In the past five months, the academic staff at Carleton University have been the miner's canary in the debate over the meaning of tenure at Canadian universities. The decision in December to close several of our language and literature programs carried with it the prospect that tenured faculty would be targeted for dismissal in May 1998. This threat confronted the Carleton University Academic Staff Association (CUASA) with the most serious challenge in our 22 year history. I am happy to report that this conflict has finally ended in a satisfactory settlement. What follows is a brief account of how we got there and the lessons that we learned along the way.

On March 26 and 27, 1998 CIEA President Ed Lavalle was invited to represent CIEA and CAUT at the first National Conference of Higher Education Unions in Mexico City. This important gathering was the first national meeting of the university unions since the Mexican government legislated against a single national union for Mexican university workers in the early 1980s. The theme of the conference was Defence of Public, Post-Secondary and Higher Education.

The need for librarians to participate actively in university and library governance is crucial. Often, however, they experience difficulties gaining representation on the appropriate committees. Librarians who attempt to change the governance structure within their institutions may discover they have to overcome not only bureaucratic obstacles but also the attitudinal obstacles of both their non-librarian colleagues and those within their own profession.

he Committee of Concerned Faculty at Memorial University and Dr. Law are particularly pleased with the treatment the Law issue received in the April edition of the CAUT Bulletin. Thank you very much.

The April Bulletin was brimming with interesting information on a variety of topics. But I take issue with Dr. Joan Scott (Outside the Loop & Doing Research) with respect to the notion that "the only brand of objectivity that science rests on is that of older white men...."

I wish to express my thanks to CAUT's Status of Women Committee: Jennifer Bankier, Jeanette Lynes, Jennifer Mather, Linda Paul and Joan Scott, for a superb supplement (Bulletin, April). As an academic with 28 years' experience, during which I was full-time, sessional, contractual and now back to sessional, I know this supplement represents my views.

erhaps the Law-Tuinman spat at Memorial University of Newfoundland (Bulletin, April) has obscured what I believe is one of the most unfortunate outcomes of the vice-president academic's tenure at this university -- the emasculation of the faculty of science.

essionals and other temporary staff at the University of Alberta have reached their first agreement with the university. After consulting with the academic staff association in the fall of 1997, the board of governors declared that those academics on temporary contracts were members of academic staff. The contract recognizes the differences between those in the group with primary responsibility for teaching and those with library, administrative or other professional duties. Almost half the group work full-time on a temporary basis, while the majority work part-time.

University of Winnipeg Faculty Association members have voted 91

The Acadia University Faculty Association (AUFA) has voted overwhelmingly to support Acadia students in their recent call for a comprehensive review of the leadership of Dr

On April 21, with a 96 per cent vote in favour, the Queen's University Faculty Association ratified an agreement between the University and QUFA to provide a scale increase of 1

When mishandled harassment cases put Simon Fraser University prominently in the national news last summer, the mass media focused on SFU's swim coach, who was first charged with sexual harassment, then fired, then rehired, and finally compensated for his legal costs.