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Dear Colleagues,
This past bargaining session featured a lot of discussion on intellectual property rights for faculty. The outcome of these issues will seriously affect how faculty can treat their creative work, including databases, software, and their instructional materials. The UFF-FSU team responded to the Board of Trustees team’s proposals for articles — 18, Inventions and Works, and 19, Conflict of Interest. A detailed and earnest discussion followed on faculty rights to control their own class materials, their creation of works outside of the university, and their ability to act during one’s free time. We also briefly discussed Article 21 with reference to classroom safety.
The University is facing financial challenges, and it appears to us that a decision has been made to monetize the faculty. The university is trying to pull back control of CBA-conferred faculty intellectual property rights. These rights will be unilaterally taken if the University administration is free to act on its own will. If you value your rights as a faculty member, we need you as a union member. There’s no more sitting on the sidelines and hoping that other people will join. Not only that, but we are close, at 59% membership as of today. This means that YOU may be the reason that all the faculty lose their union. The deadline is NOW. Please join.
In Article 18 Inventions and Works, the UFF-FSU team struck most of the language for the university claiming all rights to work in a faculty member’s “field or discipline,” whether or not the faculty member uses University resources. This would include any works or inventions produced during summer break or during vacation time. The UFF-FSU team explained in great detail that this was claiming ownership of faculty 24/7/365, which is a far cry from the contracted duties of faculty. The UFF-FSU proposed language restricts what the university can claim rights on to effort that is specifically listed in the faculty member’s AOR.
One category of items that the BOT team now believes the university should be able to claim ownership of is faculty-created databases, intended for the public research community. These have always been protected, the same as research articles, creative writing, or musical compositions. The UFF-FSU restored that exception to the status quo list of protected scholarship and also reversed the change forbidding release of Open Source Software without University approval. The BOT’s argument for these restrictions was that the Office of Commercialization might determine that some Open Source Software could instead be licensed for profit. For many faculty, the release of OSS is a way to build citations for academic advancement.
The UFF-FSU team reiterated its objection to the university claiming ownership of instructional materials and emphasized that faculty would just avoid using Canvas for these materials if everything posted there was considered to be owned by FSU. We maintain that faculty members are not indentured servants to the university. The administration argued that they need faculty instructional materials for an adjunct or new faculty to teach due to concern for the students’ educational experience. It is the view of the UFF-FSU that concern for the students should result in hiring faculty who are prepared to teach a subject and get paid a living wage. Concern for the student’s education should lead to hiring sufficient faculty so that adjunct faculty are not necessary. In addition, the administration should work with incoming faculty in their onboarding process so that they are informed sufficiently in advance of what classes they will teach and not have to produce a class at the last moment.
The UFF-FSU’s counter-proposal restores faculty rights to their own instructional materials. Faculty members should be able to take their own instructional materials with them upon leaving the university and we should be able to retain our rights to refuse if the chair wants to give our instructional materials to someone else.
In Article 19 Conflict of Interest, the BOT team had designated that a conflict of interest could occur if a faculty member engages in any act that conflicts with any contract by any outside sponsor for any amount. How many of you know every sponsorship, donor, contract, or source of revenue held by FSU? We do not! The UFF-FSU team rejects this sweeping power of control of faculty actions by the administration and proposes reverting to current language.
The BOT team finally responded to our proposed changes in Article 21 Other Faculty Rights. The UFF-FSU has been asking for improvements to campus and classroom safety for faculty, students and staff for over ten years with little progress. The BOT team told us repeatedly they were working on it, though they couldn’t explain the results nor did we see any. Last year, we required a committee from faculty, staff, and law enforcement to issue a report with recommendations on safety protocols by this summer, with changes, we propose, implemented in this Fall semester. The BOT team struck out the requirement that the report be written and thus available to all faculty and staff. Rather, they thought an oral briefing only to UFF leadership would be sufficient. In addition, the BOT team proposed that instead of any fixed deadline for implementation of these protocols, they would occur “as soon as practicable”. After a decade of waiting, this further uncertain goal is unacceptable. The University has been investigating multiple faculty (and may take disciplinary action) regarding their actions during the live shooter incident on 17 April, which the administration apparently found inappropriate. Surely few, if any, faculty felt qualified on that day to make a split-second decision about the best course of action in a potentially unsafe environment — most notably, in a classroom with doors that don’t lock (or at least don’t seem to lock). We think that the University should take responsibility for classroom safety rather than foisting that responsibility on the faculty for another ten years or “as soon as practicable.”
Comments (or praise) on bargaining issues are always welcome. Please also join us at the next collective bargaining session: Wednesday, June 4th from 2:00–5:00 at the FSU Training Center, just across Stadium Drive from the University Center (or join us on Zoom).
In solidarity and on behalf of your faculty bargaining team,
Scott Hannahs, Research Faculty
United Faculty of Florida – FSU Chapter Co-Chief Negotiator
https://uff-fsu.org (Visit our new web site!)
National High Magnetic Field Lab, Florida State University
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