Urge Your Legislators to Support the New Deal for CUNY
Send and Share the CUNY Rising Alliance Action Letter
CUNY Rising Alliance and the PSC are building on the hugely successful march in Queens with a letter campaign meant to build broad community, alumni and student support for increased CUNY funding and the New Deal for CUNY. Please send this e-letter to your NYS legislators and share the letter link widely. Forward it to colleagues, neighbors, friends and over listservs. Post it on social media, and please consider making it available to your students. Let’s fill the inboxes in Albany with messages calling for a New Deal for CUNY and full funding of CUNY’s budget request for next year.
Let the Chancellor Hear from You about Spring 2022
It is critical that before the Fall semester ends, the Chancellor hears from faculty and staff about what clear, sensible, safe guidance from CUNY looks like for Spring 2022. Our sign-on letter urging the Chancellor to reject a one-size-fits-all approach to reopening has more than 1,900 signatures. Add your name to tell the Chancellor to reject arbitrary standards that prevent the local exercise of academic judgment and undermine shared governance. Urge the administration to protect our health and the quality of a CUNY education by granting needed remote work requests and not asking staff to come to the office only to work all day online; allowing academic departments to exercise independent judgment about the percentage of in-person classes; counting hybrid classes toward the in-person category; preserving in-person classes with low enrollments; and refraining from offering HyFlex courses absent an agreement with the union about their terms and conditions.
No Scabs at Columbia University!
The Student Workers of Columbia (United Auto Workers Local 2110) have been on strike for six weeks, and now Columbia University is seeking to illegally remove and replace the SWC-UAW workers with scabs. The PSC has supported this struggle, and you can click here to make a public commitment that you will not seek nor accept any contract or adjunct employment at Columbia. Make the pledge not to scab by signing this letter being circulated by the Union for Graduate Employees at NYU.
Judge Delays Retiree Healthcare Shift to April 1
New York State Justice Leon E. Frank ruled Tuesday, December 14 that the implementation of the City’s change of retiree health care to the new Medicare Advantage Plus (MA+) program must be delayed until at least April 1, 2022. The City had sought to make the shift on January 1.
Judge Frank’s order does not stop the planned transition to Medicare Advantage Plus. But in addition to delaying the implementation of the change, the order also requires 1) that retirees be allowed to opt out of the plan until at least June 30, 2022, 2) that the City send retirees a letter by January 7 that includes a list of corrections to the MA+ enrollment guide and information on how to get the new enrollment guide, and 3) that the City report regularly to the Court on its efforts to educate providers about the plan. See this article in The City for coverage of the ruling and bookmark the What’s Happening to Retiree Healthcare page of the PSC website for coming analysis and updates. Judge Frank’s decision is available here.
PSC Spring 2022 Chapter Elections:
Declare Candidacy by January 14
Sixteen PSC chapters will elect chapter officers, delegates, and alternates to the union’s Delegate Assembly in April 2022. Thirteen campuses will elect representatives to the PSC-CUNY Welfare Fund Advisory Council. Candidates running as individuals and slate/caucus designees should submit the Declaration of Candidacy form to [email protected] no later than 11:59 PM Friday, January 14. The list of chapter elections and all relevant deadlines is posted here on the PSC website. Election rules are here.
