UC-AFT Statement on UC Campus Climate Policy Changes
Executive Board – September 16, 2024
SUMMARY: New Speech and Assembly Regulations Threaten Our Labor Rights
UC-AFT’s Executive Board is deeply concerned that recent changes to the University of California’s “campus climate” policies will negatively impact our members’ protected rights to picket and protest, their reappointments, their workplace safety and academic freedom.
We have submitted a demand to bargain over these changes, and will regularly update our members over our advocacy on these issues.
Below we offer our members and the general public an explanation of why UC has changed its campus climate policies, how it has changed them, and why we are concerned that these changes contribute to a broader attack on higher education and the excessive policing of college campuses.
BACKGROUND: CA State Legislature Requires “Campus Climate” Policy Changes
This summer, the California State Legislature made $25 million in funding for UC contingent upon it “develop[ing] a systemwide framework to provide for consistency with campus implementation and enforcement” of what it called “campus climate” policies (Senate Bill (SB) SB 108, Sec. 219 (34)).
As articulated by the new law, campus climate policies are supposed to balance two missions: “foster[ing] freedom of expression and the free exchange of ideas”, and “protecting student, staff, and faculty safety and access to educational opportunities.” These include the establishment of “time, place, and manner” limitations on speech and assembly, and policies to “ensure students can safely access buildings and activities on campus.”
The Legislature set a deadline of October 1, 2024 to demonstrate compliance with SB 108.
BACKGROUND: UC Makes Changes to Policy that Go Beyond What is Required by Law
On August 19, UC President Michael Drake exceeded what the state legislature required when he created a new statewide “framework” for UC campus climate policy.
In a August 19 statement, President Drake committed all UC campuses to “Clarifying and reinforcing requirements for policies impacting expressive activities, including policies that prohibit camping or encampments, unauthorized structures, restrictions on free movement, masking to conceal identity, and refusing to reveal one’s identity when asked to do so by University personnel.” SB 108 did not require UC schools to ban “encampments”, or punish the refusal to remove masks when asked to do so (UCOP, “Updates on UC campus climate efforts”, August 19, 2024).
Since August 19, most UC campuses have published their campus climate policies online to comply with SB 108 and President Drake’s statement. In the process, some campuses have also changed their policies without seeking meaningful input from students, faculty or staff.
CONCERN #1: UNDEMOCRATIC PROCESS FOR ESTABLISHING NEW POLICIES
The state legislature did not require UC to change its campus climate policies. We therefore believe that UC should meet and confer with campus unions, as well as solicit feedback from Academic Senate and student governments, before making any changes to those policies. The UC has failed to do this.
CONCERN #2: VIOLATION OF OUR COLLECTIVE BARGAINING AGREEMENTS
As part of UC campuses describing their campus climate policies, multiple campuses misrepresented the reappointment process for Unit 18 faculty.
At Merced, Riverside, Berkeley, Santa Cruz, Irvine, San Diego, and San Francisco, UC campus web sites describe what they call “Accountability Measures” for enforcing campus climate policies that, when applied to “Non-Senate Academic Appointees”, include “Informal counseling memorandums, written warning, written censure, demotion, suspension without pay, reduction in salary, non-reappointment, and dismissal.”
The application of such measures to the re-appointment of Unit 18 lecturers would be a clear violation of Article 7a of our collective bargaining agreement, which outlines criteria for reappointment that do not include anything having to do with campus climate policies. Article 3 of our contract, on our members’ “academic responsibilities”, does not regulate what our members do in their own personal time when not working.
Anyone who believes that their employment is being made contingent upon their compliance with UC “time, place, and manner” and other campus climate policies should contact UC-AFT immediately.
CONCERN #3: “TIME, PLACE, MANNER” RESTRICTIONS CONSTRAIN UNION ACTIVISM
As workers, our labor rights have long existed in tension with campus regulations on speech and assembly.
We have a right as employees, and as union members, to engage in concerted activities to promote workers’ rights and interests. These rights are the foundation of our ability to function as a labor union: to speak out without fear of retaliation; to raise awareness with our colleagues and our community; to rally, picket, and protest in public.
But the campuses where we work have a wide range of rules that restrict where people are allowed to assemble, when, and for what reason. These “time, place and manner” rules are enforced by campus administrators who use a permit process to sometimes charge both on-campus and off campus groups fees for being on campus, while restricting everything from the use of amplified sound to tabling and the distribution of bottled water. Those who don’t get permits may be cited, detained, or subject to violence by campus police and partner law enforcement agencies.
Recent police violence on UC campuses during the 2023-24 school year highlights the need to place safeguards in campus time, place and manner policies to protect 1) civil liberties, including academic freedom; 2) union rights; and 3) due process and proportionality in policy enforcement. Until then, we join other UC unions in opposing these policies for giving too much arbitrary and potentially violent power to UC administrators.
CONCERN #4: ENFORCEMENT OF MASK BAN CAN UNDERMINE PUBLIC HEALTH AND FREE SPEECH
UC President Drake’s order to ban “masking to conceal identity” reiterates existing state law from California Penal Code Section 185. But we are concerned about the potentially selective and discriminatory enforcement of this rule.
How can campus administrators and police determine the intent of someone wearing a surgical-style mask? How can they determine the intent of someone wearing a costume? COVID-19 is not over, and masking is still an important tool for promoting public health to prevent the spread of COVID and other airborne diseases. Costumes are a part of rallies and public protests.
The California State Senate rejected a Republican bill, SB 1271, in 2018 to require that people remove masks when asked to by law enforcement. Now it seems that UC is acting as if SB 1271 actually passed into law.
We do not want our members or members of the campus community who mask for legitimate public health or free speech reasons to be subject to new forms of discipline or discriminatory policing. UC should provide an explanation for how enforcement of this rule can prevent that kind of abuse.
