With over 100 faculty in attendance, including 35 department chairs who were invited to attend, IUP’s Representative Council has elected to conduct a vote of no confidence in IUP President Tony Atwater. Three votes were taken, the first to authorize the vote of no confidence in the president. The second vote was of the members of Representative Council who voted unanimously no confidence in the president. The third vote was of the members of the Council of Chairs who also voted unanimously no confidence in the president. The vote is scheduled for December 14-16 with the result being formally presented to the IUP Council of Trustees at their December 17th meeting.

Follow this link for Indiana Gazette article on the vote of no confidence.

APSCUF-KU held a joint Conference on Labor in Higher Education in Harrisburg on October 15-17th.  Here’s some stuff that came out of the conference:

• Here’s me being interviewed by Marc Bousquet for AAUP Online.  The interview focused on Article 11 of our contract–conversion of temporary faculty members/lines to tenure-track.
• Bousquet’s full post for AAUP Online, “Stabilizing Persons, Creating New Lines,” also includes a link to an article by Bill Hendricks of California U of PA, “Negotiated Conversions: Living with Uncertainty.”
• On Sunday, October 25th I was interviewed on the Harrisburg-based “The Rick Smith Show.” I was asked to come on the show to discuss last week’s labor conference, issues facing state faculty members, and, what the recent surge in student enrollment means for schools, students, and staff.”
• An excellent piece called “Is Your Fiscal Crisis Real?” posted by Marc Bousquet on his “Brainstorm” blog for the Chronicle of Higher Ed.
• Bousquet’s “Is Your Fiscal Crisis Real” post includes the PowerPoint presentation at the APSCUF/PSEA conference by Howard Bunsis, AAUP.  The presentation shows data that raises serious questions as to the reality of PA’s fiscal crisis.  You can check out the presentation right here.
• Also check out Marc Bousquet’s site How the University Works for lots of info on current higher education labor issues.

Welcome to APSCUF-KU XChange. This blog is an unofficial, member-initiated blog for APSCUF-KU members (and others) to discuss all issues related to working at Kutztown University.  For the uninitiated, “APSCUF-KU” stands for the Kutztown University Chapter of the Association of Pennsylvania State Colleges and University Faculties.  APSCUF is the union that represents the faculty at Pennsylvania’s 14 State owned universities.

Why is this an “unofficial” blog? Well, for starters, I don’t think a blog devoted to discussion among members should have to have the approval of local or State leadership.  I believe that a strong union has its roots in an active membership.  And by active membership, I mean members who are invested in discussing issues that directly affect their work-lives and organizing collectively to solve problems, resist injustice, and improve work-life quality.  An active membership does not wait for dictates from its local or State union leadership before it acts–just the opposite.  An active membership organizes in order to set the agenda for its local and State leadership.  An active membership also privileges member-to-member communication.  Member-to-member communication is one of the best ways we have to keep on top of administrative decisions, to build solidarity, to gain a more complete understanding of the workings of our university, to develop effective responses to abuses of our contract, and to educate each other on 0ur contract and what it means to be an academic union member.

This blog can serve as a means for determining the merit of rumors that might affect our work lives (e.g. “Did anyone else hear that they were shutting down program X?” “What ever happened to the university’s plans to build a conference center?” “Someone told me that our State union is selling its building…is that true?”).  Sometimes rumors amount to nothing.  Other times, these little whisperings might key us all into something important.  The key is to separate the rumors with merit from the BS.

This blog can also serve as a clearinghouse of information about our union, our university, and the state of higher education.  Eventually, I hope that other members become interested in posting here too.  If you are interested in becoming a contributor to APSCUF-KU XChange, drop me an email at deepdemocracy@gmail.com.

Here’s to the discussion.

This is a podcast of the paper I gave at the Rhetoric Society of America 13th Biennial Conference in Seattle, WA on May 26, 2008.  My paper, “Holding Back the Membership: Breaking Cycles of Despair and Rhetorics of Power in a Contract Negotiations Year,” was part of a panel I was on with Ken Ehrensal, Seth Kahn, and Cheryl Wanko.  Our panel was titled, “Responsible to Whom, for What?: Complex Audiences at Cross-Purposes in Labor Organizing.”  Our panel was focused on the last round of contract negotiations for our union, APSCUF.

