ca-aaup official documents and resolutions
STATEMENT in SUPPORT OF UC WORKERS
The executive board of the California Conference of the American Association of University Professors expresses unconditional support for the just demands of our colleagues and friends of the Union of Professional and Technical Employees (UPTE-CWA) and American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME). These are the people who supply the labor and technical support that enables faculty to carry out the educational mission of the University of California.
For too long, the Board of Regents and the upper levels of the UC administration have pitted professors, staff, and students against one another. Despite this, UC faculty, students and staff are learning to come together and support one another in tackling the serious problems they face with our system of higher education in California. We stand with the fundamental unity that binds us together in all sectors of California Higher Education, and we tell UC Administrators this simple truth about their staff:
They Do The Work! Without them, there is no University of California.
Issued by the Executive Board of the CA-AAUP
March 26, 2019
The executive board of the California Conference of the American Association of University Professors expresses unconditional support for the just demands of our colleagues and friends of the Union of Professional and Technical Employees (UPTE-CWA) and American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME). These are the people who supply the labor and technical support that enables faculty to carry out the educational mission of the University of California.
For too long, the Board of Regents and the upper levels of the UC administration have pitted professors, staff, and students against one another. Despite this, UC faculty, students and staff are learning to come together and support one another in tackling the serious problems they face with our system of higher education in California. We stand with the fundamental unity that binds us together in all sectors of California Higher Education, and we tell UC Administrators this simple truth about their staff:
They Do The Work! Without them, there is no University of California.
Issued by the Executive Board of the CA-AAUP
March 26, 2019
CA-AAUP Supports Proposals Reining in For-Profit Education & the Privatization of Public Higher Education
Feb. 27, 2019. Sacramento, CA --The California Conference of the American Association of University Professors (CA AAUP), representing over 1,750 faculty in the state, has announced support for proposals aimed at restoring regulations on for-profit colleges amid federal rollbacks and deregulation.
The principles proposed in a package in the CA Assembly are designed to counteract the anti-student agenda of the Trump Administration by reining in privatization in CA higher education.
“We applaud the proposed commitments to regulate for-profit higher education by implementing state-level gainful employment protections, forcing non-state institutions to comply with state consumer protections, exposing the non-profit camouflage of for-profit universities, barring false advertising, and disqualifying accrediting agencies that include college owners and investors on their boards,” said Claudio Fogu, President of the California AAUP.
Fogu added, “We equally favor measures designed to reduce students' financial burdens and risks by prohibiting colleges from requiring students to sign away certain legal rights when they enroll and by allowing students to be reimbursed for expenses beyond tuition if they are victims of predatory schools.”
The California Conference of the AAUP is a faculty organization committed to the advancement of academic freedom, shared governance, economic security in the profession, and higher education as a public good.
letters in support of wright state university faculty
The California Conference of the American Association of University Professors (CA-AAUP) stands in solidarity with the striking faculty of the American Association of University Professors-Wright State University (AAUP-WSU). Your fight is a fight for your students' education and for the continued existence of public higher education as a common good. We are dismayed that administrators at your institution refuse to negotiate in good faith and are instead using deceptive and coercive tactics to weaken support for the strike among faculty, students, and the Dayton, Ohio, community (e.g., running classes with scab faculty unfamiliar with the curriculum; threatening loss of financial aid to students who fail to attend class; filing an unfair labor practice claim to seize faculty intellectual property). Such tactics are unacceptable in an institution of higher learning. At the same time, we are heartened by the broad support you have received from your students, the local community, and other members of the higher-education community in Ohio and beyond. We recognize how crucial your struggle is to the future of public and private higher education in the United States, and we will support your strike until you achieve the resolution that your collective-bargaining chapter finds acceptable.
Issued by
The Executive Board of the CA-AAUP
26 January 2019
Issued by
The Executive Board of the CA-AAUP
26 January 2019
January 13, 2019
To: Wright State University President Cheryl Schrader
Dear President Schrader,
The California Conference of the American Association of University Professors (CA-AAUP),
representing over 1700 university faculty in California, is gravely concerned about WSU’s
unilateral imposition of a contract on full-time teaching faculty represented by AAUP-WSU. The
unilateral imposition was based on a 2017 Fact Finder report that painted a hyperbolically bleak
picture of the state of the university which was rejected by 97.5% of WSU faculty.
