SACRAMENTO – Member leaders of the California Faculty Association (CFA) will rally in-person outside the November 9 Board of Trustees meeting in Long Beach. CFA members will share their experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic teaching and delivering student support services, recruiting and retaining students, and efforts to erase long-standing inequities at the bargaining table.

The rally starts at 9:15 a.m. at 401 Golden Shore in Long Beach and will be livestreamed.

The gathering coincides with the delivery of open letter petitions to CSU campus presidents across the state imploring them to call on Chancellor Joseph I. Castro to settle a fair contract with faculty. The petitions remind presidents that it is their responsibility to speak up for their campus community, and to recognize the diligent and dedicated work faculty perform to keep students learning and graduating. The petitions ask presidents to be bold and add their voices to CFA’s demands for fair and just compensation and working conditions, and the elimination of systemic racism at the CSU. More than 8,000 faculty have signed on to the petitions.

“CFA members have spent more than 18 months proposing ways to address long-standing inequalities for students and faculty of color that would get us closer to what Chancellor Castro says he wants to achieve,” said Kevin Wehr, CFA Vice President and Bargaining Team Chair, and sociology professor at Sacramento State. “At every turn, the CSU management bargaining team has said no. No to confronting structural racism. No to resisting intersectional barriers. No to improving the lived realities of our faculty and students. At our November 9 rally, faculty will share those experiences and the path forward.”

Also at the bi-monthly CSU Trustees meeting, hundreds of CFA activists – representing 29,000 members across the state – will join students, other CSU employee unions, and community activists virtually and in-person to:

  • Share their sacrifices and struggles during the pandemic and its related fallout the last 18 months.
  • Urge trustees and Chancellor Castro to prioritize mental health funding and services; expand parental leave beyond its current meager 30 days; provide job stability to CSU’s contingent faculty; address racism, bias, and injustice with systemic and structural reforms.
  • Emphasize the need to hire more Black, Indigenous and People of Color faculty to improve student success, engagement, belonging, and wellness. The Chancellor’s Office has made very little gains on one of the most effective predictors of student success – hiring more faculty and staff who look like students, and who share similar experiences as them.
  • Update Trustees on ongoing bargaining negotiations between Unit 3 and the CSU.

These statements will come during public comment Tuesday (November 9) at 10 a.m.

Background: CFA declared impasse in contract negotiations September 30. The CFA and CSU management bargaining teams are meeting with a mediator this month. For more information on where things stand and to read proposals from each side, visit www.CFAbargaining.org.

The rally will feature multiple CFA member speakers and 50 to 100 faculty, students, and supporters with signs and noisemakers. Participants are heavily encouraged to attend only if they’ve been vaccinated, and if they wear facemasks and socially distance at all times.

CFA leaders will be available to speak with members of the media. To schedule an interview, please contact Michelle Hatfield at 916-612-8779, Kody Leibowitz, 916-947-6258, or Lisa Cohen at‪ 310-395-2544.

ABOUT THE CALIFORNIA FACULTY ASSOCIATION: CFA represents more than 29,000 tenure-line instructional faculty, lecturers, librarians, counselors and coaches on the 23 campuses of the California State University system, from Humboldt State in the north, to San Diego State in the south. Learn more about CFA at calfac.org and visit our Facebook, Twitter and Instagram pages.

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