Invitation to attend FSU Executive Committee Meeting for a conversation on issues related to recent university polices

2/5/2025

Dear Members,

Over the past year our members have witnessed several policies and actions by the administration that have raised concerns about possible infringements on our professional and personal rights at UMB. As you may recall, the University issued a new Space Use policy at the beginning of Fall semester that limits where protests can occur, requires faculty, staff, and students to show ID upon request, and holds individuals or groups organizing a demonstration accountable for any potential damage that might occur during an event. The FSU filed a cease and desist and, represented by MTA legal, filed an unfair labor practice charge at the Department of Labor.

Last semester the administration also began requiring members to mark their consent with the Acceptable Use Policy as part of annual cybersecurity training. The FSU raised concerns about the policy, particularly in its broad allowances for administration to seize, search, and access even private devices should they be used for university business, including personal laptops and cell phones. Beyond this, the administration’s decision to hand over member emails in an outside information request led to concerns about academic freedom and union rights, and the implementation of a new policy to outsource the administration of family and medical leave requests to a private entity triggered serious concerns over privacy.

While each of these are separate policies and issues, collectively they point to bigger concerns about the way in which the University has responded to a climate of increased uncertainty. Instead of addressing these challenges as a community, it has sought to shift liability from the University to faculty, librarians, staff, and students resulting in limitations to privacy, first amendment, and union rights.

We are calling on our members to join the FSU Executive Committee on Friday, February 7th from 4:30-5:00 (the last 30 minutes of our biweekly meeting) for a conversation focused on these policies. 

This portion of the meeting will begin with a brief update about the efforts thus far made by FSU in relation to these issues followed by a member discussion. We hope members will be prepared to share with our union leadership their concerns, questions, and experiences with these policies along with ideas for collective strategies to challenge these policies.

(contact FSU or Caroline Coscia for Zoom information).

We look forward to seeing you.

Sincerely,

Caroline Coscia                             Sana Haroon

Senior Lecturer II                           Professor

Political Science Department          History Department

President                                       Vice President