CFA Is No Match for PSA: Professional Society vs Union Representation

Faculty of the California State University (CSU) system are once again fighting for a new employment contract. Not surprisingly, negotiations have not gone as hoped and so they are now moving to third-party mediation. Their union representative California Faculty Association (CFA) seeks a 12% general salary increase, better defined workloads, improved paid leave, and improved campus safety. From the point of view of faculty within the higher education institutional (HEI) model of university and college employment, the CFA has been doing much to improve compensation and working conditions.

This post goes through a 3-minute promotional video capturing and commenting on the various claims in support of CFA efforts, while providing links to PSA blog posts that elaborate the commentary. The principal source of testimonials is CSU employees classified as lecturers, who earn an income of between $62,016 and $83,352 on 12-month contracts and constitute at least 45% of the faculty staff, though they have very little say in the shared governance of the CSU system, which has no where near the number of faculty necessary to meet the general demand for HE.

https://www.calfac.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Faculty-Salary-Schedule_Eff.-Jul-2022.pdf & https://www.calfac.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/2-21-23-ASCSU.pdf

Though union representation is needed within the HEI model for higher education (HE), because this is not the only, nor the original, nor the preferred model, the video content rings tragically hallow to someone whose point of view is from within the Professional Society of Academics (PSA) model. PSA makes labor union representation moot. It makes HEI employers moot. It offers far more than any union could ever hope to secure for academics or the wider range of HE stakeholders. 

(00:00-00:16) – The President of CFA identifies some of the HE work performed by lecturers that is comparable to other classes of faculty. As argued on this blog, PSA accommodates all academic work related to teaching, research and community service, while it excludes the unnecessary work related to institutional maintenance, since PSA does not need these expensive, divisive middlemen.(2017)

(00:28-00:33) - The President of CFA goes on to says that it is only through strength in unity that the faculty have any power. Though this is a true statement, it is limited to those faculty employed by the CSU and not academics outside the institution who are knocking on the human resources door. As such, the trouble is that labour unionization does not provide the scope of strength, unity or power demanded by the social good of HE and the academics who are qualified to provide this good. With greater subtlety, the call for unity by union organizations is a consequence of disunity across the stakeholders in the HEI model. This disunity has produced an us-versus-them climate across and within interest groups such as administration, faculty, support staff, students, politicians, and the public. As a consequence, this President only sees a principal unity that is narrowed to (some, most?) faculty, and a few points of connect with other stakeholders, who might at any time disconnect in pursuit of their own incompatible interests.

To illustrate this point, notice how if the CSU faculty is on strike and other qualified academics who seek careers in HE were to cross the picket line, this comparable academic labour would not be seen as fellows, but rather as scabs to be accosted with verbal or physical violence. In this way, CFA is part and parcel of an HEI model that is factional and predator by nature, and by historical design. PSA offers a different formulation of strength in unity that does not embody such systemic disunity and places far more power over the stewardship of HE in the unified hands of all academics as licensed members of an inclusive professional society, not a parochial union organization.(2012)(2014)(2022)(2023)

(00:35-01:10) The first lecturer to provide testimony says the CFA has managed to negotiate with the CSU employer for: 1) 1 to 3-year contracts; 2) access to pension and benefits; 3) the same salary range as tenured faculty; and 4) protection of academic freedom. In closing, she tells new faculty not to be “afraid to sign that membership form, because the union will always have your back and be there to fight for you in everything that you do.”

