The war is over: aftermath of the WUFA strike
By Hannah Larking
News Edtor
October 15, 2008
 UWindsor students went back to school on Monday, Oct. 6, after the Windsor University Faculty Association (WUFA) voted 91 per cent in favour of a new contract.
Shortly after returning to class for the first time in 17 days, students were notified of what those two and a half weeks had really cost them: a revised final exam period that rescheduled exams to as close as two days before Christmas.
In addition to this, the new exam schedule has exams, which are regulated to be three hours in length, scheduled as early as 7 a.m., and as late as 8 p.m., leaving many commuting students upset.
Tiffany Gooch, president of the University of Windsor Students’ Alliance (UWSA), assured that efforts are being made to accommodate for these circumstances. “The argument was that there isn’t a class that starts at 7 a.m., and for a very good reason,” said Gooch.
Residence Services is looking into ways to allow out-of-town students to stay in residence for the duration of exams, Gooch explained.
The UWSA has also launched an Academic Rights Campaign to keep students notified of what they are legally entitled to in terms of syllabus changes. “We want students to know their rights,” Gooch said. “I think at this time, more than any, it is important for students to be able to flag things that are inappropriate because there are so many things that could be going wrong.”
Section 1.7 of the University of Windsor’s senate bylaw 51 indicates that changes to syllabuses that are required after the first two weeks of class, must result in an advance student notification of at least two calendar weeks. This includes any assignments or activities (except unannounced quizzes), which will affect the final course grade.
Dr. Alan Wildeman, president of the University of Windsor, said that everyone is committed to making things work out as best they can for students.
“It’s a complicated process to get everything up and running again. What we’ve tried to do is give faculty some flexibility in terms of time that’s available to them to make up for … whatever they feel needs to be done,” said Wildeman.
“It’s a great relief to have it [the strike] done … and I hope that everybody’s going to be able to go forward now and get on with what we can do here at the university,” he added.
Professor Brian Brown, president of WUFA, did not share his optimism. “The [back-to-work] protocol has irritated many of our membership,” Brown said.
Wildeman explained that faculty members would not be paid by the university for time lost during the strike, but would be compensated a “small amount of money to help make up some of the extra time.”
During the strike, UWindsor administration purchased a full page ad to publicize the offer they had made on the last day before the strike, Sept. 17. This offer outlined a 14 per cent wage increase for professors over the next three years.
The university explained at the time that they could not offer any more than that, and that agreeing to what WUFA was asking for would cost the university an extra $5 million and double the institution’s deficit.
However, the new contract now has professors receiving a 16 per cent wage increase over three years, with Progress Through the Ranks (PTR) increases of $2,277 the first year (up from $2,200), $2,357 the second year (up from $2,277) and $2,439 the third year (up from $2,357). The new contract also has sessionals receiving a 20 per cent pay raise, leaving many students wondering how the university will suddenly be able to afford the latest hikes.
“The 14 per cent was a stretch,” Wildeman explained. “We felt that we could manage that in the ongoing plans to realign the budget.”
“The new agreement is a compromised position between where we thought we could realistically go and where we needed to end up. It will put additional pressure on the budget, but we’ll have to find a way to manage that,” he said.
Wildeman wasn’t able to comment on who in the Faculty Association would be feeling the compromise, and neither Brown nor Wildeman could comment on changes to health benefits, or how the new contract affects librarians and other staff.
“Once the agreement is printed up and formally signed, [that information] will become available,” Wildeman explained. Many students are concerned that the new contract will have a negative effect on student tuition.
Brown explained that tuition increases are inevitable, regardless of the new contract, “Student tuition is not tied to our collective agreement,” said Brown. “Tuition was raised two years ago and last year when WUFA was not in bargaining. Tuition is capped by the province and the administration can choose to raise, freeze or lower tuition.”
Gooch, who refused to comment on the new contract, added that she will be fighting tuition increases in the same way she would had the strike not happened.
While the strike’s impact was most heavily felt by students, University of Windsor’s student pub, The Basement, can attest to the fact that they were not alone. “Sales were down some days up to 80 per cent,” said Nic Gesuale, manager of The Basement. “The staff lost money as well as us.”
While the pub didn’t require any layoffs, their hours were significantly reduced. “On a normal day, there would be eight or ten servers,” Gesuale explained, “We were down to one or two. Had it gone on for a week or so longer, there would have been layoffs.”
The pub was closed for two weekend days, and sometimes was closing two or three hours early. “Some nights we were out of here at 10 p.m. or 10:30 p.m. when normally we’d be here until well after 2 a.m.,” Gesuale said.
Gesuale said that the biggest hassle that came out of the strike was having to pick up alcohol because vendors wouldn’t cross the picket lines.
In addition to this, Gesuale said that some employees of the pub also requested to not cross the picket lines as well. “I was fine with that. I wanted to respect the strike,” Gesuale said. “It wasn’t my choice to stay open or closed—we had to stay open.”
Gooch explained that the UWSA made the decision to keep the pub open so that it could be available to students living in residence.
Gooch also said that there were many additional layoffs on campus. The university laid off a lot of part time employees, with Food Services being especially affected, Gooch added. Anna Kirby, executive director of Student Ancillary Services, was unavailable to comment further on this.
Dennis Hastings, executive director of Facility Services, was in a situation similar to Gesuale’s. “Facility Services was not in a position that required layoffs,” Hastings said. “The strike never went long enough for us to move in that direction.”
Hastings added that the several employees in Facility Services, which includes grounds keeping, maintenance and custodial services among other things, also respected the picket line. “The university has always taken a position that [acknowledges] that employees in another bargaining group have the right to respect another bargaining unit’s picket line.”
“I’ve been here a long time, and I don’t think I’ve ever been through a fall when I’ve experienced such a ghost town,” Hastings said of the campus during the strike.
“It was a little lonely,” he added with a chuckle. Hastings was also the first to address the looming tension between the parties. “Any time there is a work stoppage of any kind, it creates an awful lot of tension on campus between and among employees—not just the faculty that were off, but staff that chose to respect the strike and staff that chose to come to work,” Hasting said.
Wildeman agreed. “Clearly, it’s a situation that has generated a lot of anxiety and stress and tension and a lot of emotion—but it’s over, and we need to just move forward and work together,” he said. “I don’t feel any animosity against anybody.”
Brown voiced what seemed to be a consensus amongst all parties as well. “Faculty members, ancillary academic staff, academic ancillary staff members, sessional members, and librarians of the University of Windsor continue to be committed to protecting the interests of students and to enabling our students to fulfill their program requirements and obtain credits for courses successfully completed,” Brown stated.
Students can view their rights in more detail at www.uwsa.ca.
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