An analysis of publicly available financial data confirms that all of WSU’s budget problems are
self-created and due to bad management of resources by the Board of Trustees. In addition,
compensation and benefits of the full-time teaching faculty constitute 17% of the university’s
budget. So, spending on faculty lines has clearly not created the budget problems and those
problems cannot be solved in any significant way by a punitive contract with faculty.
Your faculty has shown a willingness to share in carrying a part of the burden the Board of
Trustees and your administration have created by offering a menu of permanent and shortterm
financial concessions. You have chosen to ignore them and have now imposed a contract
that shows no appreciation for your faculty and only displays a desire to unload the burden of
administrative and Board mistakes on them, using the mess you and the Board of Trustees have
created as a justification.
We strongly invite you to rescind your irresponsible decision and invite AAUP-WSU back to the
table of negotiation.
Sincerely,
Claudio Fogu
President CA-AAUP
Mary Ann Irwin, Secretary/Treasurer
Jesse Drew (VP for University of California)
Steve Filling (California Faculty Association South)
Antonio Gallo California Faculty Association South)
Katie Graham (VP for California Community Colleges)
Rosalinda Quintanar (VP for California State University)
Alex Zukas (VP for Private Universities and Colleges)
To: Wright State University President Cheryl Schrader
Dear President Schrader,
The California Conference of the American Association of University Professors (CA-AAUP),
representing over 1700 university faculty in California, is gravely concerned about WSU’s
unilateral imposition of a contract on full-time teaching faculty represented by AAUP-WSU. The
unilateral imposition was based on a 2017 Fact Finder report that painted a hyperbolically bleak
picture of the state of the university which was rejected by 97.5% of WSU faculty.
An analysis of publicly available financial data confirms that all of WSU’s budget problems are
self-created and due to bad management of resources by the Board of Trustees. In addition,
compensation and benefits of the full-time teaching faculty constitute 17% of the university’s
budget. So, spending on faculty lines has clearly not created the budget problems and those
problems cannot be solved in any significant way by a punitive contract with faculty.
Your faculty has shown a willingness to share in carrying a part of the burden the Board of
Trustees and your administration have created by offering a menu of permanent and shortterm
financial concessions. You have chosen to ignore them and have now imposed a contract
that shows no appreciation for your faculty and only displays a desire to unload the burden of
administrative and Board mistakes on them, using the mess you and the Board of Trustees have
created as a justification.
We strongly invite you to rescind your irresponsible decision and invite AAUP-WSU back to the
table of negotiation.
Sincerely,
Claudio Fogu
President CA-AAUP
Mary Ann Irwin, Secretary/Treasurer
Jesse Drew (VP for University of California)
Steve Filling (California Faculty Association South)
Antonio Gallo California Faculty Association South)
Katie Graham (VP for California Community Colleges)
Rosalinda Quintanar (VP for California State University)
Alex Zukas (VP for Private Universities and Colleges)
Joint statement with cucfa in support of UC-FTA Unit 17 demands for recognition of UC librarians' academic freedom
August 18, 2018
President Janet Napolitano
University of California
1111 Franklin St., 12th Floor
Oakland, CA 94607
Email: president@ucop.edu
Joint statement by CUCFA and CA-AAUP:
On July 26, 2018 UC negotiators rejected a proposal by the UC-AFT Unit 17 that academic freedom be
recognized as a right of all UC librarians as academic employees. UC negotiators reportedly argued that
academic freedom is granted only to faculty and students “to enable free expression in the classroom,” that
it is “a professional standard established by faculty, for faculty,” and that their position was consistent with
“AAUP’s stance on Academic Freedom.”
The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) has rejected UC negotiators’ claims and clarified
that since 1972 it has recognized librarians as faculty (Joint Statement on Faculty Status of College and
University Librarians - https://www.aaup.org/sites/default/files/files/2013 Bulletin/librarians.pdf ).
Specifically, the joint statement affirms that:
"College and university librarians share the professional concerns of faculty members.
Academic freedom is indispensable to librarians in their roles as teachers and researchers.
Critically, they are trustees of knowledge with the responsibility of ensuring the intellectual
freedom of the academic community through the availability of information and ideas, no
matter how controversial, so that teachers may freely teach and students may freely learn.
