Duration
Contract imposed January 4
Expiration on June 30, 2020.
Tentative CBA obtained by negotiations February 10
Technically, there will be two CBAs: first expires June 30, 2020; second expires June 30, 2023. For practical purposes, this will amount to a single CBA expiring on June 30, 2023.
Workload
Contract imposed January 4
Our workload agreements were nullified, leaving the admin/board with unlimited rights to assign workloads to faculty in any way they wanted.
Tentative CBA obtained by negotiations February 10
Our workload agreements stand as they are. Likewise, the workload article in the CBA itself will be unchanged from the 2014-2017 CBA.
Merit Pay
Contract imposed January 4
Merit pay could have been given to any BUFM with a
2.0 overall annual evaluation score, a standard met by nearly all BUFMs. Otherwise, whether a BUFM got merit pay or not, and if so how much, would have been totally controlled by chairs and deans.
Tentative CBA obtained by negotiations February 10
The merit pay system in the 2014-2017 CBA remains intact. Annual evaluation scores – obtained by comparison of one’s performance to criteria in bylaws – determine merit raises, not the whim of administrators.
NTE Promotion and Job Security
Contract imposed January 4
Continuing appointments (i.e., good job security) would have been awarded only to those who had been promoted to the highest available rank (Senior Lecturer or Clinical Assistant Professor) and had served at least nine years. For most NTEs, those two requirements would have made a continuing appointment impossible without twelve years of service.
Tentative CBA obtained by negotiations February 10
Continuing appointments remain as they were in the 2014-2017 CBA, except that one additional year of service (seven years altogether) will be permitted for fixed-term appointments. This change will only apply to NTE faculty who sign an initial offer letter after April 1, 2019; so, no change applies to current NTEs. Even with the change, our CBA provides the best-in-the-US job security for NTE faculty.
Health Care
Contract imposed January 4
The imposed contract gave the admin/board total control over our health care benefits. De facto we would have ceded our legal right to negotiate health care benefits, and the admin/board could have worsened the plans as much as they wanted, as often as they wanted, restricted only by law.
Tentative CBA obtained by negotiations February 10
Specific CBA language will ensure our ongoing right to negotiate health care.
Effective April 1, 2019, BUFMs will have the same health care plans as those that were available to other employees on January 1, 2019; these plans cannot be changed through December 31, 2020. The admin/board will continue to provide two medical plans.
After December 31, 2020, cumulative increases through June 30, 2023 in monthly premiums and out-of-pocket maximums will be limited to 35%.
Furloughs
Contract imposed January 4
Furloughs, a.k.a. Cost Savings Days, could have been assigned provided other WSU employees were furloughed, but otherwise restricted only by the University’s general furlough policy – which can be changed instantly and arbitrarily by the admin/board. Furloughs notwithstanding, BUFMs’ work responsibilities would not have been lessened at all.
Tentative CBA obtained by negotiations February 10
The number of furlough days will be limited to at most one day per semester.
Summer Teaching
Contract imposed January 4
BUFMs’ summer teaching rights were totally eliminated. Summer teaching would have been controlled completely by chairs and deans, so (for example) all summer teaching could have been given to adjuncts.
Tentative CBA obtained by negotiations February 10
BUFMs’ summer teaching rights remain as they are in the 2014-2017 CBA. However, the pay rate drops from 1/36th of the academic year base salary per credit hour taught to 1/45th in summers of 2019 and 2020, 1/44th in 2021, 1/43rd in in 2022, and 1/42nd in 2023.
Raises
Contract imposed January 4
Promotion raises and minimum salaries remained as they were in the 2014-2017 CBA. Otherwise, there would have been no raises for the 1 ½ year duration of the contract (through June 30, 2020.
Tentative CBA obtained by negotiations February 10
For the academic year 2021-2022: 2 ½ % across the board and 3% increase in minimum salary scales; for the academic year 2022-2023: 2 ½ % across the board, 1% merit, and 4% increase in minimum salary scales. Promotion raises remain as they are in the 2014-2017 CBA.
About Retrenchment: even in the contract imposed on January 4, the admin/board agreed to keep the provisions in the 2014-2017 CBA. However, had we accepted the January 4 imposition, it is very likely that the board/admin would have gone after retrenchment again in the next round of negotiations, which would have been started less than a year from now.