Affiliated Faculty of Emerson College

For Members

AFEC-AAUP has negotiated four contracts on behalf of affiliated faculty at Emerson College.

Contract update: Sept 2019

AFEC-AAUP and Emerson reached agreement and signed a new, 5-year contract. Its terms are in effect with the Fall 2019 academic semester. The full contract (39 pages) is available as a PDF: 2019-2024 AFEC-AAUP contract. We will be adding a chart for the Steps to this document later.

Our new contract covers academic freedom, reappointment policies, salary and benefits including medical and dental plans, performance evaluation, grievance procedures, and faculty responsibilities. It also includes:

  • A professional development fund of $15,000 annually, for adjunct faculty to apply for up to $1,500 reimbursement for travel costs and fees for conferences, workshops, and festivals.
  • Tuition remission for eligible faculty for graduate classes and online classes.
  • A transit subsidy benefit.
  • A 403(b) retirement plan, starting in the Fall 2020 semester.

Members should have received an email from Union president Barry Marshall August 8 with the memorandum of agreement and notes on the changes to the previous agreement. Please contact Barry directly for this document if you didn’t receive it: Barry_Marshall@emerson.edu.

Union elections

Union elections results are in and as of September we have a new Secretary/Treasurer! Welcome and congratulations to Maggie Ferguson. Maggie previously served as affiliated faculty liaison to WLP department meetings. And thank you to Brian McNeil, who was re-elected as Vice President. Brian is a founding member of our union and has been an active member since day one. We’re grateful for his service.

David Akiba: 1940-2019

AFEC-AAUP wishes to observe the passing of David Akiba, a good friend who died August 24, 2019. David was an Emerson faculty member in the Visual & Media Arts department for 25 years, from 1993-2018. He was the second president of AFEC-AAUP and helped negotiate our first union contract, a process that took a grueling 30 months from 2001 to 2004.

David was proud of his work codifying the rights and institutional respect for the large class of affiliated faculty members at a time when neither of these things were easy and both were overdue. His passion was photography and his work was extraordinary. It can be seen at https://davidakiba.weebly.com.

AAUP-AFEC extends its condolences to Jane Akiba, a long-time faculty member at Emerson, also in the Visual & Media Arts department, and to David’s entire family.

Transit reimbursement

Emerson launched a transit reimbursement program for adjuncts in Spring 2019. Affiliated faculty who were members of AFEC-AAUP and teaching at least one 3 or 4 credit class were eligible for reimbursement up to $42.25 per month for their public transit payments. Updates about the program for Fall 2019 will be sent by email from Emerson’s department of human resources or from Union president Barry Marshall.

By-laws

Our Union by-laws are posted on the About page. These detail the basic procedural rules of the organization, including the roles of Union officers and the negotiation committee.

Grievance procedure

The Union contract brings to the adjunct teachers of Emerson a formal process for grieving unfair practices. The Union’s hope is that this will be a last step solution for making sure people are treated fairly.

If you feel you are being treated unfairly, the first step the Union recommends is for you to try to resolve the matter by working with your department chair or other relevant school officers. You must try to rectify the situation yourself before you turn to the Union. Many issues can be solved more quickly and efficiently if the Union never gets involved.

If you have tried to solve the problem yourself and feel like you are still being treated unfairly, do these three things:

  1. Consult the Union contract. Is there a specific provision of the contract that the school is in violation of? The Union cannot bring a grievance on your behalf unless there is a contract violation.
  2. Make several sets of photocopies of all relevant information, such as contracts, Emails, letters, evaluations, etc. Write out a clear, detailed description of the history of the problem, the part of the contract you believe the College is in violation of, and what solution you are seeking.
  3. Contact Union Grievance Officer Brian McNeil (also the vice president of the Union) at brian_mcneil@emerson.edu. Include your telephone number. Brian will take your request to the Union officers, and as a team they will make a decision about the validity of your claim and whether the Union will put its resources toward filing a grievance on your behalf.