Moreover, as members of the academic community, librarians should have latitude in the
exercise of their professional judgment within the library, a share in shaping policy within
the institution, and adequate opportunities for professional development and appropriate
reward."
The Council of University of California Faculty Associations (CUCFA) and the California Conference of AAUP
chapters (CA-AAUP) wholeheartedly agree with AAUP’s 1972 statement, recognize librarians as fellow faculty,
and jointly support UC-AFT Unit 17’s request that all librarians be “entitled to academic freedom, as their
primary responsibility to their institution and profession is to seek, state, and act according to the truth as
they see it.”
CUCFA and CA-AAUP therefore urge UC President Napolitano to instruct UC negotiators to grant academic
freedom to university librarians as they rightly deserve and have requested.
Sincerely,
Claudio Fogu
President of CA-AAUP
Stan Glantz
President of CUCFA
cc: UC Regents
President Janet Napolitano
University of California
1111 Franklin St., 12th Floor
Oakland, CA 94607
Email: president@ucop.edu
Joint statement by CUCFA and CA-AAUP:
On July 26, 2018 UC negotiators rejected a proposal by the UC-AFT Unit 17 that academic freedom be
recognized as a right of all UC librarians as academic employees. UC negotiators reportedly argued that
academic freedom is granted only to faculty and students “to enable free expression in the classroom,” that
it is “a professional standard established by faculty, for faculty,” and that their position was consistent with
“AAUP’s stance on Academic Freedom.”
The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) has rejected UC negotiators’ claims and clarified
that since 1972 it has recognized librarians as faculty (Joint Statement on Faculty Status of College and
University Librarians - https://www.aaup.org/sites/default/files/files/2013 Bulletin/librarians.pdf ).
Specifically, the joint statement affirms that:
"College and university librarians share the professional concerns of faculty members.
Academic freedom is indispensable to librarians in their roles as teachers and researchers.
Critically, they are trustees of knowledge with the responsibility of ensuring the intellectual
freedom of the academic community through the availability of information and ideas, no
matter how controversial, so that teachers may freely teach and students may freely learn.
Moreover, as members of the academic community, librarians should have latitude in the
exercise of their professional judgment within the library, a share in shaping policy within
the institution, and adequate opportunities for professional development and appropriate
reward."
The Council of University of California Faculty Associations (CUCFA) and the California Conference of AAUP
chapters (CA-AAUP) wholeheartedly agree with AAUP’s 1972 statement, recognize librarians as fellow faculty,
and jointly support UC-AFT Unit 17’s request that all librarians be “entitled to academic freedom, as their
primary responsibility to their institution and profession is to seek, state, and act according to the truth as
they see it.”
CUCFA and CA-AAUP therefore urge UC President Napolitano to instruct UC negotiators to grant academic
freedom to university librarians as they rightly deserve and have requested.
Sincerely,
Claudio Fogu
President of CA-AAUP
Stan Glantz
President of CUCFA
cc: UC Regents
| joint_cucfa-caaaup_librarian_fin.pdf |
AFSCME 3299 SUPPORT PLEDGE
May 2, 2018
As student and community organizations affiliated with the University of California, we are standing together with the workers who make the UC run every day. Right now, over 25,000 UC service and patient care workers, members of AFSCME Local 3299, are fighting for a fair contract that protects them and the dignity and respect of their families, patients, and students.
Who Are We Fighting For AFSCME 3299 members are 85% women, immigrants, and people of color. This fight is not only about economic equality, but also racial and gender equality.
- Among UC’s low-wage workers, Black women face the greatest income disparities, and Black service workers have to work on average 6 years before reaching the starting wage of their white male counterparts;
- Black and Latinx employees make starting wages 20 and 21 percent less, respectively, than white folks hired to similar positions;
- From 1996 to 2015, there was a 37% decline in the share of Black workers in AFSCME-represented titles at the UC, which may be partly explained by UC’s contracting out practices;
- Today, there is a higher percentage of Black UC outsourced workers at UCLA and UCB than UC career service workers; and
- The UC continues to ignore the intersectional Sanctuary Demands first delivered by workers and students in January 2017. A year later, UCB cook David Cole was assaulted by UCPD while peacefully protesting for his contract on Feb 1st, underlining the UC’s poor treatment of Black workers. UC also rejects the proposed targeted local hire for formerly incarcerated workers––to ensure that our good union jobs are accessible to formerly incarcerated people.
