaluation, Sabbatical Leave, and Discipline. One aspect of this chain of links amounts ultimately to a post-tenure review [by four unelected senior administrators], leading to possible dismissal. There also would be reporting requirements of all outside activities for Full and Part-Time Faculty, giving the Employer monitoring and control of all our professional lives, including parts not covered by Academic Responsibilities.
Many professors, students, and other members of the faculty believe these measures are being put into place in order to ensure that the faculty adheres to regulated educational materials and administrative ideologies.
James Compton, the UWO Faculty Association head, said the following:
People whose jobs are less secure are less willing to speak out, and that, in turn, weakens a central purpose of a university…It isn’t about money, it’s about a concern over performance management techniques that are foreign to Canadian scholarship and best practices generally…Peer review and self-governance took a long time to get right, and we have that at Western and good universities have that — it’s what marks universities off from high schools.
While we often see strikes happening over the issue of wages, what we have instead is a fight for not only the basic tenets the post-secondary educational system, but also those of every citizen: freedom of speech. Professors who refuse to teach the recommended textbooks and course outlines may face reprimand by the hands of the administration, and they will fear involving themselves in extracurricular activities (like the amazing pot luck I had with my class at my professor’s house last weekend) because they will have to explain why they did it, and why it was crucial to the course.
While many students are frustrated over the possibility of a strike, and what it can mean for their academic year, hopefully they are informed enough to realize that this fight is as much for them as it is for the professors.
