chapter profile

Fairfield University AAUP Chapter

In 1990, after a tumultuous year in which they organized around issues of governance, compensation, and the faculty’s appropriate role in salary negotiations, faculty members at Fairfield University in Connecticut voted to form a Faculty Welfare Committee that would affiliate with the AAUP and serve as an ad hoc committee of the general faculty. In the two decades since, the chapter has remained strong, active, and unified. Of 231 eligible faculty members at the small Jesuit institution, 70 percent are members of the Association.

Yavapai College AAUP Chapter

At Yavapai College in Arizona, a community college serving fifteen thousand students at six campuses, the college faculty association is also the AAUP chapter. About 85 percent of Yavapai’s hundred full-time faculty members are AAUP members, and the chapter has set a goal this year of recruiting more members from among the five hundred part-time faculty members employed by the institution. The president of the adjunct faculty organization has been invited to participate in all faculty association and senate meetings.

Chapter Profile: University of Akron

The AAUP chapter at the University of Akron in Ohio was established in 1932 and chartered as a collective bargaining chapter in 2003. It represents more than 750 full-time tenure-track and non-tenure-track faculty members. In January, the chapter ratified its second contract, which includes raises in the first two years, improvements in benefits and governance provisions, and a comprehensive article on non-tenure-track faculty.

Goucher College AAUP Chapter

In the last issue, we profiled an AAUP chapter—at the University of Akron—that was founded almost eighty years ago. This time, we look at a chapter that is just one year old, founded in 2009 after numerous disagreements with the administration about the faculty’s role in governance and in response to what the faculty perceived as unilateral cuts in benefits.

University of Northern Iowa United Faculty–AAUP

The University of Northern Iowa United Faculty, an AAUP collective bargaining chapter, was certified in 1976 as the faculty union at UNI, a comprehensive public university in Cedar Falls, Iowa. Enrollment at UNI is about thirteen thousand; the bargaining unit consists of approximately seven hundred part- and full-time faculty members.

Here, chapter president Cathy DeSoto shares her chapter’s strategies for effectively representing its members.

What is your chapter’s proudest accomplishment?

Stetson Faculty United

Stetson Faculty United, a long-dormant AAUP chapter revitalized in October 2010, represents faculty members at Stetson University, a private institution located in central Florida. Stetson has 2,400 undergraduates (who are taught almost exclusively by the faculty of Stetson’s DeLand campus) and another 1,100 graduate and professional students. Sixty of the university’s 190 faculty members belong to the AAUP chapter, all of them on the DeLand campus.

Lebanon Valley College

The AAUP chapter at Lebanon Valley College, a small private institution in Pennsylvania, was reestablished in 2009. Twenty-eight of the college’s one hundred faculty members are in the chapter.

Here, chapter president Robert Valgenti speaks with Academe about how his chapter has built membership and addressed key faculty concerns.

What is your chapter’s proudest accomplishment?

University of California, San Diego

The San Diego Faculty Association (SDFA-AAUP) is the AAUP chapter at the University of California, San Diego. Founded in 1968, the chapter became a joint endeavor with the faculty association in the late 1990s and has recently begun to take an active role in campus policy issues. SDFA-AAUP has about 120 members, out of approximately two thousand faculty members at the university.

Here, chapter vice president Luis Martín-Cabrera and chapter president Ivan Evans respond to questions about the growth of SDFA-AAUP and the issues the chapter is addressing.

University of Cincinnati Chapter–AAUP

The University of Cincinnati chapter of the AAUP was founded in November 1933 and became a collective bargaining unit in 1974. Approximately 1,700 people are represented by the bargaining unit. The chapter has four full-time staff members: Deborah Herman, the executive director; Anne Feldman, the business administrator; and Stephanie Spanja and Eric Palmer, who handle grievances and casework.

University of Cincinnati Chapter–AAUP

The University of Cincinnati chapter of the AAUP was founded in November 1933 and became a collective bargaining unit in 1974. Approximately 1,700 people are represented by the bargaining unit. The chapter has four full-time staff members: Deborah Herman, the executive director; Anne Feldman, the business administrator; and Stephanie Spanja and Eric Palmer, who handle grievances and casework.

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