Non-tenure track faculty at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs have voted to unionize.
This week, majorities of full-time and part-time non-tenure track faculty at the private liberal arts college voted to unionize with SEIU Local200United.
The votes tallied 64 to 35 in favor for full-time NTT workers, 38 to 19 for part-timers.
The votes came after a push for unionization from the group Skidmore Faculty Forward.
Skidmore English professor Ruth McAdams is a member of the group’s organizing committee. She spoke with WAMC after the successful votes conducted by the National Labor Relations Board.
“It’s the result of months, of years of outreach and community building among people, many of whom didn’t know each other before we started and are often encouraged to see each other as competitors for limited resources,” said McAdams.
McAdams says a key concern of NTT faculty is a lack of job security.
“Across the college, Skidmore uses short-term staffing to fill long-term instructional needs. And so what that means, is that across the college there are faculty who have worked at the college for many years, but always on a terminal contract – always on a one-year or a two-year short-term contract that cannot be renewed. What happens when they come to the end of their contract is that – surprise – that teaching still needs to be done. So, they get a new contract. But they’re never renewed, there’s no formal process in which their performance is reviewed, and it means the people – and I’m in this category – are always expecting to lose their job at the end of their contract,” said McAdams.
Another motivating issue for union supporters, according to McAdams, was pay, with tenure-track faculty making more than their non-tenure track colleagues, on average.
Skidmore engaged in a year-long compensation study during the 2021-2022 academic year, begun before the unionizing campaign went public.
McAdams says part-time faculty received a pay increase, but she credits faculty for bringing the issue to the college’s attention.
“That study was undertaken after a non-tenure track faculty member raised a pointed and critical question at a faculty meeting in May of 2021, in which he very forcefully and I think bravely asked why non-tenure track faculty salaries were so low,” said McAdams.
According to an estimate from McAdams, an incoming full-time non-tenure track faculty member makes around $52,000, while incoming tenure track staff would earn about $70,000.
The unionizing effort went public earlier this spring, with organizers seeking a voluntary recognition from administrators. During a May rally on campus, some students spoke in favor of the effort, including sociology major Liana Heath.
“Non-tenure track faculty are not replaceable, they are integral,” said Heath.
At the time, the college said it would “work constructively and bargain in good faith” if the union was certified.
After Tuesday’s successful votes, Skidmore College President Marc Conner provided a statement to the college community that reads in part:
“As I have maintained throughout this process, support of our non-tenure-track faculty colleagues is a priority of Skidmore College. We respect and admire their contributions to our mission. We will now move forward to bargain in good faith with their union toward mutually agreeable terms. I look forward to moving forward together in the best interests of our students and the College.”
With the bargaining table in sight, SEIU representative Sean Collins said the union would work with the organizing committee to form a negotiating unit.
“We’ll start to survey the membership to identify what the issues are across the college for both full-time and part-time, we’ll develop proposals, and we’ll get ready for negotiations, hopefully, later this fall or early winter,” said Collins.
By way of disclosure, WAMC hosts a news bureau on the Skidmore College campus.
