State Rep. Susan Hatch Davis stands with the Vermont Adjunct Organizing Committee.
Update 10/9: Adjunct Faculty at St. Michael’s college have filed for a union election. More to come soon.
Update: 10/9: American of Federation of Teachers Vermont’s President Benjamin Johnson has sent letters in support of the ongoing Adjunct Action Vermont adjunct faculty organizing efforts to the administrations of Champlain, Burlington and St. Michael’s colleges. In the letters he says adjuncts organizing at all three schools “have a right to make this important and personal decision without fear of intimidation or coercion. AFT is deeply committed to supporting workers’ rights and standing up for fair labor standards for all working people.” Read the full letters here: AFT Support Letter.
Update 10/3: Adjunct faculty at Champlain and Burlington colleges have filed for a union election. Read more here.
Update 10/3: 32 Vermont State Representatives and Senators have signed letters supporting the adjunct organizing effort in Vermont. The letters, sent to the administrators at Champlain, Burlington, and St. Michael’s colleges state: “We support adjuncts moving towards a free and fair election, free from intimidation, coercion, and unnecessary legal hearings or delays.
“We believe there is no reason for the institution to use student tuition dollars or other college resources to fight the adjuncts right to organize.” Read the full letters below.
Champlain College Letter of Support
Burlington College Letter of Support
St. Michael’s Letter of Support
Adjuncts at Champlain, St. Michael’s and Burlington College are joining adjuncts nationally in building a movement to win work with dignity. We recognize there is a crisis in higher ed: in 1960 75% of all faculty nationally were full-time and tenured. Today the opposite is true: 72% of all academics are adjuncts, unsure whether they will receive courses in subsequent semesters, enduring poverty wages, lacking access to healthcare, regularly passed over for full-time positions, without office space inside the institutions they teach to prepare for class or meet with students.
This is an idea whose time has come. No one -including professional academics, vested with the responsibility of educating Vermont’s next generation- should be treated like probationary employees years or even decades into one’s career, subsisting off a sub-minimum wage salary. In that spirit, we ask these colleges to adopt high-road practices, and not obstruct these low wage, undervalued academics from exercising the fundamental human right to organize, to better their work conditions, to raise educational standards, and to win work with dignity.
When adjuncts unionize, everyone benefits because adjunct working conditions are student learning conditions. Therefore, adjuncts’ inability to work with dignity impacts the next generation of Vermont residents’ access to quality educational outcomes. In the spirit of the long enshrined Vermont value of coming together to solve the crises facing our communities, we as students, faculty and community members stand with our adjuncts as they seek long-overdue justice.
If you are adjunct faculty and are interested in learning more about the organizing efforts, please contact Ashley Renner at [email protected].
