The Word from CSEA
Columbus State Education Association Newsletter of August 17, 2011
PEER REVIEW TEAMS
Faculty who are not yet tenured, as well as faculty who expect to apply for future promotions, are again encouraged to work with a Peer Review Team (PRT) as they navigate the promotion/tenure process. PRTs (typically 2 or 3 colleagues above your rank and from within your program/department or a closely related field) are intended to mentor each faculty member below the rank of Professor. Faculty should actively solicit feedback in this collegial process whereby the PRT can assist faculty in determining the types of activities that are appropriate for the various promotion categories, offer suggestions on opportunities for additional activities within the categories, perform classroom observations of the faculty member, and review the faculty member's annual self-appraisal.
In particular, PRTs are encouraged to offer their own comments on the faculty member's annual self-appraisal, recognizing category strengths and weaknesses, and progress toward the next promotion. Faculty who have served on the division-level promotion/tenure committees, as well as those who have served on the college-level promotion/tenure committee, have reported that the comments from a faculty member's colleagues on their annual self-appraisals have been especially helpful in determining recommendations about promotion and tenure.
CONGRATULATIONS TO DISTINGUISHED PROFESSORS
Congratulations to Dr. Greg Goodhart, Jackie Miller, and Steve Abbott on their selection as the first-ever "Distinguished Full Professors." The Distinguished Full Professor award was established three years ago during negotiations between CSEA and the College to encourage senior faculty to remain fully engaged in the college and community. This year was the initial year for the award. It is intended to recognize "distinguished professorial achievements" during the previous three years, and each recipient will receive a one-time bonus of $2,500.
Congratulations also to all who were nominated for this award, and who were thought of highly enough by their colleagues to have been considered for nomination. The examples that each of you set are ones that are worthy of emulation by all faculty.
ANNUALLY CONTRACTED FACULTY
As part of the new faculty contract, the College will be hiring up to 50 new "Annually Contracted Faculty" for this year. They will be hired by a committee consisting of 2-3 tenured faculty members from each department, along with the department chairperson.
ACF are full-time faculty who receive one-year appointments, which may be mutually renewed. They will be paid $50 per contact hour and be eligible for health insurance benefits. They will be members of the CSEA bargaining unit.
They will not be eligible for promotion, and thus will not be required to engage in Mission and Learning Support activities other than preparation, grading, and routine advising of students enrolled in their own classes relative to that course and any subsequent courses in that sequence.
Their teaching load can range from 18-24 hours per quarter, and their teaching schedules will be determined after full-time, tenure-track faculty schedules have been determined. They will also be compensated for 2 additional contact hours for departmental activities including meeting with students and colleagues and attending department meetings and In-Service days. In addition, they are eligible to receive an additional 2 contact hours of reassigned time to assist program coordinators with duties, as well as to assist with program advising.
It is anticipated that many of these ACF may eventually move into full-time, tenure-track positions as those positions become available. Faculty are encouraged to hire only the most qualified applicants from your current pool of adjuncts for these positions, and not feel obligated to recommend individuals simply because the position is currently available. In rare cases, an external candidate may be considered for an ACF position, but only if there are no current highly-qualified adjuncts available for the position.
"NO" ON ISSUE 2
By now you are undoubtedly aware that the effort to repeal Senate Bill 5 will be on the November 8, 2011 ballot as Issue 2. Faculty are strongly encouraged to vote NO on Issue 2, to the question of whether Senate Bill 5 should be enacted.
In order to get the referendum to repeal SB 5 on the ballot, signatures from 231,149 registered Ohioans needed to be collected and turned in to the Secretary of State's office over a 3-month period. Over a period of about 2 months (it took almost the entire first month to get enough petitions printed and distributed to accommodate the number of volunteers requesting petitions), a total of 1,320,417 signatures were collected and submitted. This total is over 50% more than the highest number of signatures ever collected before for a ballot initiative. CSEA thanks those faculty who volunteered to circulate petitions, and who gathered hundreds of signatures (that we're aware of) in this effort.
Following is a timeline of the events surrounding SB 5 and the related attacks on public sector employees:
March, 2009 - John Kasich, preparing to run for governor, tells a gathering of Republicans in Ashtabula County that "we need to break the back of organized labor in schools."
November, 2010 - Kasich receives 49% of the votes and is elected governor, defeating Ted Strickland who received 47% of the votes. Two days after the election, Kasich (evidently already displaying signs that he believes he received a mandate from Ohio's voters with his 49% victory) tells a crowd gathered in Columbus that "if you're not on the bus, we'll run over you with the bus. And I'm not kidding."
