We Teach UC

UC-AFT is fighting to strengthen job stability and provide career pathways for all teaching faculty; to improve wages and benefits so that all teaching faculty have access to healthcare and can provide for their families; and to ensure fair compensation and workload that reflects our training, experience, and contributions to the UC. With your participation, we can together build a more equitable UC, one in which every student has the mentorship and support they need, excellent teaching is valued, and every UC worker is afforded dignity and respect.

For the first time in over twenty years, the members of UC-AFT have voted with an overwhelming majority of 96% to authorize a strike.

Read the press release
Sign the UC Community Petition
Why We Called the Vote
Join a Campaign Event

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What We’re Fighting For

University Council - American Federation of Teachers (UC-AFT) is the union representing over 6,800 teaching faculty working throughout the UC system. Our members hold academic appointments as lecturers, program coordinators, instructors, and supervisors of teacher education. We are skilled and experienced educators who often have the same training and credentials as our tenured colleagues and who teach 30% of credit courses at UC, including introductory level and core requirement classes at both the graduate and undergraduate level, that are critical to establishing a student’s academic career.

 

A fair contract for UC teaching faculty would:

  • Protect teaching faculty from mass layoffs in the short-run and, in the long-run, establish clear and transparent  career pathways, thereby transforming teaching “gigs” into more stable, full-time jobs.
  • Support students by ensuring instructional continuity, so that they can continue to learn from the skilled and experienced teachers and mentors they know and trust.
  • Contribute to our local and regional economies by improving wages, expanding access to healthcare, and allowing teaching faculty and their families to establish roots in cities and neighborhoods close to UC campus.

Every lecturer deserves a contract that includes:

  1. Reasonable workload standards that eliminate uncompensated workload and address lecturers’ unpaid service and professional development.
  2. Transparent, consistent appointment processes tthat bring job stability through rehiring preferences, unbiased evaluations, multi-year appointments for pre-six lecturers, and accessible pathways to promotion to Senior Lecturer for continuing lecturers.
  3. Fair compensation that reflects our training, experience, and contributions to our university and will keep up with the rising cost of living in California.

“I am the only income-earner for my family at the moment and pay 75% of my check to our rent. Currently I specialize in developing and teaching university-community engagement programs: bilingual education; legal aid and advocacy; community research. Without job security, programs like these are always at risk of losing the lecturers who make them work. In our community, that means cascading displacement and disaster: losing more place-based knowledge (the people) and community infrastructure - our shelter and networks.” —Leslie Lopez, Community Studies Program, UCSC

 

“I have lost track of how many students I’ve taught at UCLA and UCSB in 6 different departments since 2015. Whether we teach one class a year or a full load, at one campus or multiple, lecturers perform the heavy lifting of the university. In Ethnic Studies in particular we don’t just teach and grade: we guide, mentor, and empower.” —Jean-Paul R. Contreras deGuzman, Asian American Studies, UCLA and UCSB

 

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Where We Stand

What Lecturers are Fighting For
What Our Union Has Proposed
What UCOP Has Proposed
Where UCOP’s Proposal Falls Short
What’s at Stake
Job Stability
What Lecturers are Fighting ForStable rehiring processes and pathways to career advancements
What Our Union Has ProposedMultiyear contracts; Fair, transparent, and consistent reviews; rehiring preferences; pathway to senior lecturer
What UCOP Has ProposedVoluntary pilot programs and multiyear contracts after third year of teaching offered, but no substantive job security proposal in 22 months.
Where UCOP’s Proposal Falls ShortWithout stable rehiring processes, lecturers suffer from chronic instability, most churned out of UC after their first year of teaching
What’s at StakeAppointment decisions remain arbitrary, inconsistent, and biased, lecturers can’t plan their lives or support their families, and UC students’ education suffers.
Compensation
What Lecturers are Fighting ForImproved Salaries for All
What Our Union Has ProposedSalary scale based on workload and experience with variable raises increasing from 3% to 5%.
What UCOP Has Proposed2021: Lift the bottom of the salary scale 5%; no raises for lecturers earning above the minimum. 2022: Variable raises averaging 1.2%. 2023-2025: 2% raises.
Where UCOP’s Proposal Falls ShortOther faculty and staff are getting 3% raises in 2021. The UC has a $75 billion budget surplus. UCOP's offer won't keep up with inflation.
What’s at StakeMedian annual salary of UC lecturers is $19,067 and starting salary for full-time lecturers is less than county low-income thresholds at 6 out of 9 UC campuses.
Workload
What Lecturers are Fighting ForNo More Unpaid Work
What Our Union Has ProposedReasonable workload standards that reflect service and work outside the classroom hours and credit adjustments when class sizes/duties change.
What UCOP Has ProposedNothing – UCOP refuses to acknowledge the scope of lecturers’ contributions to UC
Where UCOP’s Proposal Falls ShortWorkload is narrowly and inconsistently defined to classroom hours
What’s at StakeLecturers are not respected as equal participants in our profession and as valuable members of our campus communities

View the full chart with more information.

And stay up to date with our Bargaining Blog.

“I have been teaching literature, philosophy, and creative writing and filmmaking to undergrads at Berkeley and Davis for ten years and I still have no protection from being laid off and have to reapply for my job every year. More than ever, students need to learn to tell their stories and express their thoughts to each other, to the world, and to our leaders who are making decisions for them. When the UC denies me job security, they hurt my ability to reach these students and help send them into the world inspired and prepared to meet the challenges ahead of them.” – David Walter, English Department, UC Berkeley and UC Davis

 

 

“I’ve been an ecologist and conservationist for over 25 years. I have shared that experience with 1000s of students I teach at UCLA. More and more, they want to learn everything they can about what we can all do, as individuals and as a society, to ensure this planet remains livable. Without job security, I would lose the opportunity to mentor them during this very important time in their life paths, and I wouldn't be able to afford to keep a roof over my son’s head.” – Alison Lipman, Dept. of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, UCLA

 

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Who We Are

Educators

We are public servants working to shape the next generation of citizens, scholars, and leaders. As skilled and experienced teaching professionals, we provide crucial mentorship and support to UC’s most marginalized and historically underserved student populations.

 

Unionists

Our solidarity creates community, making shared governance and collective action possible. When we work together, we can transform bad “gigs” into more stable, full-time and dignified careers. As part of a national union of educators and scholars, we fight to defend public education and our communities. 

 

Visionaries

We envision a better UC, one in which every student has the mentorship and support they deserve, in which institutional memory and experience is valued, and in which every worker receives dignity and respect.