In early February, I was happy to celebrate the inauguration of CAUT’s new office building (see the article and photo in the February Bulletin), located just two doors from our former building, which we’d occupied since its completion in 1994. When we built our first building, we estimated it would serve our needs for the next 25 years! But few could have predicted the prodigious growth CAUT would experience in the following years. Over time, every square inch of space was pressed into service. As CAUT grew, so did our office staff. By late 2004, we had completely run out of office and storage space and staff began to examine the feasibility of adding a third floor, retaining the building and renting another space in a nearby building on the same street, or selling the building and renting office space, purchasing an existing building and renovating or acquiring land and constructing a new building. In 2005, after reviewing every option, the CAUT executive approved and reported to Council a proposal for a new building and the search began for a new site.

As I said in my December column, anniversaries are worth celebrating, and so are milestones in the life of an organization. The opening of our new headquarters gives us an occasion to take stock and reflect on CAUT’s growth over the past 12 years. Let’s start by looking at rising membership numbers, and then we’ll examine the expansion of our activities and services, beginning with collective bargaining.

Since 1994, the number of associations in CAUT has grown slightly — from 58 to 65 — but the number of members for whom dues are paid has jumped from 27,600 in 1994 to 39,700 in 2007 — a 44% increase during the period. When you add all the members of federated associations, CAUT now represents 57,000 academic staff nationwide.

How can we account for this tremendous growth? A number of factors were at play here. First, CAUT admitted seven new local associations to its membership: the Atlantic School of Theology Faculty Association, the academic staff association at Saint Paul University, Brescia Faculty Association, Huron University College Faculty Association, the Northern Ontario School of Medicine Faculty Association, the University Clinical Faculty Association of UBC and the Ontario College of Art and Design Faculty Association.

Second is that former member associations, such as the University of Saskatchewan Faculty Association, rejoined CAUT. Third, two provincial unions joined us in recent years: the Federation of Post-Secondary Educators of British Columbia, which represents more than 10,000 individual faculty and staff (in 18 member locals), 1,130 of whom are involved in degree-granting programs; and the Community Colleges of Applied Arts and Technology (academic division) of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union, which has 9,500 members, with nearly 500 in degree-granting programs.

Our membership increase also comes from academic staff association growth. For example, over the past 12 years, the number of dues-paying members at the University of Alberta increased by 1,700, at Calgary by 800 and at UBC by 1,100. East coast associations also saw strong increases in membership. Dalhousie increased its number of members by 25 per cent, Acadia by 52 per cent and St. Thomas by 74 per cent.

Not surprisingly, if we look at membership figures by rank, we find that most of the growth occurred through new hires. Nationally, the number of full professors remained largely unchanged from 1994 (9,060), while the ranks of associate professors showed stronger gains — increasing from 8,640 in 1994 to 9,600 in 2007, and the number of assistant professors almost doubled, from about 5,500 in 1994 to 10,100 in 2007. Appointments in other categories jumped by about 1,700.

Another reason for internal growth is a result of CAUT’s drive to bring all unorganized contract academic staff into association membership. This has resulted in a part-time membership growth from 950 in 1994 to more than 6,500 today.

But membership numbers alone do not tell the whole story. Over time, CAUT services expanded dramatically on all fronts. Here’s one expansion move.

In 1994, CAUT’s collective bargaining division underwent a major restructuring. The bargaining cooperative, created in the mid-1980s to service locals in the existing bargaining environment, shut down in April 1994, and a new CAUT standing committee on collective bargaining and economic benefits was set up. This committee has, among other positives, crafted almost 50 model clauses1 on various key topics that are a tremendous asset to our local associations in bargaining. But the work being carried out here is much more than that. A first full-time senior bargaining officer was hired in 2000 and CAUT has hired two assistant executive directors since then to assist member associations with bargaining. Meanwhile, the workload keeps growing.

The reasons are partly because negotiations in academic communities nationwide are becoming more difficult due to employers’ increased aggressiveness at the table, but also because as our staff become familiar with local circumstances, they can provide increasingly “personalized” advice, which in turn is increasingly sought out. In any given year, almost one-third of our locals are negotiating agreements with their employers. In the last few months alone, seven associations with very strong strike votes negotiated down to the wire before settlements were reached.

In these cases, as in other less dramatic ones, CAUT’s bargaining services vary from consultations between local associations and our bargaining officers to on-site visits. Similarly, long before talks begin, CAUT’s bargaining officers are working with local associations. In addition, many associations seek CAUT advice in contract interpretation disputes with their administrations.

To round out what’s been happening on the collective bargaining front, CAUT has produced no less than 16 bargaining advisories on topics ranging from intellectual property, online education, freedom to publish, carriage rights and outsourcing to child care, maternity, parental, adoption, compassionate and other family-related leave provisions and accommodation of academic staff with mental disabilities. We’ve also issued an advisory on wage equity for faculty in equity-seeking groups and another on increasing representation of designated groups on campus. As for our contract academic staff colleagues, there’s one on recognition for service, another on appointments for those on per-course contracts and one on access to a career path. Many others on a variety of topics are in preliminary stages and will be issued in the coming months.2

CAUT also maintains an extensive database of collective agreements,3 conducts annual salary and employee benefits surveys and publishes a variety of documents on academic collective bargaining, such as the CAUT Handbook for New Faculty: Negotiating Starting Salaries, and Facts and Figures, a report that summarizes key elements from recent settlements.

Finally, CAUT organizes two events around bargaining: a periodic collective bargaining conference, which looks at specific issues, and an annual chief negotiators’ forum, a venue for those who have lead responsibility for bargaining for our member associations. CAUT also brings collective bargaining training to member associations with on-site workshops.

CAUT has expanded its operations and services in many other areas as well, from its strong defence of academic freedom cases to legal services, from new courses and workshop offerings to a greatly
expanded list of publications, and from the recent addition of health and safety issues to our heightened profile on the international scene. More on these pursuits in my next column!

1. CAUT model clauses are available here.

2. Bargaining advisories are posted on a password-protected area of CAUT’s web site.

3. Ibid.