From the President
Greetings Friends,
Happy New Year!
Hard to believe we’re approaching the 3-year anniversary of the pandemic shutdown, yet here we are. I’m pleased to announce that over the break we filed a representation petition with PERC to represent professional/exempt staff at Walla Walla Community College. The next step is to come to agreement with management and PERC on which positions will be in the unit and then get to the bargaining table. As you read through this Pulse, you’ll see that AFT Washington Board member and faculty at Pierce College Jacqui Cain is working to organize professional staff at other colleges – if you know of colleagues at the CTCs who might be interested, Jacqui would welcome a conversation with them, so please reach out.
The legislative session started Monday, January 9th and already feels like we’re in a three-and-a-half month sprint! We’re working on legislation to establish part-time pay equity at 85%, reliable and consistent access to employee information so you can more effectively communicate with your members, 200 new tenure track positions at the four-year colleges, better compensation, and more! If you don’t receive our Legisletter, sign up now. We provide a weekly update and include calls to action as needed. Legislators are presented with hundreds, if not thousands, of bills each session. The only way our priorities will get the attention they deserve is if we are in constant communication with them … and they want to hear from you! Please heed our call for action when we make it!
Two major elements of our work this year are our Lobby Day on February 20th and a CTC walk-out on April 11th. We are seeking a substantial general salary increase and part-time pay equity and we’ll have to demonstrate our seriousness with escalating actions. Register right away to join us on the 20th and contact Anna-Marie Magdalena to pitch in for the win before then.
Finally, our biennial convention will be held May 18th – 21st … read through this Pulse to get more information. One of my favorite parts of convention is the Board Awards which give you the opportunity to acknowledge the work of union leaders and activists who are rock stars in your locals. We are all swamped with work, family, volunteer work (and hopefully, some fun) and I appreciate all who contribute to your union day in and day out; I know that you have union siblings working right alongside you to ensure you and your co-workers have a voice in your workplace. We want to honor those who make this important investment.
Another of my favorite parts starts at convention, when we build the fund that provides for our scholarship program, but we’re overhauling that program, and have exciting changes to announce soon. If you want to donate while you wait to learn more, you can do that at our donation page.
I hope to see you all in person or on the screen in these next few months and wish you all the best for 2023.
In solidarity,
Karen Strickland, President
Local Highlights & News
Professional Exempt Staff Win First Contract, Unite with AFT Faculty at Grays Harbor College!
By Bob Downing, Union Organizing Representative
Student success navigators, coordinators, associate directors, and more professional exempt staff at Grays Harbor College have successfully organized with AFT and bargained their first-ever union contract. Improvements in the agreement include the right to file grievances, new wage bumps for seniority, more paid time off, and most importantly, a real voice on the job.
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Associate Director of Running Start Lori Christmas was there throughout the entire campaign. “When we called AFT, people were fearful of losing their jobs because admin was making our lives super difficult,” she says. “Looking back, it was totally worth the journey, since we are now successfully pushing back when management tries to throw new job duties our way. We can finally say no without being afraid.”
In January 2021, with the support of more than 70% of her coworkers, Lori and the rest of the AFT organizing committee filed to organize their union through the state’s Public Employees Relations Commisssion (PERC). “It was not an overnight process,” Lori says, “but we spent the time doing surveys, building up our bargaining team, and preparing ourselves to finally get to the place we needed to be: the bargaining table across from Grays Harbor College administration.”
The group also decided to join the currently existing AFT local that represents faculty: the Grays Harbor Federation of Teachers Local #4984. “We just thought it made sense for us to have one local, since we’re all here for the same reason: student success. We don’t need to be in separate silos. And they agreed!”
The new members unanimously ratified their first union contract in October 2022, and now they are looking forward to organizing on a bigger stage. “I want to be involved in improving things for students at a statewide level now,” Lori says. “And that includes helping other college employees overcome their fear and go union. When you have a bigger voice at work, you can make a difference.”
Anti-Racism In Collective Bargaining Project: Recruitment, Retention, and Hiring Topics
By Ray Carrillo, Union Organizing Representative
Our AFT Washington Anti-Racism in Collective Bargaining Project began in 2021 with Kimberly McRae and David Ortiz became Co-Managers of the project.
The intention was to provide a resource with the principles, existing language, recommended language and best practices to strengthen the collective bargaining agreements of AFT Washington locals as a tool to promote anti-racist practices and dismantle practices that perpetuate disparate treatment. The project co-managers and contributors reviewed ten bargaining agreements and focused the initial phase on recruitment, retention and hiring. You can access the report here.
