The mystery of the missing economics

During the last negotiation session on July 18, which was fully online, the two parties split the day, exchanging counterproposals on different parts of the contract. The University spent its time sharing a general budget narrative and another counter proposal on adjunct orientation and onboarding. In the second half, your PSUFA team focused on grievances and arbitration—the main ways our contract is enforced. In the last half hour, we discussed the University’s questions about course appointments and your assignment rights. Here are a few bulleted takeaways from the meeting:

• SNAPSHOT: What PSU had characterized as a comprehensive financial presentation at a previous meeting was little more than a high-level fiscal snapshot that included scant substantive information, emphasized their budgetary pessimism, and offered no direct relationship to adjunct faculty.

• ECONOMICS: PSUFA passed a first proposal on wages and benefits back in May, but PSU has yet to respond directly with any economic proposals. When asked when they’d have an economic proposal ready, PSU committed to discussing wages, benefits, and appointments & assignment rights at our next two sessions in late August. Your bargaining team has discussed the possibility that this is a strategic silence on their part. Their narrative of the University's “budget shortfalls” is used as a justification for austerity and to underpay you for your work. Stay tuned next session to see if they make good on their promise to bring numbers to the table.

• ORIENTATION: While we have, after years of effort, finally gotten the University to agree to a centralized paid orientation and onboarding event for new hires, PSU is still creating confusion about how they plan to implement the program and pay faculty in an equitable way. The PSU team seemed to demonstrate a stubborn self-satisfaction that this last counter proposal on Article 4: Orientation and Onboarding, claiming it should be sufficient, since it meets the minimum legal obligation that requires all employers to give unions access to new hires. They seem to think that a centralized orientation run by the Office of Academic Affairs is all that’s needed to give a successful start to new faculty. PSU declines even to encourage (not require) departments to hold adjunct orientations and invite PSUFA to them. As former new hires ourselves, many of us having never received an orientation, we know how crucial it is to meet colleagues, staff, and supervisors at the program level in order to get vital departmental information, be ready for first classes, and better prepared to serve students, and how alienating it is when we haven’t been giving that onboarding. It’s also crucially important for members to know how union protections apply to adjunct instructional and research positions, and the University remains unwilling to elaborate on how to create the kind of robust, supportive start for new faculty that would allow for all of this.

• GRIEVANCE PROCESS: Currently, adjuncts have to go through an overly lengthy five-step grievance process in order to address contract violations. Your union team presented a first counterproposal on the subjects of grievances and arbitration, which included revisions meant to simplify and streamline things. Our presentation was met by just a few questions from the administration, the general tenor of which was decidedly suspicious and judgmental.

• STREAMLINING GRIEVANCE FILING: One surprisingly controversial aspect of our proposal was our suggestion to substitute our outdated and deficient grievance form with a simple list of items that would need to be included when filing a grievance. Our hope is that by eliminating the mandate to use the grievance form we can minimize confusion and make the grievance process more accessible and more efficient for members. It seems like both parties are looking to make changes to the overall process of addressing contract violations when they come up, so we remain open and curious to what PSU will come back with. Hopefully, we can work together to improve a vital aspect of our contract. 

• JOB SECURITY: Adjunct rank, appointments, and job security are covered in Article 8 of the CBA. The University closed out the session by asking questions about PSUFA’s proposal on these important topics. Your PSUFA team really shone, taking turns responding in a collaborative fashion to a range of questions from management, some that were about clarifying aspects of our proposal language and some more foundational or philosophical touching on big topics like why a two-year contract matters. As we struggle for our aspirations to improve our working conditions, the tone of these negotiations have made it evident that it may take some fight to maintain the protections we already have, and certainly to win the contract you deserve. 

• HIRING PRIORITY: Another highlight of the day was PSUFA’s response to PSU questioning our language guaranteeing interviews for qualified adjuncts who apply to open full-time positions at the University. You ranked job security as a top priority in contract negotiations in your bargaining survey last fall, and clear pathways to full time employment are one of the most important ways that security could be achieved. PSU shared concerns that this is a vision for a “pipeline” of sorts that would bump up against their federal hiring obligations like giving priority to veteran applicants or to to meet “diversity” goals. Your team responded by speaking eloquently about the many shapes that equity takes, including the economic precarity of many adjuncts already working at PSU. Nurturing a consistent faculty body, retaining and promoting existing adjuncts, is an important component of what we see as an equitable hiring practice. PSU has a large and diverse pool of qualified faculty already working at the University in adjunct roles. Moreover, continuing to hire historically marginalized people into adjunct positions that are underpaid and precarious is deeply problematic. If PSU truly cares about diversity, it will make hiring faculty into permanent, fairly paid positions with benefits a priority.  

We will be back at the bargaining table August 22nd and 29th, and we anticipate some heat at those sessions as we hear back from the University on weighty proposals that affect your working conditions as adjuncts at PSU. We know that an active membership is a powerful membership so you are urged to join sessions and let PSU know you are watching!

RSVP to observe Friday August 22nd and 29th. 

Solidarity!
Your PSUFA Bargaining Team

Not In Love With Your Langauge

not in love with your language

Our most recent session on July 2nd felt like a showdown in a hot, grey seemingly-airless room.

PSU continued to rely on legal maneuvering to distract from their refusal to discuss issues that are crucial to your working conditions, and to making a safer and more just campus for all. Instead, they remain committed to proposing contract language that reflects the bare minimum of what is required by state and federal law instead of what is best for their students and faculty.

Your union team showed up prepared with pointed questions and you showed up as observers and supporters on both zoom and in-person, filling seats, eating popcorn, and holding signs, and keeping the online chat lively.

Here are a few takeaways from your team:

• Along with their counter proposal to Article 7: Member Rights, PSU presented a formal color-coded letter that declared some of the aspects of our initial proposal ‘permissive subjects’ (a labor law designation meaning they are not mandatory for them to negotiate), and they refused to bargain over them. 

• PSU accused us of being “in love with“ our own proposal language and argued that they “don’t have the authority” to make decisions around some of the issues your union is bringing to the table. If that is the case, PSUFA wants to see management bring the actual decision-makers to the table who can negotiate in good faith around the issues that matter to you. 

• We work at a public institution not a corporation; it is funded by the public and has as part of its mission to “serve the city.” PSU’s refusal to engage with permissive subjects (those both parties may voluntarily agree to negotiate) is a demonstration of the ways in which they are abdicating their responsibilities to the city, to the students and workers at this institution, who deserve respect and high quality jobs and education.

• PSU’s counter proposal to Article 7: Member Rights also included language that attempts to limit our power to grieve in cases of discrimination and retaliation. Grievances are the primary way your union enforces the contract to resolve labor disputes between you and your employer. Under the current political climate, PSU’s intent to restrict our access to the grievance process and their refusal to expand our protections, particularly in a moment of growing authoritarian rule and erosion of legal protections, is dangerous. Continuously pointing to “the law” to justify doing the bare minimum is not in line with the vision they claim to want for PSU.

• PSU passed us a proposal with a crucially substantive typo. In a previous bargaining session admin had proposed language stating the disputes of matters of intellectual property (IP) not resolved by the University’s Copyright Ownership Policy “would” be subject to the grievance process. Then, in their second proposal on 7/2 it said they “would not” be subject to the grievance process. This contradicts the existing University IP policy, betrays their bargaining team’s disorganization, and would have been considered what is called “regressive bargaining”* had they not corrected the mistake. This additional “not” could have considerably limited members’ intellectual property rights and the union's ability to grieve violations of the University's copyright policy. Good thing our team was paying close attention and corrected the mistake. Adjuncts should have copyright protections on their own materials that are just as strong as any a full time faculty member!

