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April 20, 2016

FSU Executive Committee Meeting Minutes, Wednesday, April  20, 2016

Members Present: Marlene Kim  John Hess  Andres Henao-Castro  Heike Schotten  Peggy Walsh  Kathy Kogan   Steve Levine  Ursula Tafe  Karen Suyemoto Loan Dao  Linda Dumas

 

Others Present: Lorenzo Nencioli, FSU Membership Coordinator  Caroline Coscia, NTT Grievance Officer and member of FSU Elections Committee     Al Leisinger, NTT Grievance Officer  Askold Melnyczuk, Professor, English

 

A. Announcements

  1. T shirts- FSU t-shirts are available.
  2. Department chairs update- We won with 2/3 vote. Chairs will now be a separate chapter/bargaining unit represented by the FSU.
  3. MTA Annual meeting May 13, 14- We need delegates to at least show up and vote May 14. 
  4. Early retirement- FSU and Admin reached agreement on retirement incentive plan (35+ years; $25K no added years of service to pension).
  5. NTT Forum- UMB Ballroom, Sunday April 17 10-2 was successful.  There will be another meeting in July and another one in September.  John Hess: close to 50 people showed up. Barbara Madeloni came. We agreed to send out notes to members. Our goal is to bring all other locals to parity with FSU/MSP.
  6. May 11 All-Members’ Party- At FSU member Ellen Frank’s house. Evite to come.

 

B. Business

  1. Budget discussion and approval- There was discussion of the proposed FY17 FSU budget. Current proposal would reduce food expenses, non-bargaining expenses (i.e. PHENOM), would eliminate Associate Newsletter Editor position, but would keep Jobs With Justice membership. We also talked with grievance officers re their hours and decided to cut stipend from $3K to $2K for the part-time NTT grievance officers. There was further discussion of officer stipends, proposed reductions, and of FSU savings. Karen: have possibilities for multiple budgets presented at FSU Annual Meeting. Motion made to recommend a dues increase of an unspecified amount to the FY17 FSU budget. Motion seconded. 9 in favor. Motion passes. Motion made to recommend approval of proposed FY17 FSU budget with dues increase of $5 to FSU members. Motion passes (6 in favor, 1 opposed, 2 abstained). Motion made to present $10 dues increase as a possible FY17 FSU budget option to the members at the FSU Annual Meeting. Motion seconded. Motion passes (5 in favor, 2 opposed). Motion made to approve recommendation of proposed FY17 JCC budget to FSU members. Motion seconded. Motion approved.
  2. Bylaws discussion and approval- It was noted that proposed changes to FSU bylaws have to be distributed to members 10 days prior to Annual Meeting so there will not be enough time to vote on them before the 2016 FSU meeting. It was agreed to hold an all member meeting in Fall 2016 to vote on proposed changes to the bylaws. There was discussion of proposed CAPS language in Article III, Section II (‘preferably a member who has taught…’).  Article III, Section 5 changes were okay. The rest of the proposed bylaws changes will be discussed by the Ex Com at a later date.
  3. 2 2 in CLA meeting with David Terkla- John Hess, Ursula Tafe, and Marlene Kim met with Dean and presented him with additional proposals for a permanent extension of the 2/2 plan: 3/3 for Senior Lecturer’s, more pay for large enrollment (LE) sections.  Dean said no to these proposals as currently presented but would be willing to hear other proposals. Steven Levine, Karen Suyemoto, Andres Henao-Castro, Ursula Tafe, and John Hess will work with Marlene Kim on crafting a proposal on compensation/credit for LE classes for both TT and. It was noted that some junior faculty have expressed concern that LE sections seems to be given to them disproportionately, rather than to tenured faculty. There was discussion of the ‘bargainability’ of the LE issue and whether it can be raised at the main table. There was discussion of the issue of faculty who teach way more than 70 students in their LE classes (classes of 70 or more students are considered LE and the pay/credit is adjusted accordingly; the issue is whether or not there could be even more additional pay/credit for LE classes that far exceed the 70 student amount). John Hess: We need examples of specific courses of this sort and the faculty who teach them (Karen Suyemoto will provide info).
  4. Membership drive- There will be another training for activists by Robert Vodicka, MTA Director of Higher Education, either April 29 in the afternoon or the week of May 16. The training will be geared to getting activist members to talk with non-payers and to get them to join as members.
  5. Lab fees- Waste Removal- Departments are being charged for this service (i.e. they must pay out of departmental budget). This might be contrary to BOT policies. We will investigate.

 

C. New Business

                UMB Open Forum on the Budget Crisis- It appears that Admin has schedules the forum during the time that the next Ex Com meeting is planned. Marlene Kim will confirm and possibly reschedule Ex Com meeting.