OK. I was ready to shut down my computer, but APSCUF President Steve Hicks just said something that deserves to be put up here. Simply put, Hicks said that the Chancellor is going to retrench faculty. According to Hicks, the Chancellor has refused to say just how many faculty are going to be retrenched. Hicks said that the Chancellor said that all of the retrenchment will be done through temporary faculty.
This retrenchment will follow Article 29 of our contract.
I find it a little disconcerting that we’re talking about this on the last day of Assembly in which our time is limited (we have to leave the room by 12:00pm I think). It’s clear that we are going to have a lot to talk about locally about this.
Help me understand – what does it mean that retrenchment is to be done through temporary faculty? Can temps be retrenched?
Debbie Wells
Slippery Rock University
Debbie,
To be honest, it is a little unclear EXACTLY what the Chancellor (via Hicks) meant by that. What I understood him to be saying was that the Chancellor seems to think that he can avoid using Article 29 (Retrenchment) by simply not renewing temporary faculty positions. What I still need to better understand is if this process still DOES require the use of Article 29 since many of those temporary faculty positions represent unfilled tenure-track lines. We’ll see.