All of this underscores their deep lack of care for the people who choose to work, serve, and learn at their institution. It is all the more important for us to keep showing up for each other at the table–demonstrating who we are and what solidarity and care can look like. 

Next session, which is fully online, we will continue to talk about grievances and PSU has promised a presentation on economics, i.e. your wages! 

Join the bargaining session webinar as an observer. We will update this post with the link when it becomes available. Let’s show management we are paying attention!

Solidarity,

Your PSUFA Bargaining Team

*“Regressive bargaining” in the context of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), refers to a situation where an employer makes proposals during collective bargaining that are less favorable to the union than previous proposals, without a valid reason for the change.

Bargaining Recap 6/18/24 Session

Bargaining Recap 6/18/24 Session

Last Wednesday’s session marked four months at the bargaining table. Management kicked off the session with another counter to Article 4 (Orientation and Onboarding), this time extending orientation compensation to include paying adjuncts for the orientation event, as well as any other mandatory onboarding or new-hire trainings (as is their legal responsibility). Because it will now be paid, Management also tightened up language to require adjuncts to attend orientation, and proposed an alternative asynchronous option for adjuncts who cannot attend the live orientation event. Although PSU claims that they want robust onboarding for Adjuncts, they are buckling down on their refusal to keep PSUFA included in departmental level orientations (a right your union has under the current CBA).

Following Article 4, Management fully rejected PSUFA’s Article 6 Academic Freedom proposal from May 5 Your union’s proposal, which developed out of hours of research and consulting with experts and other contracts, included specific language and protections related to teaching, research, and extracurricular speech and activities. Instead of engaging meaningfully with PSUFA’s proposal, management simply copied AAUP’s academic freedom article and maintained the provision in our current contract that states that  academic freedom can not be grieved. Any language on academic freedom that is not grievable has no contractual force and is only symbolic. Your union demands that Adjuncts have real protections for academic freedom, and PSU’s refusal to grant this during the most draconian crackdown on academic freedom in recent history is remarkable! Without tenure (or any other meaningful job security) to protect our professional right to academic freedom, our contract is the only mechanism we have to secure one of the most basic rights without which we can’t do our job.  

After a long caucus, management presented a counter to PSUFA’s May 23 Article 3 proposal (Union Privileges and Limitations). Their presentation highlights two primary areas of disagreement, both of which have to do with the timeliness of the university providing information to PSUFA. Under the Public Employee Collective Bargaining Act (PECBA), PSU is legally required to provide PSUFA with contact information for all new hires to the bargaining unit within 10 days, but we disagree about what constitutes as the date of hire (and PSU is regularly in violation of this requirement). Further, while your bargaining team proposed a 30-day timeline for PSU to fulfill information requests (another PECBA requirement for the University), PSU is proposing 14 days just to acknowledge our information request . PSU has still not fulfilled information requests made for bargaining in January of this year, and the language that they propose would only continue to allow them to take a very long time to fulfill requests, slowing down your team’s work and the bargaining process.   

Next, PSUFA presented and opened Article 8 (Appointments and Assignment Rights). This is a dense article, colloquially known as the “job security article.” Following your input in the bargaining survey, your union proposed a slew of changes to strengthen Article 8 and show that we are worth more, including:

• Requiring letters of appointment to be sent out earlier 

• Extending the break in service from one to two years

• Detailing out the acceptable “academic judgement” reasons for a change in an adjunct faculty member’s appointment

• Giving adjuncts the right to request a recalculation of their assignment rights 

We also added a new Article 8 section on recall rights—an important protection for adjuncts who are not renewed. These rights would give adjuncts who experience nonrenewal priority for reappointment before new hires are considered for available positions. Adjuncts with the highest number of accumulated credits would be recalled and offered courses first, in alignment with the priorities adjuncts voiced in the job security straw poll. Further, in an effort to carve out pathways for long-term employment, we proposed language which would require the University to interview adjunct applicants for University positions (over .5FTE) when they meet  the minimum qualifications for the position.

The session concluded with discussion about the upcoming expiration date of the current Collective Bargaining Agreement (June 30), and the process of extending the contract to maintain the status quo while bargaining continues. An extension would be crucial not only to maintain adjuncts’ current rights, but also for your union to effectively administer critical adjunct support funds over the summer, including the Professional Development and Adjunct Financial Assistance Funds. Despite extensions being commonplace, Management was not forthcoming about the process, again showing little regard for adjuncts experiencing financial crisis over the summer.

Bargaining Recap 6/4/25

Bargaining Recap 6/4/25

At the last bargaining session on June 4, PSUFA presented counterproposals on two articles: Article 9 (Personnel Files), and Article 4 (Orientation and Onboarding). On Article 9, the parties are nearing a tentative agreement. Our proposals on Article 4, however, continue to be met with resistance from management. Both sides agreed that adjuncts should be compensated for attending orientation. PSU seems to assume that this would make orientation events mandatory, but that word has been nowhere in their proposals. Your bargaining team agrees that pay would incentivize orientation attendance, but the parties cannot come to a mutual agreement until PSU clarifies their position on "mandatory" versus “incentivized” attendance. ] PSU also revealed that the 2 hours of pay for orientation is meant to cover a slew of newly required trainings. Shockingly, PSU admitted that the two hours they’re offering to pay Adjuncts for orientation would be insufficient if all these other trainings are to be lumped in as well. Other issues that came up in discussions around Article 4 centered on researcher inclusion and department-specific trainings, which your union will continue to fight for in upcoming bargaining sessions.  

PSU then presented its proposals on Articles 10 (Grievances) and 11 (Arbitration). These are arguably the most important articles in your CBA—without strong provisions for grieving violations to your contract, it is effectively meaningless. Management claimed that their proposed changes were intended only to capture what’s already happening in practice, and to eliminate outdated language. But some changes in their proposal would be quite consequential—and detrimental—to adjuncts. Currently, grievances can go up to the level of university president, but PSU has proposed eliminating that step. This could theoretically make the entire process much quicker, but PSU has not proposed a shorter timeline. Instead, they’ve redistributed the days so that throughout the process THEY get more time to respond to a grievance. PSU also proposed new language that would restrict the filing of a group grievance to adjuncts under the supervisor, making it impossible to file a grievance for a violation that affects adjuncts across the university, like a pay calculation error. 

Notably, PSU proposed language that would prohibit an adjunct from grieving what it deems are issues of “academic judgment.” In the CBA, academic judgment is defined as the judgment of supervisors and administrators concerning determinations, recommendations, decisions, criteria, and information to be used with respect to reappointment, advancement of members, and with respect to matters of curricula and educational policy. In many ways, academic judgment has become a blanket excuse to justify any decisions made by departments about adjunct appointments, and to undermine valid adjunct grievances. Your union won’t agree to this! Over and over, PSUFA asked for scenarios that might exemplify the kinds of grievances PSU wants to limit. However, management could not provide any.

Next, PSU proposed new language in Article 11 (Arbitration), which covers the legal process that takes place when a grievance is not able to be resolved through the grievance process. Arbitration involves a neutral third party who reviews the facts of the case and renders a binding decision to the parties. PSU’s proposal attempts to further hamstring adjuncts and PSUFA by burdening PSUFA with the entire cost of arbitration, in the event that an arbiter determines a grievance shouldn’t have advanced because it was ultimately ruled a matter of academic judgment. PSUFA has a shared interest in streamlining the grievance process, but these proposals appear to worsen the conditions for adjuncts seeking redress.