What Are We Fighting For
AFSCME 3299 demands:
- Fair wages, affordable healthcare, retirement with dignity, job security with no contracting out, ban the box, targeted local hire program, strengthened sexual harassment protections, increased wages for student workers, and non-collaboration with ICE.
UC’s Last, Best, and Final offer to AFSCME service workers:
- A modest 2 percent raise - counteracted by eliminating step increases, attacking workers’ job security by contracting out its workforce, proposing cuts to workers’ healthcare and pension benefits, and ignoring all of our demands to strengthen the language to address racial and gender issues at UC.
Black and Latinx folks, low-wage workers, and other marginalized communities must often fight to be heard and treated fairly. We call on the UC to make meaningful changes in its treatment and compensation of these groups - and all workers that make the UC system run - first and foremost by granting the workers of AFSCME 3299 a fair contract.
We, the undersigned student and community organizations, pledge to support AFSCME 3299 members in their fight for racial and economic justice by:
- Sending a letter to UC President Janet Napolitano
- Coming out to support AFSCME 3299 actions
- Honoring all AFSCME 3299 picket lines, strikes and boycotts.
May 2, 2018
As student and community organizations affiliated with the University of California, we are standing together with the workers who make the UC run every day. Right now, over 25,000 UC service and patient care workers, members of AFSCME Local 3299, are fighting for a fair contract that protects them and the dignity and respect of their families, patients, and students.
Who Are We Fighting For AFSCME 3299 members are 85% women, immigrants, and people of color. This fight is not only about economic equality, but also racial and gender equality.
- Among UC’s low-wage workers, Black women face the greatest income disparities, and Black service workers have to work on average 6 years before reaching the starting wage of their white male counterparts;
- Black and Latinx employees make starting wages 20 and 21 percent less, respectively, than white folks hired to similar positions;
- From 1996 to 2015, there was a 37% decline in the share of Black workers in AFSCME-represented titles at the UC, which may be partly explained by UC’s contracting out practices;
- Today, there is a higher percentage of Black UC outsourced workers at UCLA and UCB than UC career service workers; and
- The UC continues to ignore the intersectional Sanctuary Demands first delivered by workers and students in January 2017. A year later, UCB cook David Cole was assaulted by UCPD while peacefully protesting for his contract on Feb 1st, underlining the UC’s poor treatment of Black workers. UC also rejects the proposed targeted local hire for formerly incarcerated workers––to ensure that our good union jobs are accessible to formerly incarcerated people.
What Are We Fighting For
AFSCME 3299 demands:
- Fair wages, affordable healthcare, retirement with dignity, job security with no contracting out, ban the box, targeted local hire program, strengthened sexual harassment protections, increased wages for student workers, and non-collaboration with ICE.
UC’s Last, Best, and Final offer to AFSCME service workers:
- A modest 2 percent raise - counteracted by eliminating step increases, attacking workers’ job security by contracting out its workforce, proposing cuts to workers’ healthcare and pension benefits, and ignoring all of our demands to strengthen the language to address racial and gender issues at UC.
Black and Latinx folks, low-wage workers, and other marginalized communities must often fight to be heard and treated fairly. We call on the UC to make meaningful changes in its treatment and compensation of these groups - and all workers that make the UC system run - first and foremost by granting the workers of AFSCME 3299 a fair contract.
We, the undersigned student and community organizations, pledge to support AFSCME 3299 members in their fight for racial and economic justice by:
- Sending a letter to UC President Janet Napolitano
- Coming out to support AFSCME 3299 actions
- Honoring all AFSCME 3299 picket lines, strikes and boycotts.
February 21, 2018
Resolution of the California Conference of the American
Association of University Professors regarding California State University Executive Orders 1100 (Revised) and 1110
The California Conference of the American Association of University Professors (CA-AAUP) met with members of the California State University (CSU) Academic Senate and California Faculty Association at the CA-AAUP’s February 10, 2018, Annual Meeting in Los Angeles, California. Following that meeting, the undersigned members of the CA-AAUP issue this condemnation of the process by which CSU Chancellor Timothy White produced Executive Orders 1100 (Revised) and 1110.
