AUFA Equity Audit Is Underway

Early in 2021, AUFA’s Executive prioritized making meaningful progress toward building a more inclusive union. As an initial step, AUFA President David Powell reported to the May 2021 General Membership Meeting in this way:

AUFA has begun an Indigenous Audit by hiring Dr. La Royce Batchelor who is examining AUFA’s documents and culture to create a series of recommendations towards a more inclusive and decolonized construct by shifts in language, inclusion, equity, diversity, and community. What that has meant is to look at what is written and what is said, and what that means. To question what power relationships are enforced through how our contract and other documents are written, and to whose advantage.

Since then, Dr. Batchelor has provided AUFA with several reports and recommendations. As an example, in a recent email to the AUFA Executive, Dr. Batchelor explained the link between union practices and the broader culture at AU:

It is a common misperception that it is the employer that determines corporate culture. However, repeated studies have demonstrated that it is the largest mass of participants that shapes corporate culture, or functional operations. If members of AUFA decide to function or operate in a different way the administration must shift.

In November, the Executive struck a committee to examine and respond to Dr. Batchelor’s observations. At present, the committee includes Myra Tait, Gail Leicht, Rhiannon Rutherford, and David Powell. Following both the letter and the spirit of Dr. Batchelor’s suggestion that the ‘largest mass of participants shapes corporate culture,’ however, many others will be needed in different capacities at different points throughout the process. The work is complex and requires us to examine biases, assumptions, structures, and long-standing practices. It’s also essential, especially if we, as a collective of over 400 individuals, are serious about addressing inequities and promoting inclusion both within our union and within the university.

To that end, while this project was initially conceived of as an Indigenous Audit, we think a better way to conceptualize it is as an Equity Audit. This more expansive and inclusive process title, we think, better reflects the audit’s broad scope and many different perspectives on power structures and relationships within AUFA and AU.

As an AUFA member, you are encouraged to review AUFA’s Equity Statement, and to consider adding your name as a signatory or offering feedback.

The Equity Committee appreciates all member feedback on the Equity Statement. We are an active committee, meeting on a monthly basis to consider a wide range of equity issues at AU. As we consider your comments, our hope is to revise the Statement on an annual basis, for presentation at the AUFA Annual General Meeting.

For the initial stages of the audit, Dr. Batchelor conducted detailed analyses of AUFA’s foundational documents, including our constitution, bylaws, and collective agreements, in addition to the Post-Secondary Learning Act, as well as the more dynamic content on the AUFA blog and website. Current and future stages will see Dr. Batchelor conduct a series of surveys designed to probe organizational culture.

Getting Started: Language Matters

Dr. Batchelor is especially attentive to how language is used – both in foundational documents as well as in our daily work and interactions. Language, of course, is powerful, and it can either reinforce inequitable power relations or promote an inclusive and welcoming organizational culture.

In the first report, Dr. Batchelor wrote,

It is difficult to focus on a dramatic organizational shift at the same time society is struggling with health and welfare as well as AUFA fighting for the jobs of its constituents. However, it is highly recommended that AUFA 1) establish a clear list of goals both current and aspirational, 2) examine definitions both connotative and denotative to ensure future clarity, and 3) question ALL language but especially language of an obvious power distance or punitive nature.

This emphasis on language is the focus of the first survey tool. The “Concepts and Definitions” survey invites participants to identify different definitions of key terms. For example, a particular term may have a different operational function than does its dictionary definition. It may also have other meanings and connotations within our organizational culture. These different definitions can sometimes stand in stark conflict with one another, and potentially contribute to inequitable power relations. Dr. Batchelor further explains:

The goal is to determine if the definitional and functional differences in words commonly used in AUFA foundational documents are also used in functional operations. If the words do not appear to have the same definitional drift in functional operations then the redress can be focused on the documents themselves. However, I am already finding that the definitions drift further in functional operations. This means that not only are there profound differences in the definitions across foundational documents, the definitions are also different in functional operations. We cannot conduct any meaningful shift in Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility if everyone is using a different functional definition.

The differences in definitions doesn't only exist in documents. Research reveals that less than 17% of employees actually read foundational documents. They rely instead on the functional operations definitions. Therefore it is necessary to understand not only the differences in document language, but also the understanding of those that rely on those documents for their livelihood. We can have amazing policies, but if the functional operation understanding does not match then we still have exclusion, homogeneity, favoritism, and inaccessible systems.

