P76/77 and Beyond

What does the proposed agreement on P76/77 between FAUW and the university administration mean for lecturers? And where do we go from here? 

At first glance, the proposed agreement suggests a convergence amongst faculty members: teaching stream can now rise to “full professors, teaching stream”; “permanence” sounds similar to “tenure”; all faculty can now sit on most governance committees; and there is movement towards something akin to a “mini-sabbatical” every 6 or 7 years. To the extent that lecturers will realize tangible benefits from this agreement demonstrates that collective organizing works: whether it has been persistent Lecturer Committee advocacy within FAUW; hard work for years by lecturers on numerous PDCs; petitioning special members meetings to demand greater lecturer representation on FRC; and ultimately a union certification drive by Lecturers Connect that provided FAUW with its only real leverage during negotiations. Lecturers should be proud of how far we have pushed an apathetic–if not antagonistic–institution. Still, a closer look at the proposed agreement reveals that under the current policy negotiation model lecturers continue to be treated as second-tier faculty members. If there is one take away from Policy 76/77 negotiations, it is that improving our working conditions and student learning conditions at UW will require collective organizing and a modernization of our labour relationship with the university.

The Need to Modernize Labour Relations at UW

By the time of implementation in Fall 2024, the changes to Policy 76/77 will have taken an entire decade. During this time, trying to get any specific details about these negotiations was frustrated by confidentiality clauses and procedural delays that clearly served the administration’s interests. With details of the tentative agreement finally released, an “all or nothing” vote is taking place. It will be unsurprising when members vote in support of this agreement—after all, no alternatives have ever been presented to faculty members.

Both FAUW and the administration publicly agreed that the current system for negotiating policy does not work. And yet neither party has firmly endorsed regular collective bargaining (unionization) as a viable alternative. Almost all other faculty associations across Canada engage in unionized collective bargaining. With the latest shift towards mediation-arbitration for P76/77, we are now in a bizarre situation where FAUW operates as a union in every way except without legal protections and enforceable timelines for negotiations, and—critically—the bargaining leverage afforded to unions during collective negotiations. 

The current model for negotiations—which requires agreement from the administration to even initiate—has produced an agreement that is ten years too late and leaves lots wanting. Looking closer we can also see concessions that FAUW has given to the administration. Yet problems and gaps with the agreement have not been highlighted by FAUW which instead issued a joint statement with the administration that only lauded the improvements contained in the agreement.

Assessing the Improvements 

To be sure, the long struggle by lecturers has delivered us some improvements in the proposed agreement. Course reductions (a one semester ‘mini-sabbatical’) and clearer language around our entitlement to a non-teaching term will give lecturers some much-needed time. The inclusion of lecturers on our own governance committees and a change in titles are also welcomed. Of course, it should not have taken a decade to make changes that have no financial cost to the university and indeed help administrators to attract and retain teaching stream faculty in line with the current Policy 76 (“UW is committed to recruit the best faculty possible”). The ability for chairs/deans to hire faculty into permanent teaching stream positions will also be clarified in policy language. And there was nothing in policy that prevented the hiring of lecturers into permanent stream positions. As Schedule F notes, at least some appointment letters were already written in this way. This change is something that deans were already asking the provost to do and so should be read as a win for the administration as much as it was for FAUW. 

A common complaint with the current P76 was the lack of accountability and consequences for delayed renewal notifications for definite-term lecturers. While the current policy requires notification of reappointment at least 6 months ahead of the contract end date for contracts longer than 1 year (Policy 76:3A), in many cases this has not happened. In some cases, this has resulted in the faculty member working without a contract, not getting paid, and having their benefits affected. The faculty member is left cleaning up the mess while there are no consequences for admin. Under the new policy this will not happen because every month that admin is late providing notification, the faculty member will automatically be given a one-month extension of the current contract. 

For the first time, the proposed agreement writes into policy a teaching load cap (12 courses over two-years). Of course, a 12-course cap was already put into practice in 2021 so will not change anything materially for lecturers. But it could open up future negotiations on workload. No rationale was provided for a cap of twelve instead of ten courses (best practice at UW is currently 10 courses over two years). A “course” is also not defined which fails to address frustration amongst some lecturers who currently teach labs that should in fact be designated as courses, or who teach very large courses that might deserve multiple course credits. These types of problems are currently left up to individual members to negotiate with their chairs and deans—even though definite-term and probationary faculty may feel they cannot raise these types of concerns without jeopardizing their contract renewal or promotion. Unionization would empower us to negotiate these and other ongoing concerns around workload (e.g., TA support, class size) collectively through regular, timely bargaining sessions.  

The proposed agreement ensures that the same course cap applies to all teaching stream faculty hired whether they are definite-term or probationary. This is an important act of solidarity amongst all groups of lecturers. However, it’s critical to understand that chairs/deans retain their right to hire incoming faculty members into either definite-term contracts or probationary appointments. Having teaching load caps will not change the fundamental financial context or management’s preference for ‘flexibility’ that lead chairs/deans to favour definite-term contracts or sessional instructors over permanent positions. In fact, the five-year limit on the length of definite-term contracts could end up making life worse for our colleagues subjected to this category of hiring (since they will automatically lose their employment with UW after five years). Solidarity must extend beyond our own membership if we are to properly navigate the financial pressures facing universities. Going forward, we should collectively support our sessional colleagues in making gains through their recent unionization because narrowing the salary gap between sessional instructors and teaching-stream faculty will benefit both groups of workers.

