I recently became a member of the Canadian Union of Public Employees, Local 3904 Unit 3.
The Union represents contract academics at Ryerson University, where I'm also a graduate
student.
Not long after I joined, on October 16, 2017, over 12,000 full-time and part-time faculty
from Ontario's 24 public colleges went on strike.
Ryerson is marginally affected due to the fact that George Brown College has a campus
here.
According to the Ontario Public Service Employees Union, or OPSU, quote, treatment of contract
faculty at the colleges has been a sticking point in negotiations.
Some 70% of all college factory work on short-term, usually four-month contracts, with substandard
wages and no job security, the end of quote.
OPSU is calling for increased wages in a faculty of at least 50% full-timers.
The Toronto Star reports that, quote, the College Employer Council has said that the
Union's demands will cost $250 million and lead to the loss of thousands of contract
positions, end quote.
The strike, now in its fourth week, affects over half a million students in Ontario.
In addition to the one on Ryerson's campus, there are picket lines for members of OPSU
Local 556 at other George Brown College locations, including the St. James campus, the Waterfront
campus, and the Casa Loma campus.
In a show of solidarity, I went to the local 556 picket lines, and here is a bit of what
I saw and what I heard.
So can you tell us why you're here?
Okay, we're here basically just for fairness for our contract faculty.
I'm a full-time faculty myself, but I want to make sure that our part-time or contract
faculty are equally paid for the hours that they work.
The dispute, as my colleague stated, is it's all about jobs.
Right now in the province, again, it's an arguable number, we're roughly 80% part-time
faculty and 20% full-time.
Just 10 years ago, that was basically, I think it was roughly 60-40 somewhere in there.
And 10 years ago, in the last 10 years, student enrollment has increased 21%, full-time faculty
has increased 12%, part-time faculty has increased 36%, administration positions have gone up
56%, and there is no part-time administrators.
It's all full-time positions.
So it's very frustrating, and they're saying there's no money available.
The colleges made $168 million profit last year.
Out of the 24 colleges, 23 of them were in the black, and there was only one that was
in the red, and that was a Sue, and they were very close to breaking even.
So the money is there, and we just want to basically, we care about our students, and
it's very hard, we have people here that have to apply for their job every eight weeks.
So it's very hard for, on the faculty, it's hard on the students.
From one semester to the next, they have different professors, and there's no continuity, and
that's what we're trying to have.
We're asking for 50-50, and in my opinion, that is not, we're not asking for the movement.
So I'm a member of QP3904 over at Ryerson.
What would you like to see in terms of support from Ryerson faculty that are not affected
by this particular strike?
We'd like them to walk with us.
That would be nice to have them walk with us and show us their support.
Absolutely.
Any support we have would be much appreciated.
Any press, again, thank you for this.
And we're going to have a rally on Thursday, the students, I believe, is tomorrow.
Faculty will be rallying on Thursday at Queen's Park also, and we just want them to get back
to the table.
That's it.
And, you know, like, they don't even seem to want to hear our sight, and it seems to
be monetary, and this is still supposed to be a public system, affordable, and it's just
not getting affordable anymore for the students.
The tuition is just going through the roof, we're in Canada, we're the lowest paid colleges,
as far as money that's being put into the system, and that's all we're asking, just
fairness.
And that's what we're going to do, and that's what we're going to do, and that's what we're
going to do.
And that's what we're going to do.
And that's what we're going to do.
And that's what we're going to do.
And that's what we're going to do, and that's what we're going to do, and that's what we're
going to do.
And that's what we're going to do, and that's what we're going to do, and that's what we're
This rule in every land, won't it just be a union grand?