Next Steps

Some of the AUFA Executive piloted this first survey tool. For the next pilot group, we will draw from a representative sample of approximately 30 AUFA members. Responses are, of course, entirely voluntary, and will be sent to Dr. Batchelor directly, kept confidential, and analyzed for content only.

A request for participation will be sent to a random and representative sample of members, but any interested members are also welcome to submit responses. Download this file and send it to Dr. Batchelor.

In the coming months, Dr. Batchelor will use a series of additional survey tools to further compile member demographics, identify challenges or barriers members face, and propose solutions. We will share more details about these surveys as they are available.

We will also seek to increase ways members can engage in this process more directly as it unfolds. There will be a townhall meeting on Tuesday, February 1, at 1:00pm MST.

Dr. Batchelor has already provided some concrete recommendations, including a full bylaw review and changes to AUFA’s organizational structure. The committee and the AUFA Executive will be seeking to make progress on these tasks over the next several months. Our hope is to have language and structure changes ready to present to the full membership for discussion at the May 2022 General Membership Meeting.

We are grateful for Dr. Batchelor’s efforts and insights so far and look forward to learning and sharing more information with AUFA members in the coming months. This is an exciting opportunity for AUFA to re-invent itself to better meet the needs of all members towards inclusive solidarity.

Myra Tait and Rhiannon Rutherford

AU proposes dismembering AUFA

On Wednesday, AU provided AUFA with a draft of a new designation policy. The effect of this proposed policy will be to remove 67% of AUFA members from the union. Specifically, the proposal appears to exclude all professionals, academic coordinators, deans, associate deans, and managers. By providing AUFA with the draft policy, AU has begun a process of consultation with no clear timeline. Once consultation is complete, the policy will be implemented.

Designation

The Post-Secondary Learning Act (PSLA) gives the Board the power to determine which individuals or groups of individuals are considered academic staff (and therefore who is an AUFA members).

This “designation” power is unusual, but not unheard of. The membership of most unions is determined by the Labour Relations Boards. Decisions of the Board of Governors about designation can be appealed to the Labour Relations Board.

AU’s current designation policy dates back to 1983. It designates all academic positions as well as all professional positions as “academic staff”. (There are a small number of exceptions, such as executive officers, certain directors, and a small number of professional staff in HR and finance.) Consequently, AUFA’s membership is (roughly) half academics and half professional. Designation as academic does not mean the employee is an academic by profession, only that they have been designated into a faculty association.

AU has been working on a new designation policy since 2018. Earlier this year, AUFA asked President Neil Fassina if this new policy would exclude professionals from the AUFA bargaining unit. His response was “I’d like to think the current Executive has demonstrated a savviness beyond that.” AUFA took that to mean that AU was not considering de-designating professionals and thereby removing them from the AUFA bargaining unit.

Policy Changes

On Wednesday, December 11, AU provided AUFA with a draft of a proposed Designation policy. The proposed policy includes a definition of academic as workers who perform research, service, and teaching functions in credit programs. This definition appears to exclude professionals (who do not teach) as well as academic coordinators (who are not required to do research) from the definition of academic:

“An AU Academic is generally a terminally credentialed expert and specialist who is responsible for the delivery, quality assurance, maintenance and development of Ministry-approved credited programs and courses of study in their primary area of specialty or relevant discipline, and who prioritizes and maintains an active professional research/creation practice and who by way of service positively enriches the vitality of the University and the social and economic fabric of the communities of which it serves. More specifically, an AU Academic supports the agile and scalable digital learning environment of the University by way of academic participation in research and scholarship, service, and teaching and learning.

To inform and assist the transparent and consistent application of the Board’s authority to designate, except from designation, or change the designation of individual employees or categories of employees the following objective criteria will be used to define an “academic” at the University:

Research and Scholarship is a vital function of the University; an AU Academic will:

·     Independently conduct or direct original research that advances the knowledge of their specific and relevant discipline;

·     Conduct funded research that leads to peer-reviewed publications and other scholarly publications; and

·     Conduct research that leads to enhanced instruction through the scholarship of teaching and learning or conduct or direct research with business, industry or other organizations to create technological or social innovations.

Service through participation in the life of the University and the community of which it is a part; an AU Academic will:

•       Contribute to the academic governance of the institution (i.e., reviewing and recommending academic policies and programs development) that contribute to the vitality of the University mission and the expansion of knowledge; and

•       Contribute to the professional academic environment through the modelling of the highest ethical standards and service, such as providing applied research peer review, participation in academic peer advisory hiring committees.

