Category Archives: Statements

STEPHEN ANDREW TAYLOR Associate Professor, Music I see a faculty union as both a protection against the corporate culture increasingly invading American universities and an optimistic step forward in self-governance—a real chance for faculty on the front lines of higher education to have a say in our rapidly changing present and future.

DEAN RIECHERS Professor, Crop Sciences A larger collective body provides an effective way for faculty members’ voices to be heard on the university’s central academic mission and priorities, to improve the quality of higher education and academic scholarship, and to ensure fair and equitable working conditions.

JAY ROSENSTEIN Professor, Journalism; Peabody Award Winner (2010); University Scholar (2013) “Shared governance” is nothing but a favor the administration extends to faculty—when they want. They can include us or ignore us depending on how they feel, so naturally on issues such as salary, furloughs, pensions, and executive compensation they ignore us. A union wouldContinue reading “Jay Rosenstein”

BRUCE ROSENSTOCK Associate Professor, Religion We are facing critical decisions in higher public education, and they call for the combined effort of all of us. We simply can’t afford to let our future rest in the hands of administrators. The challenges we face require our conjoined talents, our mutual engagement in open and democratic discussion,Continue reading “Bruce Rosenstock”

ANGHARAD VALDIVIA Professor, Media and Cinema Studies Collective engagement provides the foundation for transparency and accountability in the educational process. Education is a common good that we owe to this and future generations. I support the faculty as we strive to continue providing a world-class education to our students.

RYAN GRIFFIS Associate Professor of Art and Design, Head of the New Media Program A faculty union is one of the best forms of solidarity we can have with our fellow faculty and staff at the university. It also seems the most effective way to ensure that the university maintains its educational and research-driven missionContinue reading “Ryan Griffis”

DAVID WILSON Professor, Geography and Geographic Information Science Faculty members deserve a voice in their own governance. We currently lack the key mechanism for this that many university workers across America have: collective bargaining.

AMANDA CIAFONE Assistant Professor, Media and Cinema Studies I’m a junior faculty member, and so much is at stake at this moment in my career. Faculty union contracts ensure transparent tenure, promotion, and grievance procedures, which can benefit historically underrepresented members of the professoriate and can enable the hiring and retention of sought-after scholars andContinue reading “Amanda Ciafone”

ROBERT WARRIOR Professor of American Indian Studies, History, and English Belonging to the Campus Faculty Association is a welcome reminder to me that the most effective way of working against the trends in higher education and on our campus is by being organized. Your most progressive colleagues and the ones who care the most aboutContinue reading “Robert Warrior”

NANCY BLAKEProfessor, Comparative and World Literature A union is our best hope—probably our only hope—to restore the university to the position it held as a leading educational institution when I joined the faculty. The rate of deterioration has been steady, and it is urgent that we stop it.

CRAIG KOSLOFSKY Professor, History My father started mining coal alongside his father in western Pennsylvania in 1938. As a lifelong union member, my father fought for better working conditions, a voice in the workplace, and a secure retirement. I support a faculty union at Illinois for the same reasons.

ESSAM M. EL-NAGGAR Visiting Scholar, Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences I support the effort to build a faculty union because I am acutely aware that our collective voice is rapidly eroding. As the corporate structure becomes the norm at colleges and universities across the country, faculty unions must also become the norm in order toContinue reading “Essam M. El-Naggar”