News Local/State

UI Urbana Non-Tenured Faculty Hold 2nd Strike As Bargaining Continues

 

Negotiators for the University of Illinois and the union representing non-tenure track faculty on the Urbana campus were scheduled to meet again Thursday morning with a federal mediator. At the same time, non-tenured faculty were going back on strike.

The Non-Tenure Faculty Coalition Local 6546 says that compared to last week’s two day strike, this one will last five days, unless it’s cut short by a breakthrough in contract talks. Five days will take the strike to the end of the spring semester class schedule, not counting finals.

The administration says Thursday’s bargaining session resulted in progress on several issues. But the NTFC says the negotiations brought “very few results”, and no movement on the issue of multi-year contracts. The union wants those in the agreement while the administration says they should be left up to individual departments.  

The U of I administration says they expect most classes taught by non-tenured faculty on the Urbana campus to be held as usual during the strike --- but that students may see substitute instructors, class sections may be combined or moved to other buildings, and some classes may be cancelled.