The next phase will include student complaints, evaluations, and discipline. The co-managers and contributors took on a large task in reviewing and coming up with concrete ways to address racism in our workplaces and solutions to it in our contract. The work is ongoing and will be continue as part of AFT Washington’s work as an anti-racist organization.
AFT Washington’s 2023 Lobby Day!
Our 2023 Lobby Day is fast approaching! It will be in person in Olympia on Monday, February 20th, from 8:00 AM to 3:00 PM.
We show up for our students every day in our classrooms, our technical and community colleges, and our four-year institutions. This year we are showing up in-person to push our legislators for student success, including:
- Pay that reflects the importance of the work we do
- Adjunct pay equity
- Reduced barriers to student support services
- Real commitment to the principles of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.
We will be meeting close to Olympia's Capitol campus and will provide training for lobbying legislators, our talking points, and a meal and snacks for the day.
Register here.
Welcoming Our New Staff
AFT Washington has brought on three new staff in recent weeks! Javier Cortez is filling our vacant UOR position. Jacqui Cain, our VP for Contingent Faculty Issues has taken on a new role jointly with AFT working on external organizing, and Rosalinda Aguirre has stepped in as our temporary Administrative Support Specialist.
Rosalinda Aguirre is currently at another organization covering a previously-agreed temporary vacancy, but once she returns, she will be with us through convention, so you will likely have the opportunity connect with her at some point, and some of you may remember her as she has previously worked for AFT Washington. You can reach her at raguirre@aftwa.org.
Jacqui Cain is excited to continue working with AFT in the new role of Project Organizer. She brings several decades of experience in a variety of union leadership positions, most recently at Pierce College local #4821. At Pierce she was both the Communications Coordinator and Adjunct Faculty Representative where she served on grievance and bargaining teams. and leading unemployment benefits workshops. Jacqui is also currently serving as the Vice-President for Contingent Faculty Issues for AFT-WA. Outside of work she enjoys traveling, theater, and taking her dog for long walks. She can be reached at jcainaftwa@gmail.com.
Javier Cortez is the newest Union Organizing Representative at AFT Washington. He has been in the labor movement for a long time and has experience in helping build unions in the private sector and some in the public sector as well. He has helped represent hospital unions, and recently assisted interpreters in getting a union. Javier is happy to work with AFT Washington locals, our members, and leaders, in building a stronger union by organizing and fighting for improvements in the workplace. He lives in Tacoma, and enjoys the outdoors, which is one of the reasons he moved to Washington from California.
You can reach Javier Cortez at:
Tel: (206) 427-8107
Email: jcortez@aftwa.org
He looks forward to meeting and building with you!
It’s Time To Build The Bridge To The Future
AFT Washington is calling on Governor Inslee to understand the working conditions our members have, and that they are the learning conditions of our students. We are calling on the legislature to make significant investments in our state’s CTC system, which is a bridge to the future, connecting our diverse student population with the quality jobs of tomorrow. We have a digital version of the petition to sign here, and your UOR will be working with you to get paper petitions circulating on your campus.
From The Stand: MLK Day Events This Weekend
For the past couple of years, most events and activities honoring the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. on the weekend of MLK Day have been held virtually. This year, while some online workshops are still planned to reach the broadest audience possible, many in-person events are scheduled in the days leading up to MLK Day on Monday, Jan. 16. Masks and social distancing are encouraged for all these indoor events.
Read more for details of the events.
Tell UIC – Fair Faculty Contract NOW!
Faculty at University of Illinois at Chicago, UIC United Faculty (IFT-AFT/AAUP Local 6456), have been working without a contract since August. Faculty are demanding a contract that creates more stable, equitable, and dignified working conditions in order to assure the best possible student learning conditions. Send University Chancellor Reyes an email to tell him it’s past time to settle a fair contract that supports faculty and students at UIC!
Union Tips & Reminders
Race & Labor Trainings Available
Would you like to be a better leader in your workplace and a voice for change? AFT Washington has several leaders who are trained in presenting the Washington State Labor Council's Race & Labor training. If you are interested in doing the Race & Labor training for your local or e-board, contact your UOR and we can arrange that.
