After more than 10 months of negotiations, we are disappointed that the UPEI Board of Governors has shown little interest in addressing a range of concerns that are central to maintaining the educational quality of our institution. This includes: More full-time faculty to reduce course sizes and create more course options   Support for contract academic faculty who teach for low pay and no benefits, in challenging working conditions   Securing adequate research support to help us help

The essence of collective bargaining is the idea that workers are in a better position to negotiate improvements to their working conditions collectively than if they attempted to do so on their own. Protected by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, collective bargaining recognizes our right to work together to address issues in our workplace and to empower our union to bargain on our behalf.Because employers recognize that their employees’ solidarity is their principle mechanism

The negotiations teams met for a half day on Monday and for a full day on Tuesday for our last scheduled days of direct negotiations. On Monday, our employer made it clear that they are willing and able to negotiate on issues which they also recognize as a priority so long as the issue does not require any additional financial resources. As a result, much of Monday focused on negotiating language around equity, diversity, inclusion, and

Over the last 10 months, the UPEI Faculty Association has demonstrated a willingness to move from our bargaining positions if there was a reasonable opportunity to address it’s members’ significant concerns. For example, during conciliation we dropped half of our proposals, both to focus on your top priorities and in the hope that our willingness to compromise would be reciprocated by our employer.Today, when we resumed direct negotiations with your strong strike mandate, we were