In the current moment, managers across many CSU campuses are citing budget woes in order to impose austerity policies on faculty, staff, and students.

We know that over many years, across the CSU, the percentage of the budget CSU administrators are spending on instruction continues to decline as a percentage of the entire budget, while spending on investments, consultants and administrators increases. CFA’s forthcoming report, Shortchanging Students, details these regressive trends.

As CSU managers cut instructional budgets at the urging of expensive private consultants, these decisions directly impact faculty workloads.  At many campuses, presidents and their designees (e.g., provosts and deans) are attempting to ignore the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) in order to squeeze more unpaid work out of faculty in a range of ways, such as raising course caps, denying reassigned time and s-factor (supervision units for directed studies with students), and attempting to alter the duties of librarians in the name of budget-related “reorganization.”

In our CBA, Article 20 governs our workload rights – for instructional faculty, counselors, coaches, and librarians.

While the entire article is worth a careful review, most often faculty file grievances related to excessive and unreasonable workloads, citing the language of 20.3a, which states:

“Members of the bargaining unit shall not be required to teach an excessive number of contact hours, assume an excessive student load, or be assigned an unreasonable workload or schedule.”

Article 20.3b and 20.3c are also worth sharing in full:

“In the assignment of workload, consideration shall be given at least to the following factors: graduate instruction; course modality; activity classes; laboratory courses; supervision; distance learning; sports; and directed study. Consideration for adjustments in workload shall be given to at least the following: class size/number of students; course and curricular redesign; preparation for substantive changes in instructional methods course modality; research, scholarly, and creative activities; advising; student teacher supervision; thesis supervision; supervision of fieldwork; service learning; student success initiatives; assessment and accreditation activities; and service on department, college, or University committees.

In determining what is ‘excessive’ or ‘unreasonable’ under this section, the items listed under 20.3(b), as well as the number of students seeking to take courses in the academic area, the distribution of student enrollment, the level of support provided the program, and the effects of the introduction of new instructional technologies, and the prior practices of the University shall be among the primary elements to be considered. The parties agree that consideration of the prior practices of the University shall include the calculation of Weighted Teaching Units in prior years.”

In our current CBA, we also won new language that enables faculty to immediately request a meeting with an administrator if we believe we have been assigned an excessive or unreasonable workload. Article 20.2b includes the following language:

“Any faculty member who believes they have been assigned an excessive or unreasonable workload (including an excessive student load) may request to meet with the appropriate administrator regarding such assignment. Faculty members are encouraged to request the meeting as soon as the concern is known. The appropriate administrator shall meet with the faculty member within ten (10) days of such a request, and should provide a response within five (5) days of the meeting. Meeting with an administrator is not required in order to file a grievance over Article 20.”

While this contractual language on workload is vital, it is not a panacea.

Our workload article, Article 20, is only as strong as our willingness to invoke it, each academic term, with a view toward not only our individual situations, but our collective rights to a just workload.

Workload creep often happens steadily over time and across academic terms, as new administrators enter campus with their CBA-averse “efficiency” schemes. And yet, under the CBA, we have just seven weeks (49 days) to grieve a violation of our rights. Therefore, the best way for us to defend our workload rights is to say no at the outset when managers (or chairs, who are often unfairly pressured by managers) ask that we “volunteer” to: take more students into our classes or counseling appointment books, supervise directed research without compensation in units, take on new duties of a coaching or library colleague who left and was not replaced, and the list goes on.

By saying no, you respect not only yourself, but your colleagues and our collective rights as workers. For example, if a faculty member agrees to add just 2 extra students over the cap to each of their four classes (8 total extra students), and this occurs regularly for the next two years (for a total of 32 extra students), that practice not only sets a new precedent and changes “past practice” on course caps, it also denies our colleagues – namely Lecturer faculty, who are most threatened by today’s austerity schemes – work to which we are entitled. Even if you feel “you can handle it” because “students need to graduate” and “the dean told us they won’t open any more sections no matter how long the waitlists grow,” this approach is ultimately harmful – to students (who deserve the attention of professors in appropriately sized courses) and to faculty (especially Lecturers, who deserve steady work in reasonably sized courses).

Faculty do the work we do because we care about students, and of course, their ability to graduate with ease. Unfortunately, administrators exploit our altruistic feelings toward students in order to violate our collective rights to a fair and just workload.

In these times of austerity, consider the following practices:

  1. Say no at the outset when you are asked to “volunteer” for work you should be paid for, including taking “just a few more” students in need of classes.  Explain to students why you cannot (e.g., add them to your class, do a directed study with them), and direct them to the dean or provost’s office to complain about their lack of options.
  2. Speak up for your more vulnerable colleagues – such as those on temporary contracts, probationary assistant professors, and others who feel more timid about pushing back.
  3. Have ongoing conversations and strategy sessions with your department or division colleagues about workload, without managers (e.g. deans, associate deans) present.
  4. If a workload increase is being imposed upon you, invoke Article 20.2b and request a meeting right away with the appropriate administrator.
  5. If that meeting does not result in a fair workload, consider filing an Article 20 grievance, and document your increased workload as meticulously as you can. If possible, use this Workload Worksheet as a template.  Your chapter’s faculty rights representative can help you. They may be able to file information requests, or direct you to campus policies on course caps, such as EP & R 76-36, which remains in the appendix of our CBA as a governing document on many campuses.
  6. Get involved with your campus CFA chapter! Challenging the exploitation of our working conditions by management takes a movement. While individual grievances are a useful tool for addressing workload problems, collective action shifts the prevailing culture where managers think they can ignore our rights and impose their plans on us.

In these times of manufactured austerity, it is up to us to be vigilant and defend ourselves against workload creep and against unilateral “efficiency” schemes that harm us and our students.

Let’s answer their austerity with our solidarity!

Want to learn more? Become active with your local CFA chapter Faculty Rights team. Find your representative here.

  • Browse the faculty contract here.
  • See an archive of Faculty Rights Tips.
  • If you have questions about a faculty rights tip or would like to suggest a tip, please write us with the subject line “Faculty Rights Tip.”
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