Category: USFA e-Letter

e-Letters are brief but timely communications about workplace issues.

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Reimbursement of Professional Fees (Article 22.12.2)

In our most recent Collective Agreement an annual amount $225,000 was negotiated for the purpose of reimbursing professional fees paid by members (with the exception of practicing physicians in the College of Medicine) who are required, as a condition of employment, to maintain a certification or license in order to perform their academic duties.

Guidelines for Reimbursement were established by the Joint Committee for Management of the Agreement and, for the first distribution of these funds, claims were accepted from February 1 to 29, 2016 for eligible professional fees paid between December 1, 2013 and November 30, 2015.

Everyone who submitted a claim for reimbursement should have received an email explaining the results of their claim. If you submitted a claim and have not received an email, please contact Johanne Brassard at the USFA office (johanne.brassard@usask.ca or 5610).

On an annual basis, claims for reimbursement of professional fees paid during the twelve-month period of December 1 to November 30 must be made between November 1 and December 1. Following receipt of all claims, available financial resources will be allocated as a proportion of the total amount claimed. The next claim period is November 1 to December 1, 2016. Watch for a notice.

If you have questions about Article 22.12.2, or the Collective Agreement in general, simply let us know in a reply to this email and someone will contact you.

 

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The Crisis of Confidence in University Boards Across Canada

Voting is underway for the faculty representative on the U of S Board of Governors, with ballots closing on May 25th. If you have not yet voted, consider participating in the process to determine who will take the seat of the faculty member on our Board of Governors. As recent events across Canada have shown, the role of faculty representatives on these boards is becoming an increasingly controversial issue, and has the potential to be so in the context of our university as well.

Download Collectively Speaking
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2016 Executive Committee Election Results

As reported at the Spring General Meeting, the following individuals were elected or re-elected to the USFA Executive Committee for a two-year term effective July 1:

Susan Fowler-Kerry, Nursing

Carol Henry, Pharmacy and Nutrition

Richard Julien, Linguistics & Religious Studies

Allison Muri, English

Vicki Squires, Educational Administration

Larry Stewart, History

 

Executive Committee members with one year remaining in their term are:

Doug Chivers, Biology

Patricia Farnese, Law

Len Findlay, English

Linda McMullen, Psychology

John Moraros, School of Public Health

Eric Neufeld, Computer Science

 

Thanks to everyone who participated in this year’s election.

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Predatory Publishing and your CV: what should you do?

You may have been hearing a lot recently about “predatory” journals that print improperly vetted articles, resulting in a pollution of the peer-reviewed literature. The CBC National news carried a piece on this on April 18, 2016.

Venues like this have always existed, but their number and variety have increased in recent years due to the dramatic decrease in cost of producing both print and electronic journals. Fair or foul, academic venues are a publishers’ dream: the content and editing is done for free, and the results are sold to the universities of the world, sometimes after galley charges are sent to the author. And people’s careers depend upon it.

Cases have been brought to our attention where scholars have submitted articles to such venues in good faith, then have been penalized by the collegial review processes, and given only the cryptic advice to “publish more papers in high-impact venues.” Institutions are reluctant to outright ban certain venues, because it is near impossible to tell whether a brand new venue is predatory or a new open-access journal, and the charge opens the institution up to charges of defamation.

An exception is Beall’s list, a list of alleged predatory publishers and venues maintained by Jeffrey Beall, described in the Wikipedia as a critic of the open access publishing model – now mandated by Tri-Agency funders. Yet the editorial board of some of the journals printed by a publisher panned by Beall contained faculty from several U-15 Universities, including UBC, McGill, Calgary, Toronto, Montreal, McMaster, Western, Manitoba, Ottawa and Alberta, as well as Laval, Carleton, Ryerson, Waterloo, York, and the National Research Council of Canada.

What should you do?

  • first, be informed: see the information that our colleagues in the library have put together about predatory publishers and what you need to know when choosing a publisher or journal
  • second, address the issue in advance and annotate your CV: contextualize the journal if it appears on the list, and explain why it is an appropriate venue to publish your work

Faculty are under tremendous pressure to perform, and there is the potential for unfavourable results. The onus is on you to help others understand what you have published, where you have published it, and that your output is credible and solid peer-reviewed work.

 

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Spring General Meeting, Friday, April 22, 2016

The USFA Constitution provides for two general membership meetings per year.  The Spring General meeting is scheduled for Friday, April 22nd, 2016 at 2:30 p.m. in Arts 241, Neatby-Timlin Theatre.

