President's Message

Mitch Silverman

In a few days you will be receiving a survey from the collective bargaining team if you have not received it already. This survey is sent to the more than 1800 members of the bargaining unit at USF as well as all in-unit members in the State University System. I urge you to take the time to answer this questionnaire for the following reasons.

Even if you are not a member of the UFF/USF you are still a member of the bargaining unit and the contract effects your daily life as an educator in Florida. Next year the entire contract is open for negotiation and UFF needs your input on a number of issues that will be bargained. For those of you who have not taken the time to read the contract it covers most of the major factors governing a faculty member’s career in the Florida System. The contract addresses issues ranging from academic freedom and responsibility to nondiscrimination to assignment of responsibilities to tenure and promotion to mention a few. It also spells out the grievance process to be used when the contract is violated and other employee rights.

As can be seen the bargaining process is not just limited to salary issues but involves all aspects of the professional and work experience of the faculty. Filling out the survey that you received is one of the ways that you can have direct input into the process that develops this important governance document. It allows you the opportunity to express your concerns and ideas on how to make the contract stronger and more effective. The other way to have major input in the process is to join the UFF/USF and take an active part in the organization. We do represent you in a number of vital areas both at the university and state levels.

Bargaining Survey

Robert Welker

The Collective Bargaining Agreement between the Board of Regents and the United Faculty of Florida sets forth both the terms and conditions of your employment. The UFF is your exclusive representative for the purpose of collective bargaining with respect to your wages, hours, and other conditions of employment.

Every three years, which includes the year 2000, the articles of the Collective Bargaining Agreement are open for negotiation. The Collective Bargaining Agreement contains terms and conditions covering such topics as academic freedom and responsibility, nondiscrimination, appointment, assignment of responsibilities, performance evaluations, evaluation file, layoff and recall, promotion, tenure, disciplinary action, leaves, inventions and works, conflict of interest/outside activity, grievance procedure and arbitration, professional development programs and sabbaticals, salaries, benefits, and other employee rights.

The UFF must know your needs and concerns in order to effectively represent you in bargaining. So tell us, your representative, what you would like us to bargain this year by completing this survey.

On the Survey

Members of the bargaining unit will soon receive a survey requesting information on member concerns to be addressed in the upcoming bargaining session for the Collective Bargaining Agreement (i.e., BOR-UFF Contract). The current Agreement (and Amendment) is on line and can be accessed via the UFF/USF webpage at http://w3.usf.edu/~uff.

Presidential Search

The University of South Florida is conducting a search to select its next president. The Search Committee is now interviewing seven finalists. Each finalist will visit for two days, and visit the campuses and the local community The UFF strongly encourages all faculty to attend the faculty interview sessions.

At present , each candidate will meet with the Faculty Senate at 10:30-noon in the Marshall Center Ballroom during the first day of their visit. The current schedule is: Dr. Antoine Garibaldi on January 12, Dr. Steffen Rogers on January 18, Dr. Sharon Brehm on January 19, Dr. Carol Harter on January 20, Dr. Judith Genshaft on January 24, Dr. Thomas Tighe on January 25, and Dr. Thomas George on January 26.

Collegiality

Greg McColm

When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean, niether more nor less.

----Humpty Dumpty

Incivility (even abuse) on the job has become a major workplace issue recently. The most recent addendum to the BOR-UFF Bargaining Contract attempts to address this issue: in subsection 5.3 (b) it says that academic freedom is accompanied by a responsibility to ``treat [students, staff and colleagues] in a collegial manner.'' In section 5.4, we are expected to conduct ourselves ``in a collegial manner in all interactions.''

The recent emphasis on collegiality has significant consequences. Some universities have evaluated their faculty for ``collegiality'' separately from teaching, research, and service. ``Committee A'' of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) recently looked at the use of collegiality evaluations in tenure and promotion decisions, and observed that:

1. as a modicum of collegiality seems necessary for satisfactory performance, a separate evaluation of collegiality seems superfluous, and

2. the effect of evaluating faculty for collegiality will be the suppression of dissent and diversity.

The AAUP and others are concerned that the push for ``collegiality'' may undermine academic freedom.

On the other hand, a university is supposed to be a civilized place. The university culture should itself be a ``collegial'' place for scholars. University professionals should not have to endure abuse from colleagues or nominal superiors. Abuse--and fear of abuse--can undermine academic freedom and diversity as effectively as formal discipline. But this means that the expectation of a modicum of collegiality applies to everyone. In fact, the dictionaries agree that ``collegiality'' means ``colleagueship,'' and if a university is anything more than a collection of buildings, it is a community of scholarly colleagues. Now that the Administration has brought ``collegiality'' to the table, we should hold the Administration to their word. Collegiality holds for all of us.

One problem is that it is not clear what ``collegiality'' means. Does it mean ``civil'' or ``nice'' or ``servile'' or what? If people are formally evaluated on ``collegiality,'' what are they being evaluated on? What sort of documentation is used in the evaluation? Can one produce evidence of outstanding ``collegiality,'' or do evaluators respond only to complaints? What sort of complaints are considered? Rudeness? Refusal to do favors? Assault and battery? Disagreement on the proper interpretation of Hamlet? And who does the evaluations? (And can such evaluations be themselves ``noncollegial''?) It is not hard to see the possibilities for mischief and confusion.

One cannot help wondering how we landed in this debate. Societies have dealt with incivility with unofficial but effective social norms for eons. What's wrong with us? And what's next? Inserting a rule in the Student Handbook that all students will address their instructors as ``Sir'' or ``Ma'am''? Miss Manners has observed that zealous observance of proper manners can be used aggressively against people. That is certainly true if there are formal procedures for violations.

Finally, we should remember that ``collegiality'' originally referred to a form of governance of a religious or scholarly body. We see references to ``collegial governance'' in the Preamble and Sections 5.4 and 23.1 of the 1998-2001 BOR-UFF Contract. Well, then. Collegial governance it should be ...