At SIUE A Push for Two Unions: P/T and F/T
ILLINOIS EDUCATION ASSOCIATION organizer David Vitoff and instructor Alan Shiller are pushing for SIUE faculty members to form a union for teaching employees.
Professors want to put unions on the table at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. David Vitoff, an organizer with the Illinois Education Association, is helping SIUE professors with a card drive for unionization, and the results are coming in.
SIUE has about 360 full-time tenure-track faculty. There are another 250 nontenure-track professors, a category that includes part-time lecturers teaching three or fewer classes a semester and full-time instructors who work on a yearly contract.
Vitoff wants to organize them into two faculty locals at SIUE.
”We’re going to include everyone,“ he said.
Under the Illinois Education Labor Relations Act of 1983, a union must get 30 percent of potential members interested in representation–indicated by signing a card in support–to hold an election.
But under a law enacted last year, if more than 50 percent sign the cards indicating interest, that’s effectively a vote. The union is certified by the Labor Relations Board after the cards are verified and a 20-day posting takes place, allowing other unions the chance to bid.
Vitoff declined to give specific numbers because the card drive is ongoing.
“We’re achieving the internal goals that we’ve set, and we’re on our way toward achieving the ultimate goal,” he said. “We’re very excited about the level of activity.”
SIUE spokesmen and Chancellor David Werner, who is retiring this summer, have declined to comment.
Although union membership has declined nationally, SIUE isn’t bucking a trend. According to a report released this week by the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics, education unions have remained constant over the past 20 years, with about 37.7 percent of educators represented by unions. Overall, union membership is about 12.9 percent, down from 20.1 percent in 1983. But that decline has been centered mostly in the private sector, according to University of Illinois law professor Matthew Finkin.
”In Illinois, where unions have attempted to organize in the public sector, the success rate is over 97 percent,“ Finkin said. ”In the private sector, where they’ve gotten to the point of getting an election, they only win about half the time. That doesn’t include efforts where they don’t get a chance to hold an election.“
This isn’t the first time SIUE professors have considered organizing.
In 1988, the faculty voted to reject unions by a narrow margin. Mass communications professor Riley Maynard, who has taught at SIUE for 22 years, said he thinks the vote failed because professors had to choose between two unions.