We quote from CFA’s October 29, 2017, Resolution in Support of Rescinding California State University Executive Order 1100 (Revised). With the CFA, we conclude that the orders were, in fact, “issued without appropriate and statutorily required consultation or consideration of faculty governance protocols,” thereby
committing an egregious violation of faculty governance and academic freedom and undermining faculty control over academic preparation and standards as well as faculty purview over the curriculum.
Referring to the November 2, 2017, Open Letter to Chancellor White from the Chairs of the CSU Campus Senates, we conclude that Executive Orders 1100 (Revised) and 1110
were developed and presented to faculty without adequate consultation or true shared governance. All curricular decisions affect students directly, and therefore all curricular decisions must, by nature, lie with the teaching faculty and students; General Education criteria are not exempted from [Higher Education Employer-Employee Relations Act] principles.
The CA-AAUP views Chancellor White’s procedures in issuing Executive Orders 1100 (Re- vised) and 1110 as a direct assault on the principles of shared governance, principles that form the very core of AAUP values. We call upon Chancellor White to read the AAUP’s Statement on Government of Colleges and Universities. We also call upon the Chancellor to refrain from tak- ing further actions that undermine the principles of academic freedom and shared governance enshrined in that document, which values are reified in California statute and in case law.
Passing from process to substance, CA-AAUP supports CFA's October 29, 2017, Resolution in Support of Rescinding ... Executive Order 1100 (Revised). We agree that the order
eviscerates Section F “Comparative Cultural Studies / Gender Race, Class and Ethnicity Studies,” as well as foreign languages, denying our students a culturally responsive education and failing to demonstrate an understanding of or respect for California's increasing diversity
Further quoting CFA’s October 29, 2017, Resolution, CA-AAUP notes that Chancellor White is out-of-step with “other systems of public education in California” which are, in fact,
adopting "diversity requirements" [AB 2016 Ethnic Studies, FAIR Education Act], and requiring that students take courses in race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, deaf and disability studies as criteria for graduation.
CA-AAUP joins with the Academic Senate of the California State University and eighteen of the CSU campus senates in calling for immediate rescission or, barring that, delay in implementing Executive Order 1100 (Revised), so that our colleges “may continue to provide the breadth and quality of education that our students deserve.”
Turning to Executive Order 1110, CA-AAUP supports CFA’s October 29, 2017, Resolution in Support of Rescinding California State University Executive Order 1110. CA-AAUP condemns that order’s attempt to eliminate the English Placement Test and the Entry Level Mathematics Test. Elimination of these examinations will dramatically disadvantage poor students, students of color, students for whom English is a second language, and students entering college with educational deficits. We agree that these examinations are “the baseline for providing our students the academically responsible quality education our faculty seek to provide and our students deserve.”
Quoting CFA’s October 29, 2017, Resolution in Support of Rescinding California State University Executive Order 1110, we ask that
Chancellor White immediately rescind Executive Order 1110, which will allow develop- mental, first year, and General Education courses to continue improving the skills and competencies of our students.
Quoting that same document, CA-AAUP also calls upon Chancellor White to
refrain from reissuing Executive Order 1110 until such time as appropriate and meaningful consultation has taken place and campus faculty have had sufficient time to ensure that the curriculum we require our students to complete continues to provide the quality education our students expect and deserve.
The California Conference of the American Association of University Professors
Alex Zukas, National University (2016- 2018), President
Claudio Fogu, University of California, Santa Barbara (2017-2018), Acting Vice President for University of California
Mary Ann Irwin, Diablo Valley College (2016-2018), Secretary/Treasurer
Rosalinda Quintanar, San Jose State University (2016-2018), Vice President for California State University
Katie Graham, Diablo Valley College (2016-2018), Vice President for California Community Colleges
Antonio Gallo, Representing California Faculty Association (South)
George Beckwith, National University (2016-2018), Vice President for Private Colleges and Universities
Steven Filling, Representing California Faculty Association (North)
Resolution of the California Conference of the American
Association of University Professors regarding California State University Executive Orders 1100 (Revised) and 1110
The California Conference of the American Association of University Professors (CA-AAUP) met with members of the California State University (CSU) Academic Senate and California Faculty Association at the CA-AAUP’s February 10, 2018, Annual Meeting in Los Angeles, California. Following that meeting, the undersigned members of the CA-AAUP issue this condemnation of the process by which CSU Chancellor Timothy White produced Executive Orders 1100 (Revised) and 1110.
