A few pieces of unsolicited advice to the UIC United Faculty Union in its handling of the covid-19 situation.
First, remember that UIC faculty are, at least in the short term, much more fortunate than many, maybe a large majority, of Chicagoans and Illinoisans. As the UIC administration asks us to do more, potentially without increased compensation, it would behoove the UICUF to consider the optics of how it pursues its "demands" and how it seeks to enforce the current contract.
Second, UIC will likely have a very hard time renewing non-tenure track appointments. In part, that's because revenues are likely to plummet. In part, that's because our (NTT's) wages have increased dramatically over the last 7 years or so and it costs more to keep up on. The union may wish to consider wage concessions or less than full-time reappointments for those of us who as of now have full-time appointments.
Third, the union may soon be forced to define more precisely what it means to protect the interests of its bargaining unit. It is better to accept wage concessions and preserve the jobs of more people, or is it better to keep wages (and other benefits, like professional development funds) at their current level and suffer more layoffs (or, the equivalent, non-renewal of NTT appointments).
Fourth, the university may decide to impose furlough days. The union will have to decide how much it really wants to fight furloughs.
I know I have my differences with the UICUF. But I do appreciate the tough situation it is in. It has done quite a bit of good over the past two months. It's job is to protect its members and its officers have been doing the best they can given the constraints they are in. I also realize that union's current position seems to be, "we're willing to work with the university, but the university needs to be willing to work with us." And from union communications (see the notes from May 1 and May 6 at the UICUF website), it seems the university has chosen to act more unilaterally and without much consultation with the union.
I am writing this "advice," however, because I believe it is easy to forget that--negotiations or no negotiations, unilateralism or "action with union input"--the faculty may have to accept concessions. If the faculty don't, some faculty may have to suffer. (I focus in this post on the situations of NTT's because I am one of them and have much less insight into how this situation may affect the people on the tenure track.)
As to the effect any of this will have on the taxpaying public and on the students, I don't know. Maybe it would be better (or less bad) to have fewer faculty, but higher paid, rather than more faculty, and lower paid.
