Special Magistrate Thomas W. Young, appointed by the Florida Public Employees Relations Commission, on May 29 released his recommendations in the contract impasse between Chipola College and the United Faculty of Florida (UFF), the union which represents the Chipola faculty.

Chipola College president Dr. Gene Prough said, “We are pleased that he Magistrate has substantially agreed with the college’s position with regard to the budget challenges being experienced and rejected the UFF’s bargaining demand for fewer faculty hours on campus and fewer courses taught by each faculty member.”

These recommendations will likely proceed to the Chipola College Board of Trustees for a final resolution at the June 16 board meeting. Prough, said, “We look forward to an efficient and effective resolution of all unresolved issues and a contract.”

The main issues covered in the magistrate’s 42-page report involved Faculty Working Conditions, and Compensation and Fringe benefits. The unresolved issues fall into three general areas: (1) UFF proposed a wage bonus of $1,000 per faculty member; (2) UFF proposed a reduction of faculty workloads from a Fall, Spring and possibly Summer (72 point) schedule to a Fall and Spring (60 point) schedule; and (3) UFF proposed a reduction of the contractually scheduled hours on campus from 35 hours to 25 hours per workweek.

The magistrate recommended that UFF bargaining unit members receive a one-time $1,000 bonus effective FY 2008-2009, with the understanding that this bonus does not change the base salaries of
bargaining unit members in terms of future salary negotiations.

The magistrate rejected UFF’s proposal to reduce faculty workload from 72 to 60 point workload over a 166 day academic year workload (Fall and Spring contract without a summer load of 12 points). Currently the faculty teaching load is two and one-half semesters, 72 points and 198 days.

The magistrate rejected UFF’s proposal to reduce the faculty work week from 35 to 25 hours.

In an issue commonly known as first-right-of refusal, the magistrate also recommended the college position on substantive change to prevent a faculty member from replacing “bumping” an adjunct instructor that has been employed to teach a class.

Previously, a faculty member could choose to replace an adjunct at any time prior to two weeks into the academic session. The practice the College is seeking to avoid is where a faculty member actually replaces an adjunct instructor that has been employed to teach a class and may have even met with the course and began the instruction – only to be bumped by a full time faculty member.

Such a practice results in the unfair treatment of the adjunct instructor, the possibility of disruption in the course delivery and generally discourages the recruitment of adjuncts. Faculty’s ability to “bump” a part time faculty member for any course offered as an overload could have a potentially adverse impact on adjuncts.

In a section entitled, “Interest and Welfare of the Public,” the magistrate wrote, "It is concluded that funding the UFF economic proposals in their entirety could conceivably result in the elimination of programs and the replacement of full time faculty with adjuncts, assuming there were adjuncts available.

These results are not consistent with the delivery of services currently maintained by the College. It is concluded that fully funding the UFF proposals would not be in the best interest of the employees, or the students and community they serve."