The session ended by hammering out, in broad strokes, the agenda for the next session, which will be on Wednesday, June 18. Some of the union’s most important proposals are currently held up because the university hasn’t answered requests for information that informs those proposals. The management team awkwardly tried to blame this on the fact that PSUFA has filed an unfair labor practice against PSU for exactly this problem: not providing requested information, which is required by the current CBA. Management insists that the data have been shared and that PSU has no obligation to analyze the data provided, but the union can see clearly that the data are of poor quality, containing demonstrable falsehoods and omissions. The data that have been provided are not reliable, and this presents a huge barrier to good faith bargaining going forward.

Don’t forget to join your team and your fellow adjuncts for the next bargaining session, Wednesday, June 18 at RMNC 316 and online from 12-5pm! If you attend in person you’ll get a PSUFA t-shirt and a treat to help fuel you for the whole session. Click here for more details and to RSVP!

Bargaining Recap 5/23/25 Session

Bargaining Recap 5/23/25 Session

PSUFA and PSU bargaining teams met to exchange proposals on Friday May 23. Much of the session was devoted to your PSUFA bargaining team presenting a robust economic proposal that centered on equal pay for equal work and included a slew of creative initiatives such as a shared sick leave program, opportunities for paid adjunct sabbaticals, additional compensation for adjuncts who support marginalized or minoritized students, and raises for length of service! Read on for more about what we mean when we say, “We are worth more!”

Students, members, and community allies came to watch, share reflections and snacks during caucus, and hold signs. You show us what the power of solidarity looks like! Your presence made the anemic attendance on management’s side of the table and their lack of meaningful engagement with PSUFA’s proposals even more pronounced.

The day began quietly, with multiple members of the management team absent for various reasons. PSUFA started with a counter proposal on Article 3 on union rights. Your union’s bargaining team continues to hold fast that the no strike clause in this article is so broad and expansive as to infringe on adjuncts’ constitutional rights to protest. In response, the team has proposed significantly pared down—and less draconian—language. Your bargaining team also continues to hold fast that PSU must make data necessary for grievances and bargaining available to your union within 30 days. PSU has taken advantage of the vague language currently in our contact and has not fulfilled information requests dating back to December 2024 and January 2025, thereby denying PSUFA valuable information for its proposals. Finally, PSUFA agreed to PSU’s proposal to furnish one bulletin board to the union, which would replace our bulletin board in Smith (MIA since 2020–let us know if you see the PSUFA bulletin board!). Your team proposed FMH as the new home for a new PSUFA bulletin board. 

Next, PSU’s Director of Labor Relations briefly presented counterproposals on Article 9 (personnel files) and Article 4 (orientation and onboarding). Your team was pleased to see that management had thought through and agreed to some of PSUFA’s ideas, like the importance of hosting orientation events each term rather than once a year for a workforce as contingent as ours. This is an important win for adjuncts! The teams also discussed and defined the nature of future collaboration on materials and programs for adjunct faculty onboarding. The PSUFA team spoke again to how vital the voices of adjuncts are in the planning of these events and procedures. There will have to be more discussion of this topic to get to a resolution that will result in a new-hire program that will actually serve adjuncts. PSU, for the first time, agreed to compensate faculty for orientation (another big win for adjuncts!), but it will take more creative problem-solving to find a way to do so while also giving faculty a chance to receive the information they need before the term is already well underway.

Finally, PSUFA’s bargaining team presented proposals on salaries and the PSUFA benefits funds (Articles 12, 14 & 15) [link to articles]. With these proposals, your bargaining team continues to fight for equal pay for equal work and to fight against PSU’s two-tiered system in which part-time faculty members get compensated significantly less for the same instructional work as their full-time counterparts. Getting adjuncts pay parity would be an important step in ending this two-tier system and ensuring a better quality education for your students! To arrive at the proposed pay rates that would actually constitute equal pay for equal work, your bargaining team used the minimum salary of a full-time Senior Instructor at PSU as the basis for their calculations. The team also proposed increasing course cancellation and late appointment fees, increasing the hourly pay for curriculum development, mentoring, and special projects, and introduced a system for adjuncts to receive regular pay increases. Currently, PSU remains one of the only public institutions of higher education in the state of Oregon that doesn’t have any mechanism for its adjuncts to advance in pay. This means that the vast majority of adjuncts are paid at the minimum rate–even if they have been teaching for decades. This is deeply unfair!

In addition to salary increases, the team worked hard to expand the benefits available to adjuncts through proposals for sharing sick leave, bereavement leave (which adjuncts do not currently have through PSU whereas full-time employees do), employer pick-up of the 1% Oregon Paid Leave tax, and a smaller premium for PERS eligible adjuncts who obtain their health insurance through PSU. 

Your team also presented proposals for free PSU classes for adjuncts, more money for the professional development fund, the technology fund and the adjunct faculty assistance fund, and a new benefits fund that would compensate adjuncts for work they do to enhance PSU’s mission as a minority-serving institution. Your team believes that PSU has a responsibility to invest in and support their adjunct faculty through these funds. This is the only way to provide equitable access to a quality education for your students! 

PSU administration remained mostly quiet during the PSUFA team’s presentation of the article proposals on salaries and benefits and asked no substantive questions. This is very surprising given that PSUFA’s proposals would radically change adjunct faculty working conditions and student learning conditions. One of the few questions they asked your bargaining team was whether the team had costed out their proposal. This felt like a tactical inquiry intended to cast your team as unserious and a continued obfuscation of what really matters: fair pay for adjuncts as the essential condition for a quality education for students. Adjuncts make learning happen, and if PSU needs to adjust its budget to be more in line with its mission, then that is the administration's responsibility.

PSU seems to be employing a common management tactic at the table, which is to blame worker demands for fair pay for bankrupting the university. We want to remind PSU and our fellow adjuncts: Adjunct faculty salaries and benefits made up less than 3% of PSU’s operational budget (while teaching over a third of student credit hours) in AY 2018 through AY 2021 (we are waiting on more current budgetary data and will share that as soon as it is available). And despite PSU’s budget deficit narrative, administrators have never forgone raises. Whatever total price tag our economic proposals may have in the end, we remain the university’s cheapest source of labor and we have a resounding message for admin: WE ARE WORTH MORE! 

PSUFA Statement on Spring 2025 Non-Renewal Notices

PSUFA Statement on Spring 2025 Non-Renewal Notices

The PSUFA CBA Article 8.3.5 mandates a timeline for reappointments. During Winter Term, your department should have inquired about your availability and desire to teach during AY 25-26, no later than week 5. This term (Spring 2025) all adjuncts should have received a notice of intent to renew or not renew an appointment for AY 25-26 by the end of week 5. Further details about course assignments and schedule for the coming academic year will be communicated to faculty by July 15.

Your Spring Term intent letter will either confirm the intent of the department to renew your appointment, confirm that the department does not intend to renew your appointment, and in some cases you may receive a letter that states that the department is unable to confirm their intent at the moment. This typically means that they have not worked out the schedule for AY 25-26 yet. To see the specific contract language, see Article 8 in the CBA.

Last year PSU sent similar non-renewal notices to many adjuncts in the middle of 2 year contracts, and PSUFA immediately filed a grievance for all adjuncts on two year contracts whose assignment rights per Article 8 Section 3.6 had been violated. PSU refused to process the grievances, falsely claiming that group grievances--a grievance filled for more than one person and including unnamed individuals-- are not allowed in our Collective Bargaining Agreement. This claim ignored the fact that many group grievances have been filed and processed in the past.

Nearly a year after the university's response and refusal to process the group grievance, your union and PSU were scheduled for an arbitration hearing last week that would decide on this matter. A day before the arbitration hearing, PSU settled with your union agreeing to the processing of the group grievance. This is an important win for PSUFA who fought the university for nearly a year to protect our right to file group grievances!