Problems with the Proposed Agreement

A general problem with the proposed agreement is how it works to box in the roles of teaching stream and tenure-stream. Whereas the current policy language for lecturers states that “duties are primarily limited to teaching and service, and are normally assigned in all three terms,” the proposed agreement states that definite-term teaching stream appointments will be “limited to teaching and service” (P77) with a non-zero scholarship weighting for Assistant Professors, Teaching Stream only be permitted in “exceptional cases” (P77). While not blocking new hires in the teaching stream from being paid for scholarship, the proposed policy will heavily discourage it—with final say being given to the provost and deans.   

An academic ecosystem that fosters innovation would encourage all faculty members to develop and pursue their interests in teaching, scholarship and service, recognizing that the weighting of these duties may change back and forth throughout one’s career. Rather than a problem needing “fixing,” the often-blurred boundary in the duties currently undertaken by lecturers and tenure streams benefits students and the broader mission of the university. The most recent survey demonstrated that 15% of lecturers have scholarship as part of their contract weighting. Many more lecturers supervise graduate students which is as much research engagement as it is teaching.  Meanwhile, tenure-stream faculty may focus more or entirely on teaching at different periods in their career. The administration’s contention that research is what distinguishes “tenure” from “permanence” does not hold up to scrutiny. Policy language should trust and encourage faculty members and their chairs to negotiate these nuances and to foster a spirit of flexibility needed for innovation throughout one’s career. Policy should define teaching stream in a way that makes it easier (not harder) for lecturers to secure external grants to support their graduate students (e.g., by considering the eligibility criteria for holding tri-council and supervising Mitacs grants).  

No rationale was given by the administration as to why teaching stream faculty will not be entitled to a full sabbatical. If, as according to the administration, tenure is somehow linked to research, we note that there is no expectation in policy that faculty members engage in research during their sabbatical. Indeed, a sabbatical is often taken as a repose from conducting research. The current sabbatical policy states that the purpose of a sabbatical is for “intellectual growth and enrichment as well as for scholarly renewal and reassessment.” Clearly, this is something that teaching stream faculty (and the university) would benefit from. A sabbatical would also help teaching stream faculty meet growing expectations for professional development and scholarly engagement articulated in the new definition of teaching (P77) and as part of the proposed ‘Addendum’ to the University’s Teaching Effectiveness (Schedule C). 

The proposed agreement also downgrades the role of lecturers by curtailing our right to teach graduate courses. Whereas the current P77 language states that all regular faculty are expected to contribute to graduate teaching “where possible,” the proposed agreement changes this to: “Where feasible and depending on the needs of their unit, Teaching Stream faculty are also eligible to contribute to graduate teaching.”  

Perhaps the most telling indication that lecturers will continue to be treated as second-tier faculty members can be seen in the Faculty Salary Structure in the Memorandum of Agreement (13.2). There is no change to the salary floor for new hires. An incoming Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream will have a salary floor of $66,849 which is almost twenty thousand dollars ($19,311) less an incoming Assistant Professor—despite sharing the same basic qualifications at time of hire (i.e., in most cases, a PhD). Meanwhile, the salary floor for an Associate Professor, Teaching stream is being set $2,024 less than an Assistant Professor while a full Professor, Teaching Stream will have a salary floor less than an Associate Professor. This salary structure clearly devalues the contribution that teaching stream faculty make towards realizing the university’s mission.  

The negotiated protocol for how current faculty members will transition into teaching stream positions poses some additional problems. For example, lecturers with UARCed appointments up to as many as five years will only become definite-term rather than probationary stream. This seems unfair and reflects the weakness of FAUW’s bargaining leverage during these types of negotiations.     

The five year employment cap for definite-term is also left ambiguous: is it five years of total employment or five calendar years regardless of whether the person had a contract in each of those years? How are leaves such as pregnancy leave being treated during these five years? While the intentions of the five-year cap may be good (i.e., to encourage the administration to hire people into the probationary stream), it could very well increase the precarity of definite-term faculty members. 

In sum, a lot is being left up to the discretion of deans rather than being collectively negotiated at the bargaining table.

Where to go from here? 

Even those who feel the gains of the proposed agreement might outweigh any drawbacks, we can likely agree there is still room for improvement—especially in terms of sabbaticals, workload, and salary structure. But with a myriad of other policies now overdue for negotiation, FAUW and certainly the administration will have little appetite to revisit policy 76 and 77. If the previous ten years is any indication of the pace of policy change at UW, this may be the last major revision to P76/77 that most of us see during our careers. One reason for teaching stream to unionize is to ensure that our priorities are advanced through regular collective bargaining and to avoid having to first receive permission from the administration to even initiate negotiations. 

Beyond policy negotiations, Ontario universities are entering a turbulent financial period due to the provincial government’s ongoing funding cuts, the federal government’s restriction on international student enrolment, and declining domestic enrolment for several programs. Because teaching stream faculty have more precarious (definite-term) contracts and only constitute a minority within FAUW, we have the most at stake should budget deficits lead to financial exigency and lay-offs. We therefore need a union that will ensure we have a seat and leverage at the bargaining table to defend our interests. The past ten years has shown that the more we are collectively organized, the better positioned we are in shaping the direction of our university. 

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Your support means a lot to us, and we encourage you to join our movement by becoming a member of the University of Waterloo Teaching Stream Faculty Association (WatTSFA). Sign your membership card here.