Wednesday, February 17, 1999
SAGE upset by Carnesale letter to campus
UNION: Administrative response to PERB decision brings outcry
from supporters of bargaining rights
By Edina Lekovic
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
While it has been no secret, Chancellor Albert Carnesale’s
opposition to graduate student employee unionization took a new,
more public turn last week.
After issuing a letter to UCLA faculty, staff and students,
Carnesale explained his reasons for opposing collective bargaining
for TAs, readers and tutors. This move came on the heels of a
recent Public Employee Relations Board (PERB) decision mandating an
election for union representation.
UCLA will host the election on Mar. 9-11 at the Molecular
Biology Institute and Bunche Hall. Officials are currently defining
who will be eligible to vote.
As expected, Carnesale’s letter explained that "collective
bargaining in this case would harm the quality of education at
UCLA."
While Carnesale recognized the essential role of TAs and other
instructional aides, he said they are students first and that
collective bargaining would change the teacher-student relationship
to that of employer-employee.
"The essence of graduate education is the relationship between
students and the faculty who instruct, counsel and supervise them –
both as researchers and as teachers," Carnesale wrote. "I believe
that collective bargaining would harm that essential
relationship."
Leaders from the Student Association of Graduate Employees
(SAGE) said that the letter itself is a method of influencing
voters.
"I think it is really inappropriate for the chancellor to spend
public money to campaign against a union," said Mike Miller, a SAGE
organizer. "Employers who remain neutral don’t campaign. This
violates any notion of neutrality – for the employer to send out
letters to homes and on official university letterhead."
The Academic Senate plans to hold an educational forum to teach
faculty how to respond to student concerns and questions regarding
collective bargaining.
"It isn’t about influence, but to tell you what the parameters
are," said Academic Senate chair Vickie Mays. "At the level of
Senate chairs, we’ve engaged in substantive discussions. Part of
what we’ve talked about is mentoring and how to maintain the
student/faculty relationship."
The forum, tentatively scheduled for Feb. 23, will feature
experts from the schools of law, education and management, Mays
said. However, Miller questions the neutrality of this forum.
"I’d be real interested to know whether labor experts who are
pro-union will be on the forum," Miller said, adding that Kent
Wong, a pro-union labor expert at UCLA’s Center for Labor and
Research Education, would be an excellent addition to the
panel.
Regardless of the chancellor’s open opposition to recognition of
SAGE, organizers plan to mobilize a campaign to encourage the UC’s
thousands of TAs, readers and tutors to vote in favor of collective
bargaining.
In his letter, Carnesale predicted it could also potentially
introduce other criteria for hiring and promotion, namely
seniority. Miller said such an assumption was "mischaracterizing
the process."
If SAGE wins the election, it will mean that the union will
elect a bargaining team of TAs, tutors and readers to survey what
issues are important, then submit a proposal to the university and
meet with the university’s bargaining team in order to resolve such
issues.
"If people want seniority to be the main criterion (for hiring),
they can bargain for that," Miller said. "We haven’t done a survey,
but we doubt that’s what people want."
Carnesale believes the current variation in hiring procedures
between departments "ensures the educational flexibility required
by a university as large and as complex" as UCLA. SAGE officials,
though, said that the chancellor should not have a say in the
matter.
"This is an issue to be decided by TAs, readers and tutors,"
Miller said. "His feelings on the matter are irrelevant."
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