The next step is an arbitration hearing on the substantive issue: whether PSU violated the assignment rights for adjuncts who were not renewed in the middle of two year contracts. If you are in the middle of a two year contract and have recently received a non-renewal notice, please reach out to us and stay tuned as we head into arbitration again in mid-August. The result of that hearing will have a direct impact on every adjunct facing non-renewal on a 2 year contract this year. 

Bargaining Recap: 5/2/25 Session

Bargaining Recap: 5/2/25 Session

PSU's "Unprofessional" Behavior at the Bargaining Table Shocks Adjunct and Student Observers

Last Friday’s bargaining session was HOT (figuratively, yes, plus the bargaining room didn’t have a/c). Student observers were shocked at how “unprofessional” PSU’s team was. While PSU administrators were busy lobbing insults at Adjuncts and using legal subterfuge to disqualify negotiations over our essential working conditions, Adjuncts were busy presenting bold, innovative proposals on Member Rights, Academic Freedom, and Personnel Files with a real vision for “equitable access to a quality education,” PSU’s purported mission. Read on for details about these exciting proposals that address the pressing concerns of Adjuncts and the entire community at PSU-–from the use of AI technologies in education, to the climate catastrophe, to the explosion of online courses, to the detentions and deportations of our colleagues and students.

Whereas PSU’s team repeatedly tells Adjuncts that it’s not obligated to offer them anything beyond what is mandated by law, your bargaining team is making proposals that would result in better working conditions for faculty, better learning conditions for your students–and even in a more democratic society. Some of our student observers with YDSA were so upset about what they heard at the table that they are now circulating a petition to other students demanding that PSU administration give adjuncts stronger academic freedom protections! 

Given the importance of academic freedom to PSUFA members, and the current attacks on higher education, PSUFA invited our full-time faculty colleague Jennifer Ruth, Professor of Film Studies, as a subject matter expert to elaborate on how crucial protections to academic freedom are to the health and integrity of our university. Ruth is the co-author of the 2022 book It’s Not Free Speech: Race, Democracy, and the Future of Academic Freedom. 

Adjunct faculty are highly concerned about academic freedom (a brief straw poll of bargaining unit members confirmed this last week), and Ruth emphasized the importance of codifying academic freedom in collective bargaining agreements as a measure that protects both faculty and the university. 

Even so, immediately following the robust academic freedom presentation (and in front of a crowd of faculty, staff, and student supporters), Admin’s team thanked Ruth, vaguely mentioned a commitment to academic freedom and then immediately quashed the proposal, by denying PSUFA’s right to bargain over Article 6. This denial was intended to shock the bargaining team and observers.  “Academic freedom matters to students as well” one student angrily proclaimed after the session. 

Admin’s denial of PSUFA’s right to open the article on Academic Freedom is rooted in an ongoing technical dispute between the teams over the commencement date of bargaining, which has implications related to the Public Employee Collective Bargaining Act timeline (quick explanation here). And while PSUFA declared their intention to open the Academic Freedom article (as well as many others) back when bargaining started, PSU did not, showing that Admin is satisfied with the limited protections in the current contract, even while threats to academic freedom on American campuses intensify. (AAUP national recently found that more than one in three faculty say they have less academic freedom today when it comes to teaching content without any interference, and speaking freely when participating in shared governance!) Plus, while PSU knew days in advance that PSUFA intended to propose changes to Article 6, the team saved their bombshell refusal for the bargaining table. What does it mean that PSU felt compelled to announce to a room of Adjuncts and PSU community observers that it will block Adjuncts from bargaining over academic freedom on technical grounds? Imagine what kind of university not only doesn’t want to bargain over academic freedom protections for contingent faculty but flaunts this!  

After a brief caucus, heated discussion continued and culminated with Admin accusing the PSUFA team of “'selective hearing'" (and right before we shared our nondiscrimination clause, too!). These comments were so egregious that even students shared their concern with our team likening management to a schoolyard bully.  

Eventually, PSUFA presented a reimagined Article 7 on Member Rights. Your team has been working for weeks on this proposal which included demands to expand protection from discrimination, new language on intellectual property rights and privacy, protections against the university replacing our labor with Artificial Intelligence technologies, and new rights around access to course materials and other support for Adjunct faculty. Your team was proud to make demands for the safety of our entire PSU and planetary community by calling for a weapons- and fossil fuel- free campus and for PSU’s status as a sanctuary campus to be enshrined in our contract. Throughout the presentation of the proposal, the PSUFA bargaining team consistently expressed concern for student well-being. Because basic needs insecurity deeply impacts student learning, the team also called on the University to adequately resource critical campus services and programs for students, like the Women's Resource Center, the Queer Resource Center, the Disability Resource Center, and PSU CARES. 

As we gear up for the next bargaining session we need adjunct testimony at the bargaining table, so sign up here! Join your colleagues and students on Friday May 23 from 12-5 to observe bargaining and tell PSU that We Are Worth More!

Bargaining Recap 4/18/25 Session

Your all-star bargaining team was back at it last week, negotiating for a great contract for all PSU adjuncts on Friday, 4/18! We had both adjuncts and students in attendance in person and on zoom, and your support was key in showing admin that we mean business. In case you missed it, team member Alison Lutz brings us this snappy recap:

“Last Friday’s bargaining session began with continued conversation about accurately recording changes in the proposals we exchange at the table. PSUFA caught several instances in which PSU had altered the original language in our CBA without notating the changes, making it appear as if management’s new language is the agreed upon language.  PSU acknowledged their mistakes were violations of the procedure we had agreed to in our ground rules and recommitted to do better moving forward. 

After a brief caucus, PSU asked several questions in regard to PSUFA’s Article 3 (Union Rights, Privileges & Limitations)  proposal from 4/4. There was specific attention and concern from Administration about your union’s proposal to add 3 dedicated PSUFA-specific bulletin boards on campus, to accompany the one board our union contract provides for in SMSU. This bulletin board has been MIA since the pandemic and despite efforts to locate the board, which used to be on the 2nd floor of Smith, by PSUFA members, the board has not been found. The Vice Provost of Faculty Success did seem to be aware of its disappearance but not of its current whereabouts. Why do we need more dedicated bulletin boards? To keep you, our members and allies, informed of our various initiatives and activities. Why does PSU seem to be so skeptical about us having bulletin boards? The reason for admin’s attitude towards this issue is still unclear, but worth keeping in mind as we move forward. 

PSUFA had the opportunity to present our most recent Article 4 counterproposal. We reemphasized our commitment to a quarterly Adjunct Orientation, better Onboarding and pay for attending orientation at both the university and department/college level as being fundamental to adjunct inclusion and collaboration between the University and the Union. PSU spent the remainder of the session insisting that Orientation needs to be streamlined (reduced) and not collaboratively led and repeatedly stating that they are fulfilling their legal obligation. In an echo of their approach to cancelling courses with “low enrollment,” PSU suggested that facilitating orientation for a small number of adjuncts was not worth their time.

Our takeaway? For this session, we give PSU a C+ grade as an employer. The current management strategy calls to mind a student who is looking to just pass the class and move on, rather than striving to excel or go beyond the bare minimum.”

Make sure you don’t miss out on all the action at our next session! Join as an observer, either in-person or remote, and help your union hold PSU accountable for their role in creating great teaching and learning environment by negotiating a fair adjunct contract. The next session will take place on Friday, May 2, from 12-4pm, followed by a post-session team huddle 15 minutes after the close of negotiations. RSVP here! And email bargaining@psufa.org if you have questions or want to find out about more ways to get involved with your union.

