In late December, the university provided AUFA with a proposed revision to the Designation policy. The proposed policy would remove 67% of AUFA members—all professionals, academic coordinators, and deans and associate deans—from the union. This FAQ provides more information about this issue.
What is Designation?
Designation is the power to determine which employees or groups of employees are considered academic staff and, therefore, members of the faculty association. Historically, the power to designate who was an academic staff member was vested with the Boards of Governors of Alberta colleges, universities and technical institutes.
Under designation, the Board of Governors of an institution was required to meaningfully consult with the faculty association before making a designation decision, but the power of the Board was otherwise absolute.
Allowing the employer to determine who was in the bargaining unit was an unusual arrangement. Typically, the provincial Labour Relations Board would decide who is a member of the bargaining unit. The involvement of the Labour Board reflects that allowing an employer to determine the union’s membership creates a conflict of interest.
Specifically, a Board of Governors might be tempted to use (or threaten to use) its designation power to advance its labour-relations interests. For example, a faculty association demand for greater free speech rights for professional staff at the bargaining table may be met with a threat to de-designate the staff (thereby rendering the newly won language moot).
In May 2017, the Alberta government changed the law to give the Labour Board the power to review designation decisions made by Boards of Governors. This review process reduces the ability of the employer to mis-use its designation power.
What is the current policy?
In 1983, Athabasca University codified its approach to designation in a policy. The current policy designates all employees holding professorial, academic coordinator, or professional positions to be “academic staff members” (and, therefore, members of AUFA).
There are a small number of exceptions to this general rule. Excluded from the definition of academic staff members are:
The executive of the university (president, VPs, associate VPs and executive directors).
Managers with the title of director who report to a VP (including the university librarian and the registrar).
Staff with regular access to information supporting the negotiation or administration of the collective agreement (e.g., HR, financial managers, executive assistants to the president and VPs, the university secretary).
These exceptions are designed to prevent conflicts of interest (e.g., someone negotiating on behalf of the employer for a contract to which they are also subject).
What is the proposed policy?
In December of 2019, the university presented AUFA with a proposed revision of the designation policy. The proposed policy narrowly defines academics to be those engaged in research, teaching, and service work. This definition excludes:
professionals (who do not teach), and
academic coordinators (who do not have officially recognized research duties).
The policy also explicitly excludes deans, associate deans, and managers from the AUFA bargaining unit.
What effect will the proposed policy have?
The proposed policy will remove 67% of AUFA members from the bargaining unit. The proposed policy significantly undermines the bargaining power of the faculty association. Specifically, a strike by the much smaller and narrower bargaining unit that will exist under the proposed policy will be much less effective than a strike by the current bargaining unit.
It is unclear what will happen to members who will be excluded from the bargaining unit under the proposed policy. AUFA’s working assumption at present is:
professionals would be eligible to be organized by another union but otherwise be without union representation,
academic coordinators would move to the CUPE bargaining unit (CUPE’s certificate is for all non-designated academics staff), and
deans, associate deans, and managers would not be eligible for unionization and would be excluded staff.
AUFA expects current pension contributions would be protected. It is unclear how this change would affect pension eligibility and contributions going forward.
Why is the Board proposing a change?
The Board has not provided a clear rationale for these changes. AUFA believes AU’s true objective is to (1) reduce the union’s bargaining power and/or (2) give the employer something to trade for wage rollbacks in collective bargaining this spring.
During a brief meeting in December, the director of HR referenced a decision by the Alberta Labour Relations Board about the designation of chairs at Northern Lakes College as requiring the Board to have a clear definition of “academics”.
What does the Northern Lakes College decision actually say?
The Northern Lakes Colleges (NLC) decision stemmed from an application by the NLC Faculty Association to the Labour Relations Board to review whether academic unit chairs should be considered academic staff members (and thus be included in the faculty association). The Labour Board declined to decide the application because the NLC faculty association and Board of Governors had not yet engaged in meaningful efforts to resolve the matter between themselves.
In the NLC decision, the Labour Board made a number of comments about designation. These comments included the assertion that “in the exercise of its designation power, a Board of Governors is expected to establish objective criteria” to guide designation decisions (p. 37). Such criteria were required so that consultations between the Board of Governors and the faculty association could be meaningful and informed.
AU’s proposed policy does establish clear criteria for determining who is and is not an “academic”. However, the proposed policy goes far beyond what is required by the NLC decision and fundamentally redefines who is considered an academic staff member at AU.
AUFA asserts that AU’s proposed criteria are wrong. Specifically, they ignore the lengthy history of the AUFA bargaining unit and unique operational requirements of Athabasca University. AUFA also notes that the proposed policy appears to be an effort by the employer to advance its labour-relations interests (i.e., weakening AUFA’s bargaining power) under the guise of complying with the NLC decision.
What can we do about this?
There are two main strategies available to AUFA members to counter this move by the employer and AUFA will be employing both of them.
Legal
The Board of Governors is required to meaningfully consult with AUFA about content of the proposed policy. AUFA’s executive will be seeking amendments to the proposed policy to maintain the status quo during this consultation. AUFA considers it unlikely that these efforts will be effective at altering AU’s approach unless that are backed by significant member pressure (see below).
If the Board of Governors enacts a policy that results in the de-designation of members, AUFA will file an application with the Labour Board to have the decision reviewed. It is unclear how the Labour Board might rule on such an application and leaving the matter in the Labour Board’s hands is a high-risk strategy.
Member Pressure
The Board may decide to alter its approach to designation if AUFA and its members attach a high cost to the proposed policy. This was the strategy that AUFA used last autumn to defeat the employer’s efforts to impose company doctors and other language rollbacks on AUFA.
Costs that can be legally attached to the designation policy include:
Interpersonal stress: The president and vice-presidents (who are likely behind this policy) are vulnerable to interpersonal pressure. Being repeatedly confronted by employees in public and private about this issue will cause them frustration and distress.
Reputational harm: AU’s reputation as well as the reputation of the President is vulnerable to damage because the proposed policy is clearly a form of union busting and is obviously unfair.
AUFA will be organizing town hall meetings in mid-January to discuss the proposed policy and ways in which AUFA members can generate enough pressure on the employer that it backs away from this policy.
Bob Barnetson, Member
AUFA Membership Engagement Committee