Negotiating a new academy: “ Making knowledge work ”

1. Negotiating a new academy:“Making knowledge work” Gary Rhoades Professor & Director, Center for the Study of Higher Education, University of Arizona Director, Center for the Future of Higher Education Campaign for the Future of Higher Education

2. Write to congratulate our colleagues Mark Abbott - President – mabbottstl@gmail.com Brian Elsesser – Leadership Team – elsesser@sbcglobal.net Greg Carr- Leadership Team – gcarr26@earthlink.net Sudarsan Kant-Leadership Team -snkant@gmail.com Reynaldo Anderson-Leadership Team   reysand@swbell.net As you know, negotiating a first contract is a long process, and these colleagues could use our support

3. Management & labor, in higher education The privatized rhetoric: Individual(ized) information delivery The negotiated reality: Collective professional domain …or less …organizing More… Managed/… Professionals In this negotiation, to stand on the sidelines is to side with management

4. Where we’ve been headed, for decades, “academic capitalism & the new economy” New circuits of knowledge production Privatization of purpose Extracting private profit from public entities Increased managerial capacity Heightened social, professional, & institutional stratification Who will speak for the public good? investing in core missions, serving growth demographics

5. Privatizing hed’s purposes: Ac capitalism’s new circuitry Equal opportunity for all persons, to the maximum of their individual abilities and without regard to economic status, race, creed, color, sex, national origin, or ancestry is a major goal of American democracy. Only an informed,thoughtful,tol- erant people can develop and maintain a free society Truman Commission, 1947 Obama administration (2012) announces 500 million in community college grants to expand job training through local employer partnerships. New monies for cc’s in 2009 shifted to Dept of Labor, & restricted to workforce development (ec stimulus) Short-cycle certificates: Pathways to …? CBL MOOCs

6. Heightened stratification & inequity • Rising costs, closing doors of access, tracking of low income students to for-profits/for-subsidy hed, & high levels of debt AND DEFAULT. • No relative gains in access to most elite hed. • Far less spending per student in access colleges & univs. • Increased cost, reduced investment in faculty, evident in > increases in adjunct & contingent fac, esp in access hed. • “Those students don’t need college.” • Social stratification maps onto institutional & professional stratification, and the inequities are growing.

7. http://futureofhighered.org/ • 7 principles for affordable, quality hed for all http://futureofhighered.org/principles/ • 59 supporting organizations • Think tank reports & working papers: http://futureofhighered.org/research-center/http://futureofhighered.org/workingpapers/ • A grass roots faculty/staff voice On the Issues http://futureofhighered.org/on-the-issues/ • Organizing days of action: mobilizing locally, coordinating nationally for a new direction.

8. Campaign for the Future of Higher Education • We’re a campaign, not a competing organization--we have no fees: supporters include NEA, AAUP, AFT, SEIU, USSA, independents, fac/staff assocs & more). • We are FOR, not just against stuff: Our reports & papers feature our principles & propose real and realistic policy choices; & our commentaries offer reality checks & realistic paths. • We provide a faculty and staff voice on issues too long dominated by managers, CEOs & politicians.

9. Making knowledge (& technology) work for the public interest • CFHE papers (3) on MOOCs, & 10/9/13 national press call (getting interest inquiries from US News, & other natl press, as well as trade & local. • Forthcoming think tank report on negotiating tech & advice for practical action regarding MOOCs. • NEA Higher Education Almanac chapters on good technology language. • Book chapter I am working on regarding contract language and mobilizing in relation to MOOCs, hybrids, and web-enhanced face 2 face classroom modalities.

10. Negotiating a high tech academy • Too few provisions on technology. • Too many provisions focused only on pay and/or intellectual property. • Too much of a focus only on individuals, not on “collective” considerations (e.g., workforce, bargaining unit work, governance). • Too few speak to a progressive new unionism, & remain defensive/protective in posture. • Too few speak to the public interest. • Too few go beyond distance ed to address hybrids, & too few are positioning us well for new “innovations.”

11. Bread & Roses, & health care too:Contingent faculty working conditions • Kudos to you in IEA for fighting for adjunct faculty rights in relation to ACA (e.g., Oakton’s AFA & “adjunct affiliate” status for health care, which I realize is likely controversial, but it’s stopping the institution from stiffing all adjunct faculty). • Kudos for “Invisible No Longer” & AFA survey. • Along those lines, ACA survey of NFM (New Faculty Majority) with CFHE. Out next week, reported out on faculty in CEW, & announce a parallel survey for staff. • NEA Higher Education Almanac this year. • CFHE/NFMF “Who is professor staff” report.

12. Making the invisible visible, virtually:Linking learning to working conditions Report #2 (back to school employment practices): Who is professor “staff”… and how does this person teach SO MANY classes? “Just in time” is not…for students/faculty/quality

13. A future contingent on common cause: We rise or fall together • In academe, what managers are doing to adjunct faculty, they would like to do to all faculty: We are all contingent. • It’s not just us. What managers are doing to adjunct faculty is what is being done to employees in & outside academe: We are all employees. • It’s who and why we teach. What capital wants is compliant, surpluse, and undereducated, labor not critically thinking masses. • Connecting employment rights to civil rights to voting rights: We rise or fall together.

14. Thank you…