The University of Western Ontario’s (UWO) administration and the University of Western Ontario’s Faculty Association (UWOFA) reached an agreement on Nov. 9, avoiding a potential strike of contract professors.
Daniel Belliveau, president of the UWOFA, said in an email that the faculty association’s goals ultimately sought to improve job security for contract professors, as well improving the overall compensation of all UWO faculty.
According to a statement released by the UWOFA, 1,600 unionized full-time and part-time faculty members have not had a contract since June 30.
“Faculty at Western are currently ranked 11th in the province of Ontario in regards to compensation, yet ranked fourth on research output and funding and fifth in size of institution (number of students),” Belliveau said.
He explained that contract professors have a definite end date and teach a course term by term, while a tenured professor have a full-time position teaching for a period of time of one, two, or three years and sometimes up to five.
The UWOFA board of directors are meeting Nov. 16 to ratify the agreement that was reached last week.
Belliveau said contract professors find themselves in uncertain and precarious situations. He said some have to teach at multiple institutions at the same time in order to make enough money. As a result, they might not be able to offer their students office hours.
A 2018 study done by the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT), showed that 92 per cent of contract professors worked at universities.
The study also showed that the largest program areas taught by contract professors are humanities (21 per cent) and social sciences and law (18 per cent).
Ontario has the largest percent of contract professors, with 47 per cent of faculty being contract, found CAUT.
Fifty-four per cent are contracted on a course to course basis, which increases the risk of job loss.
Daniela Bilic, a first-year actuarial science student at Western, said she sympathizes with faculty taking a strike position because she says they’re are not paid well relative to other universities.
However, she said was nervous about the possibility of the strike and added that students did not receive answers that were clear enough about how it would impact their studies.
Bilic said while she knows tenured professors have more job security, she does not know which of her professors are tenured or contract.
Anita Woods, a contract professor at Western, wrote a blog post explaining how prominent job uncertainty is.
“I work with a majority of colleagues who are tenured and for that reason when the discussion of budget cuts come up in meetings, I look around the room and one of the few people that can be cut is me. It is terrifying. Even if I outperform 95% of my colleagues, I am up for removal as budgets tighten, not them,” she wrote.
Julia O’Connor, a third-year criminology and sociology student at Western, said that while she understands that professors have the freedom to strike under certain situations, they should do so in a way that does not affect students.
“Especially me being in third-year, it would be putting me at quite a disadvantage if it went on for too long,” she said.
She furthered explained how the university was “a little too quiet about it” and she was only made aware of the potential strike by her professors.
O’Connor also explained how she thinks the situation with contract professors is unfair and that it’s “horrible that people have to reapply for their job every couple of months or so.”
Western is not the only university that has faced a potential strike recently. In July, the Ontario government passed a back-to-work legislation to end the longest strike in Canadian history of 142 days at York University.
A statement from Western says that a tentative deal means there will be no strike and all services – including classes, labs, tutorials and research – will continue as normal.
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