Visa Revocations at PSU: What to Know and Resources to Help

Visa Revocations at PSU: What to Know and Resources to Help

Artwork by Pete Railand, courtesy Just Seeds

On Thursday, April 10, PSU President Ann Cudd sent a university-wide email alerting our community to the alarming news that several current and former PSU students had their visas revoked by the Trump administration. The email read, in part:

“​​This morning we learned that the federal government terminated the visa eligibility for two current PSU students and one recent graduate. We have not been informed of the cause for this action and our Office of International Student and Scholar Services is working to connect the impacted students with the necessary resources to determine a path forward.”

The message went on to offer the following campus resources:

• FAQ on Immigration Rights 

• Student Legal Services 

• Federal Actions page for ongoing updates 

• Student Mental Health Services and PSU Employee EAP

Additional resources not included in PSU’s email that may be useful include the DREAMER Resource Center, this Rapid Response Guide from ACLU Oregon, and this Know Your Rights Guide from AFT-Oregon.

Click through to read the full email from Pres. Cudd. 

PSUFA and our parent union, AFT-Oregon, stand with our international faculty, staff, graduate, and undergraduate students and reject the Trump administration’s widespread intimidation tactics and outright unlawful conduct in detaining legal United States residents and visiting international students and scholars under specious accusations.

We have heard initial reports of members of other locals in Oregon having their visas revoked, and will share more information as it becomes available. If this is happening to you or another member of our adjunct bargaining unit, or if you are concerned you may be targeted for this kind of action, please reach out to your union so we can connect you with support and resources. 

As public employees, PSU faculty and staff have a responsibility to protect student information. We are not allowed to give out any information about students even to family members, and importantly not to ICE. Whether ICE can enter a campus to take enforcement action depends on whether the area is considered public. Federal immigration enforcement officers can enter public areas without a warrant, just like any member of the public. However, officers cannot access nonpublic areas of campus without permission from an authorized campus official. Institutional employees are not required to grant access, provide documents or assist federal immigration officers in entering nonpublic areas of the campus. Federal immigration enforcement agents may not enter areas that are private without a legally sufficient judicial warrant. Read more about what’s legal and how to protect yourself in this guide from AFT-Oregon. 

AFT-Oregon maintains a legal defense fund in the event that a matter affecting a union member reaches or is expected to reach legal or administrative proceedings. PSUFA can connect adjuncts with this fund when appropriate, please let us know if you would like more information about this resource. 

PSUFA is calling all adjuncts to join faculty, staff, and students from across the city to fight against the deportations and take back our universities! Join us from 12-1 on Thursday April 17 in Montgomery Plaza as will call for the protection of workers and students, the end of genocide and repression, and demand that our university's administration not comply with fascism!

Spring Into Action With Your Union!

Get ready to Spring Into Action with a week of organizing activities, April 14-18! Join your fellow PSUFA members all next week and take action to make a difference—from bargaining for a better contract to protecting our nation’s education from political attacks, there are multiple days and ways for every adjunct to get involved.

Maybe you want to observe bargaining and eat cake with your colleagues? Or perhaps you’d like to discuss political action methods in a reading group. You could attend a rally and teach-in on national higher ed issues, or if you can’t come to in-person events join the bargaining Zoom or share your story about being an adjunct. However you choose to participate, you’ll be contributing your power and voice as a worker to make things better for all adjuncts at PSU, and our students and communities too!

Check out what’s going on in the schedule of events below and be part of the action! Questions? Email psufa.martha@gmail.com or organizing@psufa.org with questions and additional ways to get involved.

SPRING INTO ACTION EVENTS APRIL 14-18

Wednesday, April 16: Labor & Lit Reading Group, FMH B134, 1:30-2:30pm RSVP HERE

Thursday, April 17: HELU National Day of Action Rally, multiple campus locations, all day, DETAILS HERE

Friday, April 18: Let Us Eat Cake! Bargaining observation and cake with colleagues, RMNC Rm 316, 11:30-1:30, details and RSVP HERE

Spring 2025 New Adjunct Orientation, Office of Academic Innovation, SMU, 3-5pm, RSVP HERE

ALL WEEK LONG: Submit your testimony for bargaining, link to form HERE

MORE EVENT DETAILS BELOW

Wednesday, April 16

Labor & Lit Reading Group FMH B134 1:30-2:30pm

Labor & Lit returns for Spring Term! The next session of PSUFA's political education and reading group will focus on The Role of Disruption in Social Change, and takes place on Wednesday, April 16 from 1:30-2:30 in our union office at FMH. Facilitator and UNST Adjunct David Osborn shares this preview of what to expect:

"Please join us to discuss how disruptive action fuels social change. We'll look at a variety of examples, drawn from the labor movement, of how disruption works as an essential part of creating change. We'll also look at examples of how labor unions have taken disruptive action in solidarity with other movements. Please join us especially if you have some reservations about disruption or questions. The very point of disruptive action is to unsettle and disturb the status quo and we'll create a container to talk about our experiences."

When: Wednesday, April 16, 1:30-2:30 pm

Where: FMH B134 RSVP HERE!

THURSDAY APRIL 17

HELU National Day of Action, Multiple Campus Locations, all day

Join campus labor unions and student groups for a city-wide rally of higher education workers, students and organizers as part of a National Day of Actionto take back our education system. The event is being organized by a large coalition of organizations, including sponsorship by AFT-Oregon, our parent union, and the national coalition Higher Education Labor United, of which PSUFA is a member.

Find out more about the schedule of events for the day, which begins at noon and runs until 5:30pm, on our blog. And check out the national campaign website for more information on the goals of this nationwide action. More details to come!

WHEN: April 17th, 2025 12:00-5:30

WHERE: Montgomery Plaza, adjacent to Karl Miller Center, at SW 6th & Harrison St.

Friday, April 18

Let Us Eat Cake! Observe Bargaining With Colleagues and Cake, RMNC Rm 316, 11:30-1:30 plus bonus post bargaining team huddle

Want to have your cake and get a great contract too? Show up to support your all-star bargaining team and enjoy a sweet treat with your fellow adjuncts!

Come eat cake and observe bargaining Friday, April 18, 11:30am-1:30pm at Richard & Maurine Neuberger Center (Corner of 4th and Market) Room 316, Mt. Rainer Room. Bargaining is followed by a 15-minute huddle & recap.

WHEN: Friday, April 18, 11:30am-1:30pm

WHERE: Richard & Maurine Neuberger Center (Corner of 4th and Market) Room 316, Mt. Rainer Room

Details and RSVP HERE!

Spring 2025 New Adjunct Orientation, Office of Academic Innovation, SMU, 3-5pm

The PSU/PSUFA new adjunct orientation will be held Friday April 18, 2025 from 3:00-5:00pm in the Office of Academic Innovation (OAI) in the Smith Memorial Union (mezzanine level) and on Zoom. Please RSVP to receive a calendar invite to this event.

During the new adjunct orientation, you will learn about important PSU resources for adjuncts and part-time researchers. The PSUFA Executive Council will also share important information about your contract, and the benefits and support provided by your union. We will also be available for your questions about where to access the services, equipment and support you need to ensure a successful experience working at Portland State.

This event is geared toward adjuncts who are new to the PSU academic community. However, all adjunct instructors and researchers are welcome to attend.

WHEN: Friday, April 18, 3-5pm

WHERE: Office of Academic Innovation (OAI) in the Smith Memorial Union (mezzanine level) and on Zoom RSVP HERE

ALL WEEK LONG

Submit Your Bargaining Testimony

Your union has fought for your voice to be heard at the negotiating table and needs you to share your stories and expertise about adjunct working conditions at PSU. Please sign up to offer testimony at bargaining! Our collective voice is what makes us powerful.

Use this form to submit your testimony to your bargaining team. Members may present their own testimonies during bargaining sessions or a bargaining team member can read your testimony if you prefer to remain anonymous.

Email Vasiliki at psufa.vasiliki@gmail.com with questions.