Treasurer’s Training
Saturday, January 28, 10:00 AM - 2:30 PM
Local Treasurers, Membership Chairs, and Presidents who handle either of these roles, please join us for a Treasurer/Membership Data Training on January 28! The first module starts at 10:00 AM (financial management training) and will end by 11:30 AM. The second module starts at 12:30 PM (data management training) and ends at 2:30 PM. Participants may choose to attend both modules or select just one. Please register for either or both modules.
Register here.
Worksite Representative Training
Tuesday, January 24th, 5:00 - 7:30 PM
Whether you are called a union steward, building rep, officer, executive board member, we all want to do our best to represent our members. During this training you will learn the importance of engaging our membership, building our power inside and outside of the worksite and enforcing our contract.
Register here.
AFT's Annual PSRP Conference!
April 14-16, 2023, in Baltimore
Join the AFT in historic Baltimore for the 45th PSRP Professional Issues Conference, April 14-16, 2023.
The agenda is centered around three mini-plenaries, focused on our theme This Is How We Do It: School and College Staff Taking Center Stage to Support Our Students, Our Communities and Ourselves!
- This Is How We Do It—Celebrating PSRP Wins;
- This Is How We’ll Do It—Advocacy, Resources and Strategies; and
- This Is How We’ve Done It—Sharing Successes, Failures and What We’ve Learned Along the Way.
There will also be a wide range of professional development workshops to help strengthen our union, develop leadership skills and equip workers with new tools to help activists advocate for our professions. We look forward to seeing you in Baltimore!
Register here.
More Details on The 2023 Convention
Mark your calendars now for the AFT Washington convention, which will be held May 18-21, 2023! We’ll have much, much more information as we go, but four things to be aware of now are resolutions, board awards, the scholarship fund, and the social event. We are particularly encouraging leaders to consider resolutions that you want to bring forward.
If you have any questions about whether your idea is suitable for a resolution, talk to your UOR! They can help you turn your idea into a strong resolution that will guide our work. Resolutions can be in support of a constituency, such as last year’s resolution supporting contingent faculty, or for the full state federation, as 2020’s anti-racism resolution is. There are many options in between, and we’ll have more information on them as well very soon.
The board awards are briefly described here. They are divided into categories, most of which only union members are eligible for, but the Cesar Chavez Human Rights Award is a special case: that award is for an individual, group, or local who has a mission or vision that embraces human rights and confronts challenges to human rights head on. Be thinking about people you would like to nominate for the awards, and talk to your UOR about the process of nomination.
In addition, the Convention is typically when we start our fundraising campaign for the scholarship program. We are planning changes to accommodate the virtual format, but while we iron out the details if you’d like to start building the fund now, you can do that here
And finally, this year we are changing the format a bit. While the business and workshop portion of the event will be virtual, we are going to host a social event, with a dinner and keynote conversation, at Renton Technical College on Friday, May 19th in the afternoon. More details will be available soon!
AFT Connect: Better Data For A Stronger Union
Connect is AFT’s web-based, secure local data management system. It provides a great way to record individual member data, and so much more!
- Capture detailed employment and employer information about members, prospective members, and retired members of your local.
- Make sure your members can access their union-provided benefits (discounted insurance, home mortgages, travel, goods and personal services).
- Keep track of changes in member earnings to ensure proper payment of your local’s per capita obligations.
- Manage your local executive board as well as COPE and other local committees.
- Plan outreach to your members and prospects. Have the information you need to conduct mailings, email, phone and text message outreach via local efforts or using AFT’s communications tools. Record member event attendance and outreach responses.
- Create forms and surveys.
- Track your local’s engagement with and support from Community Allies.
Readily use these features and more through AFT Connect’s dashboard, upload bulk spreadsheet updates of your membership, or let Connect help your local turn data into a powerful outreach and management tool through easy, customizable reports.
Maintaining your local’s membership and leadership information in Connect meets AFT and AFT Washington requirements for your local to remain in good standing.
To get started with AFT Connect, or to request training and other member data support, contact Christine Landon at clandon@aftwa.org.
Communications Help Is Available
Is your local not sure how to best use your website? Did you know you can have a free website? Would you like help with figuring out strategies for better communications outreach? Got something for the whole union to hear about? We can help with all of these, and more!
On top of helping your local, we can provide outreach to the union as a whole, through the Pulse and the Union Spotlight. We are actively interested in anything your members are doing, such as workshops or innovative problem solving.
If you have questions about them, want guidance, or are interested in learning more, please contact Cortney Marabetta at cmarabetta@aftwa.org.