If you would like a paper copy of the meeting package, please e-mail tammy.stieb@usask.ca with your campus address and she will send you a copy.  A limited amount of paper copies of the package will be available at the meeting as well.

Mark your calendar and plan to attend!

 

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It’s never too soon to think about tenure or promotion

Today is the best day to start thinking about your promotion/tenure case. You have a lot of resources to help you with your case.

If you are planning to go forward for renewal, tenure or promotion this fall, consider joining USFA representatives at the University Club in the Club Room from 11:30 to 1:30 April 26 or 29 to talk about the process. Lunch will be provided, so please reply to this email if you are interested in attending or let us know by phone (306-966-5609).

By May 31, your Department Head or Dean should have met with you to discuss your progress with respect to the approved standards, with which you should be familiar.

You don’t give students much credit for answering a question other than the one you asked them to answer. Similarly, your colleagues will not give you much credit for activity other than that needed to meet your standards. Nor can they give you credit for your achievements if your file does not provide sufficient and appropriate data to thoroughly document your case.

Be sure you understand the meaning of all terms. If your standards are vague, you should ask how they have been interpreted in the past. Your Dean, Department Head, or faculty mentor should be able to provide you with further advice.

It is the responsibility of your Department Head or Dean to gather information and documentation for your case file. It is your responsibility to know what has been gathered and to add information to demonstrate you have met or exceeded the standards (see the university’s “Guidelines for preparation of case files for renewal of probation, tenure and promotion”).

For tenure, and promotion to full professor, your department or college committees will select several independent external reviewers. Your standards will describe the selection process, and you generally will have an opportunity for input.

Notify your Department Head or Dean as soon as possible that you intend to go forward for tenure or promotion, but no later than June 15.

By June 30, you should have been advised to provide anything you want included in your case file and it needs to be in by August 1.

If you have questions about the tenure or promotion procedure, feel free to include them in a reply to this email, and someone will get in touch with you.

 

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The Politics of Austerity and Academic Freedom: An Inevitable Collision?

“The Politics of Austerity and Academic Freedom: An Inevitable Collision?”
April 7, 4:00 to 5:45 p.m.
Neatby-Timlin Theatre (241 Arts)

Keynote: Dr. Root Gorelick, Carleton University
“Academic Freedom in University Governance: Blogging and Gagging”

Last November, just months after the University of Saskatchewan agreed to a one-time holdback of $20 million to help the provincial government balance its budget, the province cut another $9.8 million from its annual grant. The University of Regina had its 1% operating grant increase halved. Reduced operating grants and funding claw backs stand to weaken Saskatchewan’s PSE institutions and place foundational principles of advanced education, such as academic freedom, on a collision course with a financial bottom line.

With a re-elected Saskatchewan Party government whose platform included financial commitments that will only come to pass when the province is economically stable or the province’s finances strengthen, the likelihood of funds clawed back last fall being returned this spring is slim. More likely, PSE institutions in Saskatchewan will be implementing an austerity agenda: reducing spending and seeking alternative revenue sources.

“With no idea yet about what funding the U of S will receive from the provincial government for 2016-17, ramifications for the university’s operations are unknown,” says USFA Chair Larry Stewart. “What we do know is advanced education is the means through which we enable the people of Saskatchewan to be skilled participants in strengthening the economy of our province. Now is not the time to be cutting resources to universities, or to be making choices that threaten to impinge on academic freedom.” More and more, universities model themselves on corporations: they seek to maximize profitability, productivity, and marketability. As a result, many of the ideals of academic freedom – the right to teach, learn, study and publish free of threat of reprisal and discrimination, and the right to criticize the university and to participate in its governance – have been eroded, and in some circumstances extinguished, on campuses across Canada.

Last December Biology professor Root Gorelick, a faculty representative on Carleton University’s board of governors, was ordered to sign a confidentiality agreement that forbids public commentary on board business. He refused. Gorelick said the order “flies in the face of academic freedom and is the antitheses of collegial and democratic governance (and) is meant to stifle dissent, openness, accountability and transparency, all of which should be fundamental at any public university. I refuse to allow such corporatization of Carleton to proceed unimpeded.”

“The Buckingham incident was a result of austerity measures in Transform US butting heads with a corporate mentality that required secrecy of senior administrators at the expense of collegial sharing and open dialogue,” says Stewart. “This is an important issue for us and there couldn’t be a better moment to explore it.”

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Thinking about renewal of probation, tenure or promotion?

