Big thanks to Carrol, too, who did some heavy emailing!
From: Stephan Dobson <stdobson at yahoo.com> Reply-To: sdobson at chass.utoronto.ca
Dear Sister Kelley -
On behalf of the Strike Committee of the Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 3902 University of Toronto I'd like to thank you and the Method & Theory listserv community for your help during our recent struggle. (And Ken's freezing ass probably appreciates it too!! He is my colleague at the Centre for the Study of Religion, UofT.)
As you are probably by now aware, after our call for assistance went out the province called both parties back to the bargaining table and as a result of negotiations, a tentative agreement was ratified by our membership on Wednesday last (62.4% in favour; 37.6% against; 1233 voting out of approx 2300). The turnout for this ratification was the largest in our Local's 25 year history.
While the agreement does address some of our Local's concerns, the main issues of wage parity with other area universities as well as tuition relief were not adequately addressed. The university admin here has appointed a task force on graduate funding, so we will see, I suppose. Nonetheless, many of our members, myself included, are distrustful of both the administration and their task forces (there have been about 3 this decade, with no implementation of findings). Myself and others on the Strike Committee also feel that a fundamental issue of the strike was not addressed, namely, that UofT insists on treating TA appointments as a supplement to funding rather than as work.
A letter of support sent to the administration, perhaps censuring them for their recent behaviour (lock-out; "restructuring"/firing our members; threatened expulsions for an occupation) as well as calling upon them to deal fairly with grad students during the Orchard Task Force period, would be greatly appreciated:
President Robert Prichard Simcoe Hall 27 King's College Circle University of Toronto Toronto, ON, Canada M4W 2A8
email: president at utoronto.ca phone: 416.978.4865
Copies of correspondence can be sent to:
or:
Canadian Union of Public Employees, Local 3902 229 College St., Suite 304 Toronto, ON, Canada M5T 1R4
Many of our members are now feeling demoralized; your support in this matter helps. The strike has been a bitter one, and support like yours prevented a hostile administration from breaking our Local. On behalf of the Strike Committee, we thank you.
Yours in solidarity,
Stephan Dobson Strike Co-ordinator Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 3902, University of Toronto
"Universities work because we do."
-- p u l p c u l t u r e a list for the discussion of media/culture/politics http://www.flash.net/~oudies/pulp_culture.htm ~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.