[Fdu] Open Letter to Our Colleagues Regarding the Strike at the University of Toronto

[Cynthia Wright]

 Dear All, 

We write to invite you as faculty, emeritus faculty and librarians to sign this Open Letter that we plan to publish in The Star.  We hope to gather as many signatures as possible.
  
  Over the last couple of days, a smaller group of us have been working to transform a  letter that had circulated for signatures previously into a public statement.  We have also been working on the logistics of circulation, signatories and fundraising. The revised text appears below. In the interests of moving quickly and minimizing email back and forth we ask you to do the following:

   

  1. READ the statement below. Alert us if you find any glaring problems, typos or inaccuracies.

   

  2. SIGN the statement by replying to this email ASAP, including your department, if your status is Emeritus, and any honours you may want to include (CRCs, Royal Society, etc). It is important to avoid inundating everyone's e-mail with messages, SO PLEASE DO NOT HIT REPLY ALL, just reply to: openletterutfaculty at gmail.com

   

  3. CONTRIBUTE if you are able. The Star is giving us a heavily discounted rate for the ad, but the smallest possible size we can use that will fit the letter and still have impact is a 1/3 page advertisement with a price tag of $7,116. Please give what you can. If everyone on the list were to give $100 we would be getting close, but some may not give, so please reach deep. If there is any surplus we would of course discuss where to direct it (e.g., donation to CUPE, etc). You can contribute by sending an interac e-payment to this email address: openletterutfaculty at gmail.com. 

  Please make the password 'Robarts' (capital R) and the security question 'library that looks like a turkey'

   

  4. RECRUIT! We need more signatories (and $!). Please please if everyone could take it upon themselves to try and get at least a handful of your colleagues involved, that would be very helpful.

   

  5. MOVE QUICKLY. All of this needs to be done fast. We are asking for all signatures and donations by Sunday March 15th at 11pm EST. 

   

  Many thanks,

   

  Alissa Trotz, Deborah Cowen, Michelle Murphy, Susan Ruddick, Sarah Wakefield, Judith Taylor




  OPEN LETTER FROM FACULTY, EMERITI AND LIBRARIANS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO

   

   

  We are now [FILL BLANK] days into the strike by members of CUPE 3902 Unit 1 at the University of Toronto. Those on strike are mostly graduate students who teach at the University to support themselves and their families as they also study and research full time.

   

  It is patently clear to us that it is not business as usual at the University. We know that undergraduate students are worried about class assignments, cancelled classes, worried about examinations and graduating on time. Students and their striking teachers want to get back to learning.

   

  Graduate students are vital to our classrooms as teaching fellows, demonstrators, tutors, markers, instructors, laboratory assistants, exam invigilators and part-time lecturers, small group leaders for large courses.  The University simply cannot fulfill its educational mission without the work that they do.

   

  The members of Unit 1 of CUPE 3902 are also the researchers of the future and our collaborators today.   The University of Toronto’s mission is to be an internationally significant research university devoted to excellence.  Supporting our graduate students, who do the innovative research of tomorrow, is vital to this vision.

   

  However, the members of CUPE 3902 Unit 1 cannot carry out their work effectively unless they have adequate financial resources. Graduate students deserve employment compensation and an overall base funding package that reflect more adequately what it actually costs to live in Toronto.  To have any less severely impedes the development of their capacities as current educators and future scholars, with implications for higher education and society.

   

  Doing everything we can to support graduate students is in the University’s best interests. The University prides itself on its global ranking. Yet, our standard funding package is much lower than the ones offered by other top universities in the world. This puts us at a competitive disadvantage in recruiting top graduate students from Canada and abroad.

   

  The stresses on the University are not new to this strike.  Chronic provincial underfunding means that Ontario universities are teaching more students per full‐time faculty member with less money per student than all other Canadian provinces. We have dramatically increased our number of undergraduate students without adding more faculty.  This has resulted in a chronic situation of making up the difference with underpaid insecure positions.  These are truly challenging problems facing the future of higher education.  Administration, faculty, and students should be coming together to address them.

   

  For these reasons, we call on the University administration to commit to the bargaining table and negotiate a fairer funding package and better conditions for labour and study.

   
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