PSUFA Joins Local Unions to Keep Portland Police Association Out of Labor Council

PSUFA Joins Local Unions to Keep Portland Police Association Out of Labor Council

​Sign the petition today to keep our labor organizing safe!

PSUFA’s Executive Council has joined with other unions to oppose the proposed admission of the Portland Police Association to the Northwest Oregon Labor Council. In a statement released as part of a petition action, unions and rank-and-file members explained the reasons PPA should not be allowed to join the council:

“We, the undersigned labor union rank-and-file and union officers of NW Oregon, stand shoulder-to-shoulder with delegates opposing the Portland Police Association's (PPA) entrance into the NW Oregon Labor Council.

Historically and to the present, police serve as strike-breakers across the nation and in Portland, always siding with bosses against organized workers—with the police association lining up with their commanders.

The effort to bring the PPA into the Labor Council represents a total repudiation of core labor values, which are grounded in solidarity, racial & social justice, and collective action.

Instead, the police association's conduct and track record speaks to their self-interest at the expense of other workers, threats and violence against pro-worker public officials, and a resolute commitment to avoid the type of accountability that no other public employee has.”

PSUFA Chair of Political Action Erica Thomas co-authored an in-depth discussion of this issue on The Thorn, the blog of Portland DSA. Thomas notes the strong support the petition has received so far, sharing that the petition “is approaching 400 signatures in less than one week; signatories are rank-and-file members of 34+ local unions from the building trades to the service sector — public workers at the City of Portland and beyond.” Read the entire blog post for a deep dive into why PPA wants to join NOLC now, and why it should matter to workers.

Do you want to keep our labor council safe for workers and their unions? Sign the petition to reject PPA’s admission to NOLC now!

Bargaining Recap 4/4/25

Negotiations for a new contract for adjuncts at PSU continue, and your incredible bargaining team is bringing their A game to the table! Here with the latest session recap is bargaining team member Anna Gray:

“At our Friday, April 4th bargaining session things started to heat up! 

After a brief discussion of a PSUFA counter proposal on Article 18: (Notices and Communications), PSU shared a counter proposal for Article 9 (Personnel Files), which led to a discussion about University transparency. 

PSUFA also opened Article 3 (Union Rights & Privileges), with a strong presentation that stressed how essential Adjuncts and our Union are to the University. Citing evidence of how unionization helps foster a more engaged faculty body and helps educational institutions function more effectively, PSUFA proposed changes that would allow our Union to operate and communicate with members more easily. Our proposed language also expanded important protections for Adjuncts, like adjusting our “no strike clause” in an effort to guard free speech and the right to protest, as well as the right for Adjuncts to refuse extra work if other faculty or staff go on strike. 

PSU then responded with a proposal for Article 4 (Orientation and Onboarding). They chose to entirely reject the proposal PSUFA gave on this topic last session and instead composed an entirely new proposal. In comparison to the robust presentation and expansive proposal that PSUFA gave on March 21, which included renaming Article 4 as Adjunct Orientation, Onboarding, and Inclusion and offered multiple provisions for onboarding adjuncts and integrating them into the PSU community, the University’s proposal was anemic. 

PSU’s proposal would strip your Union of the right to be placed on the agenda at  Departmental Orientations and lacked detail about how Orientation would be offered outside of Fall Term. Given that Article 4 functions as one of the most substantive articles related to the meaningful inclusion of Adjuncts into the campus community – with much potential for reimagining and codifying Adjunct integration and collaboration – PSU’s Article 4 proposal offered no creativity or real vision. At the table, PSU’s team talked eagerly about putting orientation material on Canvas and did not address the concerns expressed by PSUFA about adjunct isolation and the need for broader inclusion in the University. PSU did agree to PSUFA’s proposed payment structure for New Hires to attend Orientation. This would end the long-standing problem of orientation for new hires as a form of unpaid labor.

Your bargaining team spent the rest of the session scrutinizing how the University’s proposal could actually lead to practices that increase faculty success & foster a sense of inclusion for part-time faculty. More to come on this in the future! 

We had observers join us both online and in-person for this session. Thank you to those who attended, keep it up! Observing bargaining puts pressure on Admin and shows our power and solidarity. Our next bargaining session is scheduled for April 18 from 9:30-1:30. Your team will present contract language to make our entire university community more safe and to protect teaching and learning as human-centered activities. Once again, your team will use these negotiations to promote a quality education for our students!”

Citywide higher ed rally at PSU - April 17th!

SAVE THE DATE!
National Day of Action in higher ed - rally and teach-in at PSU
April 17th, 2025
Montgomery Plaza, adjacent to Karl Miller Center, at SW 6th & Harrison St.

Join campus labor unions and student groups for a city-wide rally of higher education workers, students and organizers as part of a National Day of Action to take back our education system. The event is being organized by a large coalition of organizations, including sponsorship by AFT-Oregon, our parent union, and the national coalition Higher Education Labor United, of which PSUFA is a member. The Day of Action has developed the following set of demands:

• We Take Action to Defend Worker Autonomy.

• We Take Action for the Freedom to Teach and Learn.

• We Take Action to Defend the Value of Dissent.

• We Take Action for Wall-to-Wall Unionization in Higher Ed.

• We Take Action for Education As a Civil Right.

• We Take Action in Recognition of the Power of the Strike.

The full descriptions of the demands can be read here: dayofactionforhighered.org/agenda

PSUFA will be rallying along with all PSU campus labor unions, several AFT affiliated unions across Portland including PCC and OHSU, Portland State Faculty and Students for Justice in Palestine (FSJP), ASPSU, and others.

April 17th events include…
12–1pm - Rally in Montgomery Plaza
1–2pm - Art build, solidarity, food and discussion, KMC 465
2–3:30pm - National Palestine teach-in watch party, KMC 465
3:30–4 - Food and community gathering
4–5:30 - Free Higher Ed Now - national teach-in

We encourage you to wear your union swag and/or your keffiyeh, bring a sign, bring your students and co-workers!

A full list of the national live-streamed events can be viewed here: https://www.dayofactionforhighered.org/events

Bargaining Recap 3/21/25

Contract negotiations are continuing to move ahead full steam, and your all-star union bargaining team is back with another update! Bargaining Team Member and PSUFA Chair of Membership All Schisler Blizzard brings this report straight from the table to all our adjunct members:

3/21/25 Bargaining Recap: "During the March 21 Bargaining Session, PSUFA opened Article 4 (Orientation and Onboarding) with proposed changes that would increase the frequency of University-wide adjunct orientation events, procure paid orientation opportunities for adjuncts, and require enhanced resource guides for adjuncts. This proposal language reflects consistent feedback from adjuncts across the University that onboarding and departmental support is inconsistent and, for some, nonexistent. PSUFA also proposed increasing virtual access to University events, and increasing funds for adjunct inclusion within departments.

PSU opened and passed Article 7 (Bargaining Unit Member Rights), with suggested changes that were both technical and substantive. More info to come.

This was also our first session with observers! Observing bargaining puts pressure on Admin and shows our solidarity."

The next session takes place this Friday, April 4, from 9:30am-1:30pm, and your team needs YOU to show up and show admin that we are united in the fight for a fair contract and a better PSU for everyone! In-person and remote options are available. RSVP at the link below:

When: Friday, April 4, 9:30-1:30pm

Where: Room 316 (Mt. Rainier Room), Richard & Maurine Neuberger Center, 1600 SW 4th Ave. and on Zoom https://pdx.zoom.us/j/84306099553

RSVP here: https://airtable.com/appGBGq9nW0w9BrSc/pagxQ3rqp4Eu4BrZH/form

Upcoming bargaining dates and times

April 4 9:30-1:30 and April 18 9:30-1:30.

