Response to Worthen and Berry: Bargaining for Survival in Higher Education

The crux of the issue addressed by Berry and Worthen in their case study from the City Colleges of Chicago is not so much a debate over who defines quality and how it can be attained through collective bargaining, but rather a question of how higher education unions can effectively protect both the contractual and traditional academic rights of their members when faced with a challenge or mandate to improve "quality" or an attempt by management to usurp faculty roles. As they note, failure to contractually agree upon the components of quality at the bargaining table (or where no bargaining exists) will likely result in the party with the greatest power imposing its definitions on the weaker party. In most cases, this means that the employer will determine what quality measures "count," and unilaterally apply its definition when considering employee performance and evaluation.

The administrative behavior described in the case study involves an acting dean who appears to have initiated a less than straightforward attack on an unsuspecting and overworked faculty member/union activist. This attack alleges negligence (poor quality work) and certainly suggests a lack of collegial behavior on the part of the acting dean. The case study also implies that the union is, at best, less than effective in its ability to protect the faculty member from arbitrary and capricious administrative actions due to weak protective language in the collective bargaining agreement. We can only presume that the union was unable to obtain stronger language due to a lack of bargaining power, bargaining inexperience, or both. It is likewise clear that Berry and Worthen find nothing to remedy this situation through the adoption of a collaborative or "win-win" bargaining model such as Kerchner's strategy of labor-management collaboration for quality. The evidence presented in the case study certainly supports their conclusions in this latter regard.

The critical question raised is: how do faculty, particularly contingent or part-time faculty teaching at public community colleges and lower status state supported four-year institutions, protect their rights and effectively deal with administrations that evidence little appreciation for, or understanding of, collegial values and gravitate toward hierarchical and authoritarian administrative styles that are indirectly supported, if not encouraged, by legislative bodies and public boards of control? There appear to be at least two barriers to directly addressing this question: (1) a misperception on the part of legislators and boards of control, a misperception unfortunately shared by some college administrators, of the fundamental difference of the roles of secondary and post-secondary faculty in creating a high quality educational experience; and (2) the misapplication of the industrial union model to higher education.

Secondary vs. Post-Secondary Faculty

Public secondary education in the United States has historically been based on the presumed ability of locally elected boards of education to devise and administer schools that are both relevant in terms of their curricular offerings and responsive to the values and goals of the local community. The same is true of private secondary schools that simply replace the wisdom of the elected board with private boards of control that may reflect alumni, parental, and/or religious interests. It cannot be denied that these boards of control have always asserted the right to establish the content and, to considerable extent, the presentation of the curriculum to the students. Secondary teachers do not determine which courses will be taught or what is to be taught in them. This is a management right, typically withheld from collective bargaining by the employer. At best, secondary school faculty may be able to bargain an advisory role or recommend the texts that will be used to illustrate the curriculum.

By contrast, post-secondary education relies on the instructor's ability to determine the curriculum and how it will be taught. This is true for most college professors and instructors, and is even applicable to instructors and...