Though this might sound impressive within the constraints of the HEI model, these working condition achievements pale in comparison to those promised by the PSA model. First, employment contracts are non-existent. Under PSA, service provision takes the principal form of independent academic practice – as one finds with other professions such as psychiatry, accountancy, medicine, law, dentistry, etc. This is entrepreneurial, self-employment, not union-represented, contract-bound, interest-conflicted institutional employment.(2012)(2014)(2022) Second, existing professions have secured for themselves a very attractive range of pension and benefit options, among other items such a tax breaks and business incentives. But even if this were not so, the dramatic increase in academic practitioner income under PSA leaves plenty of room to personally secure pension and benefits coverage, while something like maternity leave or vacation is purely a matter of professional prerogative, not “fought for” clauses in a contract with a one or two-year shelf life. As to the third point on salary, as intimated, the PSA model can at least double, if not triple, the income of lectures (in CSU); while it reduces the total cost of HE provision by at least 50%.(2012)(2013)(2018)(2021)(2022a, 2022b) No union on the planet can hope to do that, while these points of union praise from the CFA member are only likely to increase the overall cost of HE provision, in a model that succumbs to the spiral of rising costs and reduced faculty positions, increased class sizes, etc. The final tribute claims that unions fight to protect academic freedom, presumably from threats posed by HEI employers who need to kowtow to political flavors for favors and protect their brand in an increasingly competitive industry. PSA eliminates institutional interests that can flow counter to academic freedom. Further, by dramatically reducing the cost of HE provision, it reduces the influence that politicians can flex over academia.(2023) If the American Association of University Professors was the sort of legislated professional body that PSA prescribes – like that of the State Bar of California is for lawyers – then the AAUP’s commendable description and defense of academic freedom could be the only one of relevance in the academe, under the protection and direction of a professional society of academics.(2021)(2023a, 2023b) Finally, unlike the current antagonist employer-employee model, where this lecturer feels the need to close by cheerleading against faculty fear of joining a union, PSA requires all those who wish to practice HE to be licensed by the professional society of which they are a member, to follow its code of ethics and conduct, to subject themselves to the disciplinary actions of their peers, among other societal matters. To talk of fear under this professional framework is to describe an odd fear of one’s self, not others such as institutional employers.(2013)

(01:12-01:29) The second advocate for CFA highlights how academia can be “isolating and you have to figure out everything on your own;” but when she joined the union, she felt like for the first time she was on a team, part of a family. Certainly, it is important for people to feel connected to their work and co-workers – especially when the circumstances involve abusive employers that exploit their employees. By now, it should be clear that PSA divides through by HEI employers. That said, connection to toil and team remains important under PSA. For instance, if academics wish to coalesce and form partnerships in the provision of their expert HE services, then they are free to do so. Under PSA such partnerships must be equal, with a one-person-one-vote constitution. At the professional society level, PSA operates like its analogues offering guidance in practice operations, professional development, conferences, mentorships, insurance options, and the like. In fact, not much need change when it comes to face-to-face connections with colleagues of the sort found on HEI campuses, since these facilities are public assets that can be converted to the PSA model.(2014)(2022)

(01:30-01:43) The third CFA groupie declares that the organization has done a lot so that lecturers “can serve the population of California, the students of California.” While this might be true, it is not enough, or rather PSA can do better. Every year 10s of thousands of qualified Californian students are unable to access the HE system of their state, because there is not enough faculty and furniture to service them. This is true as public funding is routinely cut, while HEIs reach out to lucrative international student markets to fill their classrooms and coffers. Further, though it is reasonable for the faculty that manage to access the limited and limiting employment capacity of the HEI model to seek better working conditions, doing so places even greater strain on the crippled budgets of HEIs and so the head of the snake comes to eat its tail.(2013)(2014)(2016)(2022)(2023)

PSA opens the provision of HE up to all qualified academics who want to earn a respectable living in academia. At the moment, the number of lawyers in California exceeds the demand for legal services. This is a problem we should be so lucky to have in HE. PSA allows the academic labour force to expand and contract with a responsiveness to demand that can’t be matched in the HEI model, unencumbered as it is by institutional inefficiency, service siloing and market protectionism. The model also allows academics far greater freedom of mobility than does employment anchored to HEIs. This means academics have expansive latitude to choose where they want to work and what sort of academic work they want to do. By allowing academics to enjoy the same sort of labour liberties as the existing professions – who were principally educated and credentialed by academics – the benefits of HE can be more widely and wisely distributed throughout communities.(2022a, 2022b, 2022c, 2022d)

NOTE: This video references grade schools, but is applicable to the PSA model.

