Members and supporters of the University of Connecticut’s branch of the American Association of University Professors filled the halls outside of the Student Union Ballroom on Monday, Oct. 20, to protest the UConn administration’s handling of contract negotiations over academic freedom, CIRE faculty and paid family leave.
“This is how unions win; we show up, we demand change and we stand together,” said Sam Sommers, UConn-AAUP’s Vice President for Membership Development and Organizing. Sommers is also a professor-in residence of English at the UConn Waterbury campus.
The rally took place from 12:30 to 1:15 p.m., with members of the UConn-AAUP on site from noon until 3:30 p.m. They were waiting until 3:30 p.m. to receive information on whether UConn administrators would move forward with the AAUP’s proposal.
Food and supplies were provided to attendees. Signs with messages such as “RESPECT OUR FACULITY” and “GUARANTEE ACADEMIC FREEDOM” were handed out, while some opted to bring homemade signs displaying similar messages. Attendees lined up against each wall of the hallway outside of the ballroom, maintaining a walkway for those trying to pass through.
“UConn-AAUP is new to this kind of fighting posture,” Sommers said. “We are organizing in ways that we haven’t before, especially in this contract fight, because the university is putting up roadblocks in ways that are deeply unproductive.”
Sommers defined academic freedom as “the right of every faculty member to follow their research and their process of interrogating questions and making new knowledge wherever it leads.” While that freedom is currently protected by university bylaws, Sommers said that the AAUP doesn’t believe that this is enough to guarantee the protection, and that they want it to be a condition of employment.
Other issues also protested included the conditions under which clinical, in-residence and extension faculty receive a multi-year contract with job protections. This currently takes place after seven years. The AAUP proposed that it be moved up to four years. UConn administration countered nine months later by suggesting that it be extended to eleven years, a proposal which Sommers called “unproductive.”
The AAUP also wants changes in guaranteed family leave. Birthing parents can currently use medical leave, but co-parents, non-birthing parents and adoptive parents do not have this option, according to Sommers. Currently UConn does not provide any time for paid family leave, with the AAUP proposing 16 weeks.
Around 1 p.m., protestors were moved multiple times by members of the Student Union staff and the UConn Fire Department to rooms throughout Meeting Rooms 316-325 across from the Ballroom. This prompted chants of “time to sign” from the majority of protesters in attendance.
There was some warning of this displacement, as Student Union leadership had sent a letter to the AAUP upon finding out about their plans that stated that “gathering in front of the SU 330/331 Ballroom Concourse is not permitted in that space.” The contents of that letter were provided by the UConn-AAUP to supporters in an email prior to the event. Despite the interruption, Sommers still felt that the rally was successful in getting UConn administration to hear their demands.
“It’s time to work together to make this university better, and it’s time to listen to faculty about the fact that we cannot keep going the way we have been,” said Sommers.