Historic Agreement...AFT and CFT coverage

But it’s not just UC-AFT members who stand to benefit. This contract addresses crucial issues that universally plague adjunct professors—those faculty who work on part-time, limited contracts. It improves job security, raises pay and increases family leave benefits.

“Everywhere across the country, adjuncts and lecturers are literally working paycheck to paycheck, cobbling together a gazillion jobs, not having healthcare, not having retirement security and, worse, not knowing from semester to semester or year to year what’s going to happen next year,” said AFT President Randi Weingarten at a celebratory rally Nov. 17. “What you have done in this contract is taken a giant step to eliminate precarity.”

Read the full AFT article here: https://www.aft.org/news/strike-averted-groundbreaking-adjunct-contract-california

How close were lecturers to walking on picket lines? Before setting off for the marathon bargaining session, CFT President Jeff Freitas laid out two shirts for the morning: a red one for striking, and a blue one for celebrating.

“I was ready for the red, but I’m so much happier to wear the blue,” Freitas said.

“We saved a whole lot of people’s jobs today,” said Caroline Luce, a lecturer in the Labor Studies department, “and we gave every job a career ladder.”

The cheers grew louder as Luce, also a member of the UC-AFT communications team, listed enforceable workloads, paid family leave, and other contract breakthroughs. Applause broke out when she thanked the California Nurses Association and other unions on campus for their support during years of organizing and bargaining.

Read the full CFT article here: https://www.cft.org/article/uc-lecturers-greet-new-contract-game-changer-and-only-beginning