The PSC has filed a grievance challenging CUNY management’s attempt to implement the new multiyear appointment pilot program (Appendix E of the contract) in a way that does not represent our bargaining agreement fully and accurately.
The union is focused on voluminous guidance that management circulated to department chairs about the new pilot program. In conjunction with the provision itself, a nine-page document, CUNY management published an implementation memorandum, a 26-page FAQ document, plus additional scenario and outcomes documents. All of this guidance ostensibly clarifies the roles of department chairs and P&B committees, but actually creates more work than the contract requires. It is also our sense that it enlist chairs in the administration’s effort to deny multiyear appointments when possible.
FAIR IMPLEMENTATION
Multiyear appointments for long-serving teaching adjuncts were a PSC priority for the 2023-2027 contract. We were outraged that CUNY management sought to eliminate the previous, successful pilot program, announcing that intention the first summer we began bargaining. Agreement on the elements of a revised program was only reached after extensive negotiations. Its cornerstone is a two-year appointment of six or more contact hours per semester in the same department or qualifying academic program, with an option to extend to a third year at the department’s discretion.
The parties agreed to these elements and more in December of 2024, shortly before reaching an agreement on the full terms of the contract. The Memorandum of Agreement included the prior October 2024 proposal as well, to provide a framework to incorporate the elements of the December agreement following ratification. Rather than consult the PSC, CUNY management undertook the process of incorporating these two documents unilaterally. They distorted parts of the agreement, and presented it to college administrators and department chairs as final.
While the fundamental elements of the new multiyear appointments are not in dispute, CUNY management’s version contains significant errors, the basis of the union’s grievance. For example:
- A review of credit-bearing courses in academic programs for eligibility needs to be conducted immediately. Eligibility for additional academic programs must be clarified.
- Our December 2024 agreement included very limited restrictions on the PSC’s grievance and arbitration rights. But CUNY’s version of Appendix E expanded the restriction on grievances to several other areas.
- Our December 2024 agreement did not include a section on “assessment of the continuing need for the position,” nor did it reference an instructor’s lateness to class as a basis for denying further eligibility, so Appendix E should not include them.
- Rather than “availability of funding” in a department, Appendix E should refer to “review of the fiscal and programmatic needs” of a department and/or college, as the December 2024 agreement does. The former is vague; the latter is a rigorous standard.
HONOR AGREEMENT
Management showed contempt for CUNY’s 11,000-plus teaching adjuncts, department chairs and our union by proceeding in this way. Errors and disputes could have been avoided by consulting the union in a good-faith implementation process. Instead, management misrepresented aspects of our agreement and revealed a tenuous grasp of the work performed by department chairs, P&B committees and adjuncts themselves.
Note that other critical features of the multiyear appointment are not in dispute, including:
- Grandfathered eligibility for adjuncts who would have been considered in Spring 2024 if the previous Appendix E had been in place and who taught both semesters of 2024-2025, regardless of contact hours.
- Full individual COBRA payment by the college for up to one semester for any adjunct on a multiyear appointment who would otherwise lose their health insurance due to a reduction in teaching contact hours.
- The ability for an adjunct on a multiyear appointment whose teaching contact hours fall below six in a semester to maintain eligibility for a subsequent multiyear appointment by teaching in another department or CUNY college up to one semester.
Appendix E is in effect. Implementation of a new contract rarely proceeds without tensions, and eligible adjuncts should not be deprived of consideration while the parties resolve disputes. The radical contingency in faculty appointments that management continues to pursue is not in the spirit or the letter of our negotiated agreement. We are hoping to reach a positive resolution soon.