Teaching and Learning extend beyond merely providing academic support to learners; an AU Academic will:

•       Develop credit curriculum and programming, including the development of learning outcomes;

•       Combine scholarship and research in the individuals specific and relevant discipline and incorporate the latest research, knowledge and theory in instruction and delivery;

•       Retain overall accountability for the quality and integrity of curriculum development, delivery and assessment towards the goals of the University, the program and the course;

•       Maintain responsibility for the evaluation of student performance. While an academic may delegate student evaluation the ultimate accountability for controlling the quality and standard of all course-related marking/assessment rests with the academic;

•       Write, or assist with the preparation of, proposals for new or revised courses in approved programs; and

•       Teaching, assessing and supervising graduate students.

Together these three pursuits – Research and Scholarship, Service, and Teaching and Learning comprise the role of an Academic at AU. The definitions of the above three pursuits are not exhaustive and are meant to illustrate the nature of these pursuits.”

The proposed policy also explicitly excludes deans, associate deans and managers from the bargaining unit (these positions are currently in the AUFA unit).

In her email that accompanied the proposed policy, AU’s HR director Charlene Polege framed these changes as designed to give greater clarity to designation decisions:

In order to discuss whether or not an employee ought to be designated as ‘academic staff’, it is important that there be some clarity regarding the objective criteria used to make that assessment. The attached policy and procedure were prepared in large part further to the above and contains a proposed criteria. 

Obviously these changes do more than provide clarity.

AUFA met with AU on Thursday for a preliminary discussion of the proposed policy.

The employer’s rationale for the policy is that Labour Relations Board decision requires a defined consultation process for resolving designation challenges. However, narrowly defining designation criteria in a way that excludes most AUFA members is the employer’s decision alone. The implication is that a professional who doesn't fit the criteria is not an “academic” and therefore wouldn't be designated as such, but that AUFA was free to take the issue to the labour board to let them decide. The glaring absence of any mention of professionals in the policy suggests that they will removed from AUFA.

When asked if the intent of the policy was to de-designate professionals, HR’s response was that staff members who do not fit the criteria would not be designated.

Analysis

The proposed policy will have the effect of excluding 67% of current AUFA members from the bargaining unit. Presently, AUFA has approximately 425 members. Our initial analysis suggests the proposed policy will exclude:

• 185 non-managerial professionals

• 60 academic coordinators

• 35 deans, associate deans, and managers

It is unclear what will happen to these current AUFA members if they are de-designated. Our initial assessment is that:

 •       Professionals would not automatically fall into the AUPE unit (which presently represents only general support staff). Professionals could be organized by another union. Or the university could voluntarily recognize another union as the bargaining agent of these members (e.g., AUPE).

•       Academic coordinators would fall into the CUPE bargaining unit, which currently represents “all non-designated academics”.

•       Deans, associate deans, and managers would likely be excluded employees with no union representation.

Carving 67% of AUFA members out of the bargaining unit will have three main effects:

1. It will financially cripple AUFA. This effect could be offset by a doubling or tripling of dues.

2. It will reduce AUFA’s bargaining power by radically reducing the impact of any strike by remaining AUFA.

3. It will reduce the bargaining power of former AUFA members by leaving them without union representation or in unions that have traditionally done worse at the table than AUFA.

These effects suggest this policy proposal is the next step in AU’s long-term union-rejection strategy which, to date, has included:

1. impeding the union’s access to the worksite,

2. refusing to meet with the union,

3. being unreasonable in the negotiation and administration of the collective agreement, and

4. running up the union’s legal bill.

AU may also be hoping to use this policy as leverage in the upcoming round of bargaining. For example, AU might offer to maintain its current policy if AUFA agrees to salary rollbacks and other concessions. Alternately, AU may simply break up the unit and extract concessions from the remaining AUFA members and former AUFA members in a piecemeal fashion.

Next Steps

This proposed policy is a form of union busting and is intended to intimidate AUFA members as we head into bargaining. This attack is yet another mis-step by the Fassina administration, which has already driven staff morale to unprecedented depths.

Over the winter break, the AUFA executive will be strategizing about how to respond to the both the proposed policy and, if the policy is enacted, the de-designation of 67% of the membership.

We will communicate developments as soon as possible. In the meantime, the executive thanks you for you patience as we deal with this latest employer attack on our rights. Please be assured that we will be exploring many options to mitigate or prevent damage to the unit.

Jolene Armstrong, President