COHE BARGAINING REPORT #3
COHE Proposals, Faculty Survey Results and More
February 3, 2011
Greetings!
These are tough times for higher education in South Dakota. On behalf of COHE, I want to thank you for the terrific job you are doing, "more with less."  We must continue to work together to improve higher education, but also to convince the public and policy makers that an educated population is the single best asset our state needs to grow in the next half-century.
Al's Oasis

Bargaining News

This past Saturday, January 29, COHE bargainers met with the BOR representatives in Oacoma, SD.   During this--our third--bargaining session, we accomplished several things.   We tentatively agreed to a few non-controversial BOR proposals.  Also, COHE representatives asked a large number of questions about BOR proposals on intellectual property.  Finally, we began a discussion on COHE compensation proposals.

 

We meet for our fourth session on Saturday, February 12 in Pierre.  We have also scheduled three additional bargaining sessions with our final session tentatively scheduled for May 5 in Pierre.  Our ground rules allow COHE to keep you informed about the general progress of negotiations.  However, to protect the process and encourage conciliation, we do not release specific details in digitized form.  Dues-paying COHE members are provided more information and at an earlier time.   If you desire more information about bargaining, please contact a COHE officer on your campus!

Survey

COHE Proposals and Survey Results

Each side has offered a large number of complex proposals.  Previously, we provided all faculty with a copy of the BOR proposals.   For the first time now, we share COHE's proposals with all faculty here.  These have been given to dues-paying COHE members a few weeks ago.   

 

Last Fall, all non-COHE faculty and COHE members were invited to complete separate surveys to rank items for negotiations.  One hundred and nine non-COHE members and 59 COHE members submitted their surveys. We provide the results and analysis from these surveys below.  As you can see, the two surveys provided nearly identical results.  The COHE Executive Board used these results to prioritize our proposals. The Board agreed to use all of the items for which 2/3 of COHE members strongly agreed.  Then, individual COHE bargainers prepared draft contract language which we used to develop the proposals above.


Take Class Action
Faculty Plan for Quality Higher Education

COHE is joining with faculty nationwide for the first time to campaign for higher education.  COHE President Gary Aguiar attended a meeting on January 21 - 22 in Los Angeles, which was attended by 70 faculty leaders from 21 states.  Collectively, we represented tens of thousands of faculty who teach millions of students.  We are now reaching out to our colleagues in the remaining states and other allies, especially students.

As part of that effort, we are seeking input and suggestions on our draft of principles.  Please respond with any comments before March 1.  Also, we will begin planning local and regional days of action.  These activities, which peak on April 13, include teach-ins, teach-outs, rallies, and hands-across-campus. At SDSU, COHE is working with the Student Association for an on-campus event in late February.  Stay tuned for more information on these and other events.

Also, a group of faculty who attended from our region agreed to meet to further the discussion.  We will meet April 16 at the University of Nebraska at Omaha with commitments from faculty leaders in Minnesota, Nebraska, and Kansas.  We will encourage the participation of others in the Great Plains to attend.