We (your elected Bargaining Team) had all-day Conciliation meetings on March 7 and March 8. We responded to several counter-articles that the employer had previously returned to us.
However, the employer wasted those two days with no response on the many outstanding articles and issues. The bulk of the outstanding articles are in the employer’s hands, and they continue to stall. With only two more conciliation dates booked before our strike deadline of March 27, it seems they are pushing us toward job action.
Outstanding Issues
The employer still refuses to engage meaningfully with issues that you and your colleagues have told us are priorities:
- TA-Student Ratios and Enrolment Caps
The employer has still not engaged with our proposal on TA-Student Ratios (guaranteed course support) and enrolment caps based on course/assessment types.
CIs at Carleton teach up to 40% of all credit courses every year and teach an even higher percentage of all first- and second-year courses. These are often high-enrolment courses.
We’ve seen enrolment numbers balloon since the start of the Pandemic without adequate support, or consultation. TA-Student Ratios would not only improve the ability of CIs and TAs to engage meaningfully with students’ and their coursework but also improve the overall quality of education for students.
- Benefits
The employer has refused to give us back our power to make decisions about Professional Development expense reimbursements that was taken away when the claims process moved online.
CIs do not have access to Carleton’s superlative health benefits plan or the Carleton pension plan, yet the employer has refused to make contributions to the CI health benefits plan as a proportion of CI payroll to help our fund administrator and trustees adequately maintain the plan, and the employer has rejected our proposal for employer contributions for an opt-in Registered Retirement Savings Plan (RRSP).
- Salary
The employer has offered 9.5% over the life of the collective agreement, which neither addresses the rate of inflation/cost of living nor the stark 15% wage disparity between CIs at Carleton and their colleagues at the University of Ottawa.
CI pay accounts for just 4% of Carleton’s salary expenses.
The employer rejected our proposed language for paid pedagogical training, rapid-modality switch top-ups, and small increases in course cancellation fees.
You and your colleagues helped keep the systems in the bricks-and-mortar institution that is Carleton going these past three years—pivoting to online teaching, from cuLearn to Brightspace, to teaching masked with social-distancing protocols—all without compensation for the increased workload.
You and your colleagues are facing record high inflation and cost of living and have taken year-over-year pay cuts when adjusted for inflation. CUPE 4600 is the largest group of workers on campus. Carleton works because you and your colleagues do. You deserve working conditions, wages, and benefits that reflect that. You deserve better. You deserve more.
Remember, now that the “no board” has been filed, we are in the count-down to legal job action. Although it’s still unclear if there will be a strike or lockout, this countdown means that we’ll be in a position for job action by March 27, 2023.
Keep an eye on your inbox for more information in the coming days!
In solidarity, The Bargaining Team
Noreen Cauley-Le Fevre, President Sarah Fiander, VP Internal Cheryl Cundell, co-VP Unit 2 and Chief Negotiator Ryan Conard, Recording Secretary Patti Kmiec, Mobilization Committee Chair Lori Stinson, Unit 2 Member Codie Fortin Lalonde, Acting Business Agent and Organizer
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