>Anyway the first step we went through was to get the personnel manual
>and learn every piece of it. The point is to know the regulations
>better than anybody you meet with.
<snip>
>The larger point is to start acting like you already are a union and
>just do what real unions are supposed to do--pick fights with
>Personnel over job descriptions, pay, benefits, hours, duties, and so
>on. Any mistakes on pay checks or other paperwork are a great excuse to
>go over to Personnel to meet and straighten 'this' problem out. You get
>to meet and know and case-out the slimy little snakes in their dark
>little holes. Except I think they call it 'Human Resources' nowadays.
>After some of these minor meetings and battles, your people should start
>to feel organized because they were supported--they were not alone to
>face the monster. Also, chasing down minor employment problems teaches
>you how the enemy is organized, what the channels are, who is really a
>possible friend and who the real jerks are and where they hide in the
>system.
Makes lots of sense. Thanks for a very helpful reply. A couple of things I am thinking of right now are course assignments and teaching evaluations.
Some departments at OSU make course assignments for lecturers (the lowest-level term-employed adjuncts) months ahead of time, while others make us wait until the last minute, which makes it very difficult to even order textbooks, media equipment, and such in time. I'd like to bring the worst departments' practice in line with the better departments', at least.
Another thing is that a couple of friends of mine were recently told that their teaching would be on probation, just because a couple of students complained (on no reasonable ground, to my knowledge). This definitely speaks for a necessity for a formal grievance procedure.
I'll float these ideas and see if others would be interested in starting on these and like problems. If anyone else has experience in solving these problems, let me know, on- or offlist. (I think Annalee's still subbed to this list. Would she please share her story?)
Yoshie