We quote from CFA’s October 29, 2017, Resolution in Support of Rescinding California State University Executive Order 1100 (Revised). With the CFA, we conclude that the orders were, in fact, “issued without appropriate and statutorily required consultation or consideration of faculty governance protocols,” thereby
committing an egregious violation of faculty governance and academic freedom and undermining faculty control over academic preparation and standards as well as faculty purview over the curriculum.
Referring to the November 2, 2017, Open Letter to Chancellor White from the Chairs of the CSU Campus Senates, we conclude that Executive Orders 1100 (Revised) and 1110
were developed and presented to faculty without adequate consultation or true shared governance. All curricular decisions affect students directly, and therefore all curricular decisions must, by nature, lie with the teaching faculty and students; General Education criteria are not exempted from [Higher Education Employer-Employee Relations Act] principles.
The CA-AAUP views Chancellor White’s procedures in issuing Executive Orders 1100 (Re- vised) and 1110 as a direct assault on the principles of shared governance, principles that form the very core of AAUP values. We call upon Chancellor White to read the AAUP’s Statement on Government of Colleges and Universities. We also call upon the Chancellor to refrain from tak- ing further actions that undermine the principles of academic freedom and shared governance enshrined in that document, which values are reified in California statute and in case law.
Passing from process to substance, CA-AAUP supports CFA's October 29, 2017, Resolution in Support of Rescinding ... Executive Order 1100 (Revised). We agree that the order
eviscerates Section F “Comparative Cultural Studies / Gender Race, Class and Ethnicity Studies,” as well as foreign languages, denying our students a culturally responsive education and failing to demonstrate an understanding of or respect for California's increasing diversity
Further quoting CFA’s October 29, 2017, Resolution, CA-AAUP notes that Chancellor White is out-of-step with “other systems of public education in California” which are, in fact,
adopting "diversity requirements" [AB 2016 Ethnic Studies, FAIR Education Act], and requiring that students take courses in race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, deaf and disability studies as criteria for graduation.
CA-AAUP joins with the Academic Senate of the California State University and eighteen of the CSU campus senates in calling for immediate rescission or, barring that, delay in implementing Executive Order 1100 (Revised), so that our colleges “may continue to provide the breadth and quality of education that our students deserve.”
Turning to Executive Order 1110, CA-AAUP supports CFA’s October 29, 2017, Resolution in Support of Rescinding California State University Executive Order 1110. CA-AAUP condemns that order’s attempt to eliminate the English Placement Test and the Entry Level Mathematics Test. Elimination of these examinations will dramatically disadvantage poor students, students of color, students for whom English is a second language, and students entering college with educational deficits. We agree that these examinations are “the baseline for providing our students the academically responsible quality education our faculty seek to provide and our students deserve.”
Quoting CFA’s October 29, 2017, Resolution in Support of Rescinding California State University Executive Order 1110, we ask that
Chancellor White immediately rescind Executive Order 1110, which will allow develop- mental, first year, and General Education courses to continue improving the skills and competencies of our students.
Quoting that same document, CA-AAUP also calls upon Chancellor White to
refrain from reissuing Executive Order 1110 until such time as appropriate and meaningful consultation has taken place and campus faculty have had sufficient time to ensure that the curriculum we require our students to complete continues to provide the quality education our students expect and deserve.
The California Conference of the American Association of University Professors
Alex Zukas, National University (2016- 2018), President
Claudio Fogu, University of California, Santa Barbara (2017-2018), Acting Vice President for University of California
Mary Ann Irwin, Diablo Valley College (2016-2018), Secretary/Treasurer
Rosalinda Quintanar, San Jose State University (2016-2018), Vice President for California State University
Katie Graham, Diablo Valley College (2016-2018), Vice President for California Community Colleges
Antonio Gallo, Representing California Faculty Association (South)
George Beckwith, National University (2016-2018), Vice President for Private Colleges and Universities
Steven Filling, Representing California Faculty Association (North)
photo credit: Banner, Sonoma County, California by Janis Crystal Lipzin