If you would like to download full paper with my Works Cited page and cut selections, you can do that here –> Holding Back the Membership (doc)

 

 Holding Back the Membership, RSA 2008 [26:37m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (51)

That’s right folks.  APSCUF entered YouTube in September 2008.  Here’s the link <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6EInZfXYUw> and here’s the video:   

That’s right…breaking news from the blogosphere: Seth Kahn’s got a blog!  So, do yourself a favor and check out Here Comes Trouble for a window into Seth’s world!

I can’t put my finger on it, but it seems like it’s time to build.  Maybe it’s because I’m just worn out.  But I don’t think that’s it. All I know is that I continually find myself looking at other Comp/Rhet program and imagining the possibilities at Kutztown.  It is just coincidence that I stumble across an issue of Composition Studies from last spring dedicated to the emerging trend toward undergraduate majors in writing, writing studies, cultural rhetoric, and the like?  Is it happenstance that I’m reading Rebecca Moore Howard’s article in said journal and hear echoes of my own arguments? Signs.  Swing away, Merill.

As I’m reading about different programs I’m sketching visual representations of curricula.  Overlapping egg shapes circled by satellites of course clusters.  I need to see things visually if I have any hope of holding onto my thoughts.  A few months ago the possibility of building courses and curricula seemed like wishful thinking.  Or, at least, hardly worth the effort.  Something has shifted.

Best I can tell, it’s linked to the work I’ve done with the union these past several years.  I’m thinking that because of a comment I made to a colleague last week.  I said to her I wanted to bring what I learned over the past couple of years in the union back home.  I don’t know if it’s stranger that I called our little comp program “home” or that I made the link between my union work and my comp work.   Maybe it’s because our vote of no confidence discussions–which have occupied most of this semester–have begun to bear fruit.  Maybe in this little spring break pause has been enough for me to reflect a bit.

I mean I look back at how far we’ve come as a union over the past 4 years and I am amazed.   Most of our new leadership were untenured and/or temporary faculty when we were elected to our Executive Committee.  While some people warned us to “keep our heads down” until we got tenure, or reminded us that “things are not done that way at Kutztown,” we worked.  We worked for the kind of union we thought we should have.  We didn’t settle for “good enough” or “no other choice.”  I look back now and am pleasantly surprised to see the synergy between my writing and my union work.  I guess it’s time for that kind of work to come “home.”

I also said to that same colleague that my preferred approach to leading our program is to create spaces for discussion and conversation.  But now, I said, I think it’s time to begin to assert our program a little more.  Time to work for what we would like to see, not only what is “good enough” or safe.  I’m looking forward to that.

Here’s what I just posted to the vote of no confidence blog:

By a vote of 45 to 15 (with 4 abstentions) APSCUF-KU Representative Council has authorized a vote of no confidence in President Cevallos.

Over the next two weeks APSCUF-KU will hold several faculty meetings to discuss the bill of particulars in even more detail. Links to the bill of particulars and other supporting documents can be found on the right-hand sidebar and the APSCUF-KU web site.

Further details about the voting dates and upcoming meetings will be posted here as soon as they become available.

45 to 15. It’s interesting. You never quite know how these things are going to break. I want to note as well that a member of the Music Department brought a “no confidence in APSCUF-KU Exec” motion to the floor as well. I seconded the motion. I thought it was important to have that vote too since some faculty have made a case that they are “greatly disappointed” in APSCUF-KU leadership and have inferred that that is also the feeling of “lots of other faculty as well.” However, when it comes down to it, numbers speak.

The vote of no confidence in our leadership was defeated. 7 representatives voted no confidence, 49 voted confidence in our leadership. I say our here because, of course, I am a member of APSCUF-KU Exec.

I seconded that motion because I thought it was an important discussion and vote to have. I for one have worked hard over the past 5 years to turn our APSCUF-KU local into a strong, fighting union. A union that actually served it’s members and worked to bring more membership involvement. When I first came to KU our union was deemed largely ineffective by most faculty. My early involvement seemed to confirm that. Don’t get me wrong, there were many people in the union who were working incredibly hard. But it was not, for the most part, an activist union.

Now that we are much more proactive and strong, we are getting resistance in the other direction…Are we pushing too hard? Are we doing too much? Are the faculty content with the way things are? Do they want to return to the days when the union was not so active? For that reason, I thought we–at the very least I–needed to hear if Rep Council had confidence in our leadership or not. 49 Reps said they did have confidence. 40 Reps said, we want to continue as an active, fighting union.

To all those Reps who showed confidence in our leadership…I thank you. You may well be the reason I stay at KU.