Plus! Your Bargaining Team will be hosting a brief (15 minutes) Post-Bargaining Team Huddle for remote and in-person observers after each session. Join the huddle and build our team spirit by joining the link 15 minutes after the end of each bargaining session! (Link provided upon RSVP or in the PSUFA Discord channel)

Post-Bargaining Team Huddle (on Zoom 15 mins after the close of each session)

Keep an eye on your inbox for more important bargaining news and great events in the coming weeks, and reach out if you have questions about other ways to get involved and support your fellow adjuncts!

PSUFA Signs Cross-Union Statement Rejecting Federal Investigation Into PSU Protests

PSUFA Signs Cross-Union Statement Rejecting Federal Investigation Into PSU Protests

PSUFA is proud to stand with our sibling campus unions and student leadership in rejecting the Trump administration’s spurious investigation into PSU. On Friday, March 14, representatives from PSUFA, PSU-AAUP, GEU, SEIU-503, and ASPSU presented PSU President Ann Cudd with a statement condemning these investigations and calling on university leadership to protect students, faculty, and staff from this baseless attack on academic speech and freedom of expression.

See the full statement below, including a plain text version at the end of this post.

STATEMENT (Finalized on 3/5/2025)

The Associated Students of Portland State University, the Graduate Employees Union at PSU, PSUFA AFT local 3571, PSU-AAUP, and SEIU Local 503 Chapter 89 reject the premise of the federally directed investigation into antisemitism at PSU. This investigation emerges not from a specific complaint from a PSU community member, but instead from the Trump administration's desire to intimidate higher education writ large into compliance with the administration’s highly partisan goals and agenda by threatening select institutions with having their federal funding revoked. To achieve this end, the Trump administration has decided to weaponize a highly controversial and contested definition of antisemitism that conflates criticism of state policy with discrimination in order to suppress free speech, political dissent, and the academic freedom that is essential to a rigorous college education. 

We reject, and call on PSU leadership to reject, this and all other efforts by the Trump administration to characterize student, staff, and faculty protest against war and genocide as antisemitic or supportive of terrorism. Protests against state violence which has been identified by the international community as long-form crimes against humanity is not anti-semitism, nor is support for Palestinian peoples facing genocide.

 We also reject harassment of any kind, particularly of our Jewish and Palestinian students, co-workers, and colleagues. We call on PSU leadership to protect students, staff, and faculty in response to this baseless investigation. We have a duty of care to all of the students who come to PSU and trust us with their education. It would be a failure of this duty to allow our students to be targeted by this spurious investigation. The stakes of this investigation for campus workers are high and the administration has an obligation to protect the campus community against baseless political investigations that seek to chill academic speech and freedom of expression.

Signatories

• The Graduate Employees Union at PSU (AFT/AAUP # 6666)

• SEIU Local 503, Chapter 89 (PSU)

• PSUFA AFT local 3571 

• Associated Students Of Portland State University

• PSU - AAUP

Patricia Vázquez Gómez documents the power of language

Adjunct Patricia Vázquez Gómez Explores Language and Migration Through Art

buuts’ (still) | Courtesy of Patricia Vázquez Gómez

According to her bio, PSU alum Patricia Vázquez Gómez “lives and works between the ancient Tenochtitlán and the unceded and occupied lands of the Chinook, Clackamas, Multnomah and other Indigenous peoples,” and even from a cursory glance it’s clear that this geographic split has influenced her multidisciplinary art practice. Vázquez Gómez has explored themes of migration and culture across borders in projects ranging from a mobile art gallery and cultural center in a retrofitted school bus, a performance produced in collaboration with day laborers at the MLK Workers center, and an installation including found objects left behind by migrants in the desert. Her forthcoming installation at the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art, titled ja’ / buuts’ / t’aan, continues her creative research into these themes, combining video and audio to create an immersive experience of language and place. ja’ / buuts’ / t’aan opens at PICA on March 13, and will remain on view through May 31, 2025. More info can be found here.

In addition to her teaching and professional art practice, PSUFA is excited to share that Patricia Vázquez Gómez has also accepted the position of Interim Chair of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Justice, serving on our union Executive Council beginning in Spring 2025. To mark the opening of her show at PICA and her new role in the union, we interviewed her about the show and what drives her creative work. 

PSUFA: How long have you been teaching at PSU? What dept./classes do you teach?

Patricia Vázquez Gómez: I have been teaching in the Art Department for about 7 years. The first class I taught was a seminar on the Ethics of Engagement for the Social Practice MFA students, I still teach that class. I have taught other classes for undergraduate and graduate students: Introduction to Art and Social Practice, BFA Research and Proposal, Vertical Lab and a few seminars.

What inspired this project? How did you get involved with this community/subject matter?

The project has a few origins. The oldest root is my long standing desire to learn an Indigenous language. I was born and raised in Mexico and I was brought up speaking Spanish. My family must have spoken an Indigenous language at some point, but that got lost, and with that, parts of the history and culture that I didn’t have access to. 

Shortly after arriving in the US, I did many years of work with immigrant and labor rights movements. Through that work I came in contact with Indigenous speakers, mostly from Mexico and Guatemala. My observation was that in the context of migration, Indigenous Languages disappear within a generation. That increases the languages’ chance of extinction. I'm not a linguist or an anthropologist and I am not approaching what I'm doing through the lens of those disciplines, but I definitely have had this longing for exploring the presence of Indigenous Languages from South of the border in the US.

Photo courtesy Patricia Vázquez Gómez

When I moved to the neighborhood where I live in NE Portland, I realized that maayat’aan is very present. I would go to the store, or to a protest, or to the food cart and hear the language. I learned there are a lot of families in the neighborhood using maayat’aan every day. I was surprised, but mostly very moved by having the language so alive in my immediacy! 

What do you hope viewers will take away from this project? Is there a kind of impact or action you'd like to see out in the world as a result of people spending time with this work?

What I am most interested in is the work having an impact on the families I have been working with, and particularly the kids. I want them to believe that their language is valued beyond the people who speak it. That if they wanted, they could use their language to engage in cultural production, as some folks are doing these days. That institutions and individuals would be willing to fund that production. One of the things I have learned through my research is that, at least in the Mayab (what we now know as Yucatán, México), it is more profitable to learn English than to continue speaking maayat'aan. If folks speak English they can have access to jobs in the tourist industry —"salarios de hambre" as we say in Spanish (starvation wages) but it is the only option that many Mayans have. But there's nothing in terms of economic advancement that comes with speaking maayat'aan. The very few folks making some money from speaking the language are cultural producers: writers, rappers, singers. So maybe it is through the cultural sector that we can start changing that.

PSU-AAUP Strike: What Adjuncts Need to Know

PSU-AAUP Strike: What Adjuncts Need to Know

What’s Going On With PSU-AAUP: As you know, PSU-AAUP recently declared an impasse in contract negotiations. This means that a strike is possible, should the last best offer from PSU management fail to meet with approval from AAUP membership. PSU-AAUP has asked its members to vote on whether or not to approve a strike, and is expected to announce the results of a vote in the coming days. This does not necessarily mean a strike will take place–in 2014, PSU-AAUP voted to approve a strike. Immediately after the vote, PSU management offered a revised contract that was accepted by union members, and averted the strike. However, all campus unions are preparing to stand in solidarity with full-time faculty in the event that a strike is necessary. 

What the Law Says: The Public Employee Collective Bargaining Act (PECBA) does not allow PSUFA to strike in solidarity alongside AAUP, and considers a refusal to cross a picket line (by employees not in the striking bargaining unit) as an illegal strike. This DOES NOT MEAN you can’t support the picket line, attend rallies, and engage in a range of solidarity actions. 