If you are planning to go forward for renewal, tenure or promotion this fall, please join USFA representatives for lunch at the University Club in the Club Room from 11:30 to 1:30 April 26 or 29 to talk about the process. It’s on us!

Soon, if not already, these annual processes will get underway. By the end of May, Department Heads, or Deans in non-departmentalized colleges, should have met with you to discuss your progress towards renewal, tenure, and promotion. By mid-June you should have indicated if you are going forward.

You must seek renewal of probation in the third year of your initial probationary appointment and you can elect to go for tenure, or promotion, in any year if you believe you have met the standards. You must go for tenure in the final year of your probationary period (5th for Associate and 6th for Assistant).

Please reply to this email or contact Tammy Stieb at 306-966-5609 or tammy.stieb@usask.ca if you are interested in attending on the 26th or 29th.

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2016 USFA Award Recipients

With pleasure, we announce the 2016 recipients of the Peter T. Millard Award, the USFA Academic Freedom Award and the Peter C. Dooley Legacy Award.

The 2016 Peter Millard Award goes to Chris Adams from the Library.

Chris has patiently and painstakingly served USFA members for a number of years. As an Executive Committee member and a Grievance Officer for the USFA, as well as a member of the CAUT Librarians and Archivists Committee, he has worked steadfastly and without flamboyance in support of the USFA, USFA members and his fellow librarians.

The 2016 Academic Freedom Award goes to Penni Stewart, Associate Professor of Sociology, York University.

Penni has made numerous and important contributions to academic freedom in Canada. A gifted, unselfish and courageous colleague, she has patiently and bravely unpacked difficult situations that bring the desire for equity into conflict with principles and practices of academic freedom, including exposure of and resistance to the misuse of respectful workplace policies to silence criticism of University and college administrations. Penni has made national contributions to academic freedom as President and member of the CAUT Executive protecting the rights of unfairly endangered colleagues and educating university presidents and provosts in the basics of academic freedom. She has exercised prudent and informed counsel, keeping interests of individual faculty and their associations’ paramount and developed defences of core academic rights that send a powerful message across Canada and across borders.

The 2016 Peter C. Dooley Legacy Award goes to Howard Woodhouse and Jay Kalra, both from the University of Saskatchewan. Their examples as champions of collegial governance and collegial decision-making at the U of S, while different, are equally important.

Howard is committed to the University as a place of learning where major decisions are made by faculty free from the influence of external forces. Through various peer-reviewed and popular publications, he has taken an active role in the mobilization of knowledge about university governance and he has used it in conjunction with members of the university community to draw attention to the problematic aspects of the TransformUS initiative where collegial governance was undermined.

Jay has had a leadership role in collegial governance as Chair of University Council while the collegium navigated very rough waters seeking to restore our institution to internal health, invigorating independence and public esteem. His unequivocal commitment to collegial rights and responsibilities as the ground on which stability could be achieved and a new institutional course set, along with his unapologetic and recurrent reminders at Council meetings of the values and process that govern Council’s activities and that academic decisions belong in academic hands, carried the university community during the acutely stressful time surrounding TransformUS, the ensuing leadership crisis and an interim presidency.

These awards will be presented at a celebration dinner on Thursday, April 7.

In addition to the celebration dinner on April 7, the USFA is hosting an academic freedom event from 4:00 to 5:45 in the Neatby-Timlin Theater (241 Arts). Event details can be found on the USFA website. Please plan to attend.

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USFA 2016 Academic Freedom Event April 7

“The Politics of Austerity and Academic Freedom: An Inevitable Collision?”
April 7, 4:00 to 5:45 p.m.
Neatby-Timlin Theatre (241 Arts)

More and more, universities model themselves on corporations: they seek to maximize profitability, productivity, and marketability. As a result, many of the ideals of academic freedom have been eroded, and in some circumstances extinguished, on campuses across Canada.

The austerity agenda means politicians and administrators alike are embracing the private sector’s financial participation in university research and governance—and that has serious repercussions for academic freedom.

 Keynote: Dr. Root Gorelick, Carleton University
“Academic Freedom in University Governance: Blogging and Gagging”

Last December Biology professor Gorelick, a faculty representative on Carleton University’s board of governors, was ordered to sign a confidentiality agreement that forbids public commentary on board business. He refused. Gorelick said the order “flies in the face of academic freedom and is the antitheses of collegial and democratic governance (and) is meant to stifle dissent, openness, accountability and transparency, all of which should be fundamental at any public university. I refuse to allow such corporatization of Carleton to proceed unimpeded.”

 Everyone welcome.