2008 Woodie Awards
Marching for a new contract
By Kyleen McGee
Rocket Contributor
Issue date: 4/27/07 Section: News
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"(The march) is to alert the university that contracts have not been settled," President of APSCUF Jace Condravy said. "We are frustrated because we offered a negotiation in January 2006 to the state system. They have met with us but they have dragged their feet settling a negotiation."
The SRU APSCUF was started to attend to the needs of its members during strikes and emergencies.
The Solidarity Fund is meant to help ensure that in the event of a strike or emergency none of its members will have to endure financial hardships. The fund grants members in need interest-free loans.
According to the APSCUF Web site, the Solidarity Fund is for new and newer SRU faculty, meaning faculty that are just out of college with a hefty amount of student loans and other debts, single faculty, married faculty with one source of income, and financially troubled faculty in particular.
APSCUF Vice President Tom Daddesio feels the march will be successful in raising awareness.
"That's the whole point, to raise awareness (of APSCUF) and about the seriousness of negotiations," he said.
Issues that APSCUF is trying to tackle in negotiations include limiting class sizes, more tenure track faculty and a fair increase in salary.
Sharon Sykora, strike chair of APSCUF, said there has been no settling on the issues. "We have been offered zero, zero, zero, zero," she said.
Throughout the campus on Thursday, messages could be seen written on the sidewalk asking to offer support to the members.
Alex McNeill, a sophomore political science major and the president of the College Democrats, feels that the march will have an impact on the university.
"An active demonstration will speak volumes," she said.
Although student support was and is very much welcome for the faculty, students were not pressured to come and participate with the faculty.
"We are not in a position to ask students to join the march," Daddesio said. "We are under strict instruction not to talk about it in class because we don't want to pressure our students."
Though students had not been asked to march, some took it upon themselves to let other students know the details of what was going on with APSCUF and its efforts.
"The College Democrats will be there, and other students from my hall," McNeill said. "This is very important because our faculty is very important to us."
McNeill also said that the Commonwealth Association of Students was receiving e-mails about the event.
A sense of unity and support could be felt from professors and coaches who were in attendance. Coaches are relatively new to the APSCUF union, which the rest of the faculty seemed very happy about.
Sykora and Condravy led the march with bullhorns actively expressing their feelings about negotiations and their contract.
The members were heard chanting "Faculty stops, everything stops" and "Fair contract now," among other things.
Faculty and students held signs as they passed out informational fliers to passersby.
The goal of awareness was surely achieved by the looks of students and other members of the university.
Many people stopped in their tracks and took notice. Students who spotted their professors offered their support by giving pats on the back, taking fliers and briefly conversing with them.
"This was our time to make our contribution and a good way to build support in case of a strike," Sykora said.
Condravy assured anyone who would listen that faculty and coaches were working their hardest to negotiate a contract before it expires on June 30.
The march went from McKay Education Building to the University Union and ended back at McKay.
Condravy concluded the march by expressing her gratitude to the faculty.
"I thought it went fabulously," she said. "We are a very strong union and demonstrated that today."
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