11 minute read
Lecturers' Labor Negotiation News - Part 2
Tuesday, October 19, 2021
From the Bruin, 10-18-21: The University Council-American Federation of Teachers hosted informational pickets on campus about its ongoing bargaining with the University of California on Wednesday and Thursday (of last week). The UC-AFT is a labor union that encompasses lecturers and other part-time faculty across all UC campuses, representing more than 6,800 lecturers. UC-AFT has been bargaining with the UC for more than two years to advocate for improved salaries and fairer workload standards for lecturers. On June 25, the California Public Employment Relations Board declared an impasse between UC-AFT and the UC, and the two parties entered state-sponsored mediation.
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Starting at 10 a.m., UC-AFT members gathered in Meyerhoff Park to pass out pamphlets and speak to students about its ongoing negotiations with the UC. On both days, lecturers spoke about the struggles they face because of low wages and lack of job security. They also criticized UC President Michael Drake’s unresponsiveness to UC-AFT throughout contract negotiations...
On Monday, the UC presented union leaders with a formal proposal for new, multiyear contracts. However, some lecturers expressed mixed feelings about the recent offer. Ryan King, a UC Office of the President spokesperson, said under the latest offer, the majority of UC-AFT lecturers would receive 4% to 5% pay increases, while the lowest paid lecturers would receive at least an 8% increase in pay...
UC and UC-AFT remain in mediation and if the two move on from mediation to factfinding, a state-appointed fact-finder will issue what they think is a fair contract but neither side is obligated to accept it. If no agreement is reached, then UC-AFT is legally allowed to call a strike...
Full story at https://dailybruin.com/2021/10/18/ucla-lecturers-rally-for-new-workloadstandards-improved-salaries.
Wednesday, October 20, 2021
The Dorian Abbot controversy has spilled over from MIT to Princeton and now to Berkeley. If you don't know what that controversy is, I have provided a key document below and links to several others.
In essence, Prof. Dorian Abbot of the University of Chicago was invited to give a public lecture at MIT concerning climate science and life on other planets. Apparently, some students got wind of remarks he had made about diversity issues in academia, protested, and the lecture was cancelled, causing an outcry about free speech in the news media.*
*Example from the Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/10/whylatest-campus-cancellation-different/620352/.
Abbot was then extended an invitation to give a non-public lecture within the inviting department. (It's unclear if this non-public lecture will in fact take place.) MIT released an official statement (reproduced below) after the story of the cancellation of the public lecture circulated on the internet. Meanwhile, another entity at Princeton University invited Abbot to give his lecture "there" - in fact via Zoom at the date/time it was scheduled originally at MIT.**
** https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2021/10/19/mit-deals-fallout-canceled-lecture.
the Berkeley Atmospheric Sciences Center (BASC) sought to invite Abbott to speak, but he was rebuffed and then resigned over Twitter.** (See the accompanying image.) Exactly who did the rebuffing is not entirely clear from the Twitter thread.
**See the long thread at https://twitter.com/romps/status/1450139374125862913.
Needless to say, it is a Bad Thing for academia to have such occurrences repeatedly in the news. Exactly how the Berkeley powers-that-be will react is also unclear at this point. Yours truly looked at the Daily Cal early this morning and found no mention of the Romps resignation. But there is plenty about it floating around the internet.
From MIT's president:
To the members of the MIT community,
You may have heard about a situation centered on our Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences (EAPS) regarding an invited speaker, Professor Dorian Abbot. In a recent letter*** to the faculty, Provost Marty Schmidt lays out the facts, some of which have not come through clearly in the media and on social media. I encourage you to read his letter. You will also find thorough coverage in The Tech.****
*** https://orgchart.mit.edu/node/6/letters_to_community/important-update-re-eaps.
**** https://thetech.com/2021/10/14/carlson-lecture-cancellation.
The controversy around this situation has caused great distress for many members of our community, in many quarters. It has also uncovered significant differences within the Institute on several issues. I would like to reflect on what happened and set us on a path forward. But let me address the human questions first.
To the members of the EAPS community: I am deeply disturbed that as a direct result of this situation, many of you – students, postdocs, faculty and young alumni – have suffered a tide of online targeting and hate mail from outside MIT. This conduct is reprehensible and utterly unacceptable. For members of the MIT community, where we value treating one another with decency and respect, this feels especially jarring.I encourage anyone who is subjected to harassing or threatening behavior or language to reach out for support and guidance to the Institute Discrimination and Harassment Response (IDHR) office.
I also want to express my tremendous respect for Professor Rob van der Hilst, department head in EAPS, who faced a difficult situation. I know Rob as a person of the highest integrity and character. We are fortunate to have his leadership in EAPS. In this
case, when Rob concluded, after consulting broadly, that EAPS could not host an effective public outreach event centered around Professor Abbot, he chose to extend instead an invitation for an on-campus lecture; Rob took this step deliberately to preserve the opportunity for free dialogue and open scientific exchange.
Professor Abbot is a distinguished scientist who remains welcome to speak on the MIT campus, and he has been working with EAPS to confirm the event details. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that this matter has caused many people inside and outside our community to question the Institute’s commitment to free expression. Some report feeling that certain topics are now off limits at MIT. I have heard these concerns directly from faculty colleagues, alumni and others who care deeply about the Institute. Let me say clearly what I have observed through more than 40 years at MIT:
Freedom of expression is a fundamental value of the Institute.