What the University Might Try to Do: It is possible the University will attempt to replace full-time faculty with adjuncts by asking us to pick up classes, research assignments, etc. This is known as “scabbing” in the labor movement; workers who fill in for striking union members are referred to as scabs. Last minute assignments or wage agreements this Spring are very likely the university's attempt to undermine a strike. You do NOT have to say yes to these asks; our Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) protects adjuncts who decline courses. CBA Article 8 Section 3.6 says: An Adjunct can decline any courses offered to them without penalty to their assignment rights. This declination must be in writing. Please reach out to PSUFA if you get a last minute assignment, or face retaliation for refusing extra work. 

How Adjuncts Can Support Our Full-Time Colleagues: In addition to saying no to extra work, there are lots of ways adjuncts can support our full-time colleagues. PSUFA will keep members posted on solidarity opportunities as our colleagues approach a potential strike date. Adjuncts can follow CLASS, the student-led pro-labor group on campus, for more information about student solidarity actions.

Are you ready to stand with our full-time colleagues right now? Sign the community strike solidarity pledge today!

Cuts and Confusion Threaten PSU’s Native Student Center

Cuts and Confusion Threaten PSU’s Native Student Center

Photo courtesy PSU NASCC

PSU’s Native American Student and Community Center (NASCC) opened just over twenty years ago, in October 2003, after many years of advocacy and organizing by Native students, alongside faculty, staff, alumni and community members. The center, which was envisioned as a welcoming “home away from home” for indigenous students according to an article marking the center’s 20th anniversary, serves as a hub for access to resources, community-building events, and a culturally specific safe drop-in space. 

But the widespread budget woes that have plagued the entire university in recent years have not spared NASCC. According to adjunct and student members of PSU’s native community, the center has experienced drastic reductions in operating capacity due to reduced revenue. The center, which must supplement university support through event space rentals in order to stay afloat, is now facing a nearly $40,000 budget shortfall. 

The reason? According to sources that contacted PSUFA to alert the wider university to the situation, in 2024 PSU failed to collect rental fees equal to that amount. In the months since, PSU, which is responsible for collecting rental fees while the center’s employees handle logistics, has only managed to recover around $2,000 of the outstanding fees. Meanwhile, NASCC workers have been left in the dark about when the funds will be recouped and what department or positions within the administration are ultimately responsible for this mess. This shortfall has compounded the effects of decreased rental demand during the weeks that Pres. Cudd installed riot police across campus in response to student anti-genocide activism. 

This deficit has resulted in reduced open hours and chronic understaffing that students say are negatively impacting the community NASCC was intended to serve. A student with first-hand knowledge of the situation said that PSU initially suggested reducing the center’s open hours from Monday-Friday 9-5 to just Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays from 10-3. Student workers pushed back on this idea, noting that with such limited hours the center could not function as a meaningful resource for students. A compromise was reached to keep the center open three days per week from 9-5, but students and faculty say that’s still not enough. Furthermore, lack of funding has led PSU to reduce the number of student workers employed by NASCC from approximately 11-12 in 2023 to just 4 as of November 2024. The remaining workers report having taken on additional unpaid work, including many duties previously held by the center manager position. This position has been vacant since the last manager resigned in protest over police presence on campus and underpayment issues. According to sources, a student worker is currently filling the role of manager with no increase in their hourly wage to reflect their increased responsibilities. 

What does this mean for PSU’s indigenous community? Individual students have complained to center employees about the loss of access to this space, as well as student and community groups that would normally utilize the space, including United Indigenous Students in Higher Education, American Indigenous Business Leaders, and mentorship programs facilitated by host nations. Moreover, PSU’s mismanagement and opacity in the situation has eroded trust with the native community. A faculty member with connections to the center said “this whole situation sends a message to our community,” and that “there’s no transparency,” and that “nobody knows how much PSU puts into the budget for the center.” One student told PSUFA that “they (PSU) know they messed up.” 

Image courtesy PSU NASCC

From a wider perspective, the issues at NASCC once again call into question PSU’s administrative efficacy. It’s hard to know exactly what is going on due to the lack of transparency endemic across university leadership and operations, and that confusion has only added to the frustration expressed by native community members. Most critically, this story casts doubt upon PSU’s commitment to being a minority serving institution. This element of the university’s mission statement is especially urgent as federal initiatives seek to undermine and dismantle programs that benefit minoritized groups within higher education. 

Everyone PSUFA spoke with emphasized the importance of NASCC to indigenous members of the PSU community. “Many indigenous students are first generation. So this place where we are likely to run into other native people (is important).” 

“I was going around telling people ‘go to the center, everyone is welcome there!’ And promoting the resources. Then come to find out it's not even open all the time, and when you do go in there the lights aren’t on, the computer lab is locked. Its supposed to be a hub for native students”

“I’m speaking about it because a lot of people don’t know what’s going on. I want to see PSU not only fix the financial issues that are affecting everyone, but I also want more acknowledgement to the center.”

Introducing Our 2025 Bargaining Platform!

Introducing PSUFA’s 2025 Bargaining Platform!

PSUFA is thrilled to present our 2025 Bargaining Platform! Based on the results of over 300 responses to our bargaining survey, our team put together a list of our top priorities–check it out below! These are the things YOU told us you need in order to succeed as an adjunct at PSU, and our amazing Bargaining Team is prepared to go to bat to get the best contract possible for all adjuncts! Check out our nifty graphic or scroll down for the full text-only list.

PSUFA 2025 Bargaining Platform

Adjunct professors and researchers are critical to the educational mission of PSU. When adjuncts get the resources and working conditions they need to succeed, everyone wins—from students to full-time faculty and staff. 

Together We Thrive

Fair Compensation

Adjuncts deserve fair pay, living wages, and raises for length of service

Equal Pay for Equal Work

End the two-tier system! Adjuncts deserve the same pay and benefits for the same work as their full-time counterparts

Job Security

Honor contracts and assignment rights

Real Benefits

All adjuncts deserve retirement benefits and access to health, dental and vision care.

The Support We Need

Adjuncts need better working space and resources to support their scholarly, professional, and artistic practices

Academic Freedom

Vulnerable faculty need guaranteed protections to speak the truth in their teaching and research

Transparency and Collaboration

Workers have a right to know how PSU is making critical decisions and the opportunity to shape the way our institution is run

Bargaining 101: The Bargaining Process

Bargaining 101: The Bargaining Process

Bargaining is about to begin, and that means it’s time for the next installment in our Bargaining 101 series! This semi-regular column in our email newsletters and on our blog and social media will feature learning resources and guides to make sure every adjunct can follow along and support our amazing team as we fight for a great new contract!

You know all about the power of collective bargaining and the fact that PSUFA has assembled an all-star team to negotiate a great contract for all adjuncts at PSU. But do you know how it all happens? If you’re curious to understand the process of collective bargaining in more depth, read on! Our handy graphic breaks it all down (text version after the jump!)

1. Prepare for Bargaining: PSUFA and Management establish teams and set ground rules

2. Direct Bargaining: Parties meet to review proposals with legal obligation to bargain in good faith for at least 150 days with an attempt to reach an agreement.

3. Mediation: If parties don't reach agreement after 150 days, either side can initiate mediation. After 15 days, an impasse can be declared.

4. Impasse: Within 7 days of declaring an impasse, both parties are required to submit final offers and cost summaries to mediator (our full-time colleagues in PSU-AAUP have just reached this stage in their bargaining process!)

5. Cooling Off: A 30 day cooling off period follows the publication of final offer. This time allows for further attempts at resolution.

6. PSUFA Can Strike: If no agreement is reached, PSU can implement its last, best, and final proposal. PSUFA can legally hold a strike and demand better than PSU's final offer.