(01:44-02:06) The fourth apologist repeats how CFA has fought and won battles for excellent lecturer benefits that would not have been possible without the union. She declares, “People need to join the union. Your future depends on it. The future of the CSU. The future of education in California.” Alternatively, academics could pool their solidarity and skills around the aim of transforming HE with PSA, opening up a truly promising future for all. As just one example, consider this looming future: Technology has made it possible for HEIs to significantly reduce the amount of academic labour needed to provide HE service within their shrinking and strained budgets. With the approach of this inevitable future, do faculty employees want their HEI employers to have any say or final say in what tech to introduce and how to use it in the academe, or do academics want to possess this decision-making power for themselves? This is no idle question. If we leave the HEI model in place and fail to wrest this power from institutional hands, then union representation will be of no use when the Board of Governors says “we” must introduce such labour-saving tech, or “we” must convert to an online model with a handful of star teachers and an army of teaching assistants or advanced artificial intelligence. The BOG will correctly insist this is the only way to preserve the institution – but it will incorrectly assume that institutions are HE and individuals are not.(2013)(2018)

The CFA is impotent to stop such a future, because it does not control decision-making, because its faculty union members must share governance with their institutional employers. By contrast, PSA is potent, because a profession of academics under the protection and direction of their legally established professional society is empowered to make such decisions for itself, bound by its civic trust and within the far more favorable, flexible financial climate of PSA. The reality is that organizations like CFA seek to secure for their dues-paying members as much decision-making power as possible over their working conditions, to protect against the capricious or calculated abuses of institutional employers. The curiosity is that from the point of view of CFA or more relevantly their academic (faculty) members, a logical progression of what the HEI model calls shared governance is the professional service model, where institutional employers are no longer relevant to the equation and individual academics are self-employed and self-directed professionals charged with the stewardship of HE.(2023)

(02:07-02:25) The fifth witness claims that the CFA teaches him how to advocate for himself and his students, and that the CFA “is looking out for people that look like me.” In the first instance, not many people would claim that the existing professions don’t know how to advocate for themselves or the public they are charged with serving. Many people would claim that existing professions could offer master classes in self-advocacy, though perhaps to the detriment of their public trust. Historically, the existing professions also have not been open to people that “look like him” – that is, to people of color or females. Though this is undeniable, it is fallacious reasoning to think that necessarily the same would be true of a newly formed Professional Society of Academics. Learning from the errors and misdeeds of the existing professions, in this time of raised social consciousness and with an academically and socially active heterogenous academe, there is good reason to be hopeful for a honorably constructed and conducted PSA.(2022)

The lecturer mentions how the CFA has helped him advocate better for his students. Though to some degree faculty labour unions and student unions do share goals and coordinate efforts to change aspects of the HEI model, there is no binding unity here, there is no guarantee that the interests of the faculty and the students always align. For instance, if there was a choice to be made between smaller class sizes and better compensation and benefits, then if push comes to shove their respective interests would diverge – small class sizes are better for student outcomes, but larger class sizes mean fewer faculty are needed and so more institutional money is available for their payroll. This is not likely to happen in PSA thanks to two features of the model: anonymous crowd-sourced evaluation of students and published practice performance records.(2013a, 2013b, 2014, 2016, 2023)

The HEI model has tenure and a tradition of instructors evaluating their own students. The first makes it virtually impossible to remove or improve bad instructors, supposing they are in the classroom at all. As a consequence, students must suffer classes with such underperforming instructors and the negative impact this has on their learning success. But in the end, it doesn’t much matter because whether the instructor is tenured or not, whether the instructor is competent or not, in the HEI model students are evaluated by the service provider and so poor instructor or student performance can be adjusted through the methods of evaluation and grading