Faculty Senate addresses bargaining

The Faculty Senate has further delineated the criteria that must be met before deciding whether to support future state collective bargaining enabling legislation.

The resolution passed April 1 requires both the University Committee and the Faculty Senate to agree that all seven criteria are met before seeking a discussion by the entire faculty.

The resolution requires opposition of any legislation that does not:

• Give the Board of Regents sole responsibility for negotiating and administering any collective bargaining agreements for faculty.

• Allow UW–Madison faculty to decide whether to engage in collective bargaining independently from other staff and faculties at other institutions.

• Allow faculty at each UW System campus to be given the same choices, including desirability of collective bargaining and bargaining unit makeup.

• Protect academic freedom, tenure and faculty governance practices.

• Clarify which faculty will be considered supervisory or management.

• Exempt compensation and working condition improvements from laws governing unfair labor practices when the improvements are based on a comparison to peer institutions.

• Include fact-finding provisions to resolve bargaining impasses.

The resolution comes on the heals of a failed state Senate bill that would have set the stage for faculty and academic staff at UW System campuses to decide whether they wanted to engage in collective bargaining. The University Committee opposed the state legislation as inadequate because it did not meet many of the criteria in the resolution.

The resolution replaced a motion that sought to direct the University Committee to write collective bargaining enabling legislation and bring it to the Faculty Senate for review and approval.