January, 2011 - In a further display of Kasich's view of public employees, he refers to a police officer who (three years earlier) gave him a ticket as an "idiot." Kasich does not call him an idiot once, or twice, but three times. And this was not done over the dinner table in a private conversation with his wife, or at a pub with his buddies at happy hour. Kasich referred to the police officer performing his sworn duties as a public employee as an idiot in a public meeting attended by over 1,000 employees of the Ohio EPA. If you have not yet seen the video of our governor referring to a police officer as an idiot, you can watch it athttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KF0_Qe4zNrE.
February, 2011 - Senate Bill 5 is introduced by Senator Shannon Jones. Jones, not unlike John Kasich, has stated that one of her top priorities is to eliminate collective bargaining rights for state employees, and she was initially appointed to fill a vacant seat in the Senate "by a handful of state senators in a private session in Columbus" (Middletown Journal, 1/6/10). She was later appointed as Majority Whip by her Republican colleagues.
March, 2011 - Some Republican senators express concerns about the extreme measures contained in Senate Bill 5, but their voices are ignored by the Republican leadership. In order to get enough votes to pass the bill out of committee, Senate Majority leader Tom Niehaus replaces fellow Republican Senator Bill Seitz on the Insurance, Commerce, and Labor Committee. It passes out of that committee by a 7-6 party-line vote.
In another display of "dirty politics", Senate Majority leader Tom Niehuas again replaces a fellow Republican, Senator Scott Oelslager, on the Senate Rules Committee in order to get SB 5 passed out of that committee. Both Seitz and Oelslager, along with four other Republicans, eventually vote against SB 5. Despite bi-partisan opposition to the extreme bill, it still passes by a 17-16 vote [17 Republicans in favor; 10 Democrats and 6 Republicans opposed].
April through June, 2011 - Thousands of volunteers gather signatures to place a referendum on the November ballot to repeal SB 5.
July, 2011 - A Quinnipiac University poll shows that registered Ohio voters oppose Senate Bill 5 by a 56% to 32% margin, with a 2.4% margin of error. The same poll shows 50% of registered Ohio voters disapproving of the job John Kasich has done as governor, with only 35% approving.
August, 2011 - After endorsing Kasich for governor (after his remarks about "breaking the backs of teachers unions"); after extolling the virtues of Senate Bill 5 on numerous occasions; after using questionable data to support some of the claims in favor of SB 5; after reporting on the uncompromising way in which Senate Bill 5 was forced through committees; after Columbus Dispatch subscribers are encouraged to cancel their subscriptions because of the newspaper's continued support for the attacks on middle-class Ohioans; after seeing the number of daily home delivery subscriptions for the Dispatchdrop from over 195,000 (May 2009) to about 142,000 (March 2011); and (undoubtedly) after reading the latest poll numbers from Quinnipiac University showing SB 5 is almost certainly going to be repealed, theDispatch publishes an editorial in which it now seeks "compromise" on the matter.
The time for compromise was when Democrats and moderate Republicans wanted to offer amendments to SB 5 but were denied the opportunity to do so. The time for compromise was when middle-class Ohioans wanted to offer testimony against SB 5 but were denied the opportunity to do so. The time for compromise was when Ohio's workers wanted to protest inside the people's Statehouse but found the doors were locked on them. The time to compromise was when Senate committees were preparing to vote on SB 5 but moderate Republicans were removed from those committees.
After reviewing the events that have led up to this point, it is critical to understand that the most important part of our work remains: Vote NO on Issue 2 in November and make sure that your friends and colleagues get out to vote as well.
STUDENT INTERNSHIP OPPORTUNITY
"We Are Ohio" is a citizen-driven, community-driven, bi-partisan coalition that has come together to work to repeal Senate Bill 5. They are seeking motivated students to join their veteran's outreach program as interns to help in the following areas:
- Assisting in the development and maintenance of online communications tools such as Facebook fan pages, blogs and other new media products;
- Researching information on veterans issues and organizations; and
- Management of veteran outreach programs.
Students should be familiar with the We Are Ohio campaign and Senate Bill 5. Students should also be self-motivated, organized individuals who like speaking with people and have a strong attention to detail. Strong consideration for student interns with prior military experience, from military families or familiar with military issues will be given, but is not a prerequisite to apply.
If you know of any students who might find this a valuable learning experience, they should submit their resumes to Zach Roberts at zroberts@weareohio.com.
The Word is produced by the Communications Committee of the Columbus State Education Association. We welcome your comments, news, and insights.
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