The Board of Governors (BoG) held a meeting on March 27 to discuss updates on negotiations between the school and the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 2424, among other items.
While the meetings are normally held in Richcraft Hall, the meeting was held via teleconference “due to the ongoing picketing blocking entrances to campus” according to an email from Amanda Goth, the board secretary.
Throughout the meeting, dozens of members from CUPE Local 4600—which represents contract instructors and teaching assistants at Carleton—gathered in front of Richcraft Hall with signs and banners to show solidarity with CUPE 2424 by protesting the BoG meeting.
Brian Greenspan, an English professor who came to the protest, said the switch to a teleconference meeting “doesn’t maybe send the right message.”
“I would say that there must be a responsibility for the Board to appear before the members of the community,” he said. “I think that everyone else still working has to come on campus to do their job. The Board shouldn’t be an exception. We have to be at our jobs.”
Jordan Steinhauer, a masters of journalism student and teaching assistant, said she came to the protest to specifically show support for the support and technical staff in the journalism department who are on strike.
“In the faculty of journalism, we have a lot of amazing members that are out on strike, and it’s really hurting us as a unit,” she said. “We miss them a lot, and I want the best for them, and I want them to be able to have access to their full pension. So, I think it’s important to show support for those people that I care a lot about and that help me be a better journalist and a better student.”
She added that she thinks Carleton is starting to understand that more people are on the side of picketers than on the side of administration.
“I think that change, that shift—it illustrates that they know that they’re kind of stuck in a hard place right now,” Steinhauer said. “So, hopefully they’ll come to some resolution.”
Carleton vice-president (human resources) Rob Thomas gave a brief update on the negotiations during the meeting. As the campus enters the fourth week of the strike, Thomas said that the school and the union will be meeting with an “expert external mediator” to discuss resolutions.
Thomas added that the school is “hopeful that [they] will be able to bring this matter to resolution.”
Other than the March 28 meeting with the external mediator, there was no mention of further dates set out for bargaining talks during the BoG meeting.
According to Greenspan, CUPE 4600’s protest aimed to send this message: “please deal plainly and end the strike soon.”
Photo by Meagan Casalino