I believe that, as an institution of higher learning, we must ensure that different points of view – even views that some or all of us may reject – are allowed to be heard and debated at MIT. Open dialogue is how we make each other wiser and smarter. This commitment to free expression can carry a human cost. The speech of those we strongly disagree with can anger us. It can disgust us. It can even make members of our own community feel unwelcome and illegitimate on our campus or in their field of study. I am convinced that, as an institution, we must be prepared to endure such painful outcomes as the price of protecting free expression – the principle is that important. I am equally certain, however, that when members of our community must bear the cost of other people’s free expression, they deserve our understanding and support. We need to ensure that they, too, have the opportunity to express their own views.
A path forward
The issues this situation has brought to the surface are complex. No unilateral declaration on behalf of MIT could either resolve them in the moment or prevent future controversies. So I believe it is vital now that we engage in serious, open discussion together. As the provost’s letter described, we will begin with a faculty forum, being planned for the last week of October. Discussion in this working session might address questions like these: Given our shared commitment to open inquiry and free expression, are there further steps we should take to practice it consistently? Should we develop guidelines to help groups in their own decision making? Does the concept need more prominence in our curriculum? How should we respond when members of our community bear the disproportionate cost of other people’s speech?
It will be essential in this overall process to include the perspective and experience of graduate and undergraduate students; I have asked Chancellor Melissa Nobles to work with student leaders to decide the best way to do so. I have also asked Provost Marty Schmidt, Chancellor Nobles and Chair of the Faculty Lily Tsai to begin immediately assembling a special ad hoc working group to consider the insights and lessons we should take away from this situation. I believe this extremely important topic deserves and will benefit from this kind of thoughtful, deliberative, nuanced approach, perhaps including experts from outside MIT. The themes that emerge from the initial faculty forum will help inform the working group’s charge.
From the comments that have come to me directly, I can attest that our community encompasses a wide spectrum of very strong views about what has transpired in these last weeks. As we cope with the aftermath of this public controversy here at home, let us hold ourselves to the same standards in our interactions with each other as in our intellectual work: To learn more, assume less and ask more – and listen as closely as we can to each other’s ideas, perspectives and experiences. I hope that, in this moment and always, we will all continue to value and respect each other as fellow members of one community, united in a single great mission.
Sincerely,
L. Rafael Reif
S o u r c e : http://mit.imodules.com/controls/email_marketing/view_in_browser.aspx?sid=1314&gid=1 3&sendId=2877841&ecatid=1433&puid=711eff31-074f-4913-920a-13a653b2a18c.
Abbot controversy spills over from MIT to Princeton and now to Berk...
Thursday, October 21, 2021
Our previous post noted the controversy concerning the Abbot lecture cancellation at MIT and its spillover to Princeton and now to UC-Berkeley via the Romps resignation.* Up until now, i.e., before it arrived at Berkeley, the controversy, although it did show up in some mainstream publications (we provided a link to The Atlantic), mainly circulated in conservative news source. The Berkeley addition has apparently taken it mainstream:
From NBC News: After lecture is canceled, free speech debate roils science academia
Some academics are pushing back against what they see as personal politics that overshadows scientific work. Others stress that actions have consequences.
By Denise Chow
A prominent climate physicist has resigned from one of his roles at the University of California, Berkeley, after he said faculty members would not agree to invite a guest lecturer to the school who had come under fire for his political views.
The lecturer, Dorian Abbot, a geophysicist, has been criticized for opposing affirmative action programs and other initiatives to promote diversity, equity and inclusion at colleges and universities. He has been the subject of boycotts and opposition from left-leaning students and at academic faculty meetings.
In a statement on Twitter, the physicist, David Romps, said Monday that he is stepping down as director of the Berkeley Atmospheric Sciences Center, or BASC, “at the end of this calendar year or when a replacement is ready, whichever is sooner.” Romps will remain a professor in the school’s department of earth and planetary sciences, a university spokesperson said.
The incident has added to the debate about when, if ever, it is appropriate to suppress speech on college campuses.
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology this month rescinded a lecture invitation to Abbot, a geophysicist and associate professor at the University of Chicago, amid public backlash over an op-ed he co-wrote in Newsweek that argued in favor of a “Merit, Fairness, and Equality” framework on campuses as an alternative to diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, which he said sought “to increase the representation of some groups through discrimination against members of other groups.” Last year, Abbot also denounced the riots that erupted in Chicago after George Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. He addressed those comments in a post published Oct. 5 on Substack.
Abbot was scheduled to deliver the prestigious Carlson Lecture at MIT’s department of earth, atmospheric and planetary sciences about his research on climate science and the potential for alien planets to support life.
Romps, who did not respond to a request for comment, said his request to the faculty followed the MIT cancellation.
Romps said he asked faculty members whether the school could invite Abbot “to speak to us in the coming months to hear the science talk he had prepared and, by extending the invitation now, reaffirm that BASC is a purely scientific organization, not a political one,” he wrote on Twitter.
He said that discussions remained unresolved and that his colleagues’ unwillingness to include guest lecturers who have divergent political beliefs goes against the school’s mission.
“Excluding people because of their political and social views diminishes the pool of scientists with which members of BASC can interact and reduces the opportunities for learning and collaboration,” he wrote, adding that such actions signal that “some opinions — even well-intentioned ones — are forbidden, thereby increasing self-censorship, degrading public discourse, and contributing to our nation’s political balkanization.”
Source: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna3105.
We'll see where the story goes from here. However, as we noted yesterday, such controversies are not a Good Thing for academia. We have already seen political interventions in some states, particularly in regard to public universities. Perhaps UC seems immune since it resides in a "blue" state. Congressional elections in 2022 and the presidential election in 2024 could change things, even in California. Don't think so? Ask your grandparents about "1950s' loyalty oath controversy" at UC. Ask your parents about what happened to Clark Kerr in the 1960s. Or Google these events.
* http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2021/10/abbot-controversy-spills-over-frommit.html.
