Guidance: Department/Program Meetings with Part-Time Faculty per CBA
Overview
The ACT-UAW 7902 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) includes provisions that invite and allow for part-time faculty to engage more often with the work of their programs/departments. The primary mechanism is through the “Department Meeting”. The CBA states “(e)ach academic year, each department/program will hold four (4) paid meetings open to all Faculty teaching in the department/program”.
To meet this requirement, each program/department must schedule four meetings per academic year (two per semester) and invite all part-time faculty teaching in that program/department, and designate those as “CBA Department Meetings”. Part-time faculty with confirmed attendance at these meetings are compensated for one hour at the Miscellaneous Non-teaching rate, and funded through a central Department Meeting Provost’s Office fund.
Academic leadership, in consultation with College PTF Affairs, should confirm that a meeting constitutes a department/program meeting per the CBA (as described above), and invite all faculty to attend using the language and form provided below, for PTF to report their attendance. Meeting attendance should be tracked, and College PTF Affairs will confirm attendance. The Provost Office will submit payment centrally on behalf of the Colleges via an Additional Duties/Department Meeting EIB.
PLEASE NOTE:
Per the CBA, Eligible departmental meetings must provide time within the agenda where faculty can raise “any matter of general importance” with program leadership, “which may include matters related to curriculum.” Suggestions for meeting topics are included below.
*Only two meetings per semester per program/department should be designated as CBA-eligible Department Meetings (paid via PO). CBA-eligible meetings must be pre-designated. Any other faculty meetings hosted by a department or program may be scheduled as appropriate outside of this designation; such meetings, if required/compensated, are paid via local budget.
Process: Invitation and Payment
Academic Leadership should invite faculty with Labor Relations and University Part-time Faculty Affairs on copy to an eligible departmental meeting specifying the following information which is needed for payment submission:
- Department/program per the University Programs/Departments list
- Day/time of meeting, and location
- Link to PTF Departmental Meeting Attendance Reporting form
Departmental meeting invitation language
Dear Faculty,
You are invited to attend a departmental meeting on X DATE, TIME, LOCATION. This meeting is for the following program/department: X PROGRAM/DEPT [see: University Programs/Departments]
Pursuant to Article IX.V of the CBA with UAW 7902, this meeting is eligible for departmental meeting pay. For attending such meetings, Part-time Faculty will be compensated for one hour per meeting at the miscellaneous non-teaching rate. After you have attended the meeting, please fill out the PTF Departmental Meeting Attendance Reporting form to log your attendance. Once your attendance is confirmed, the payment will be submitted to HR and will be reflected in a subsequent paycheck. You may refer to the Paid Department/Program Meetings Overview for PTF card for helpful information.
Faculty should be reminded to submit the Attendance Reporting form, and attendance at eligible meetings should be tracked. Once the meeting takes place, College PTF Affairs will confirm attendance/payment via the reporting form, and the Provost Office will transfer the information to HR to issue payment.
Timing
As above, Department Meetings must take place twice per semester. To simplify scheduling, consider holding one meeting at the beginning of the semester and one in the second half of the semester.
Meeting Content
In order to support the development of a culture of assessment across the university, departments and programs are encouraged to use these compensated meetings to help part-time faculty develop an understanding of teaching, learning and assessment practices and their ability to contribute toward student learning assessment at multiple levels, from individual assignment outcomes, to course and program learning outcomes.
These could include:
- How to think about and write learning outcomes for activities and assignments
- Effective course design
- Inclusive teaching practices
- Facilitating difficult dialogue, which supports effective and inclusive teaching
- Writing and using assessment rubrics
- Using Canvas to facilitate grading
In addition to these workshop-style sessions, topics for conversation could include
- how individual course learning outcomes contribute to program learning outcomes;
- how courses contributing to a particular program learning outcome ensure they introduce, develop or advance student learning toward satisfaction of that learning outcome;
- breakout sessions in which faculty teaching multiple sections of the same course confer on their assignments and activities that contribute to the course and program learning outcomes, etc.
Staff in The Faculty Center and in Curriculum and Learning in the Provost’s Office are available to facilitate sessions from 10 to 45 minutes and can customize content as needed.
Please note that per the CBA, some time must be set aside for open conversation to allow faculty to raise “any matter of general importance” with program leadership, “which may include matters related to curriculum.”
Questions? Reach out to UniversityPTFAffairs@newschool.edu, or your local University Part-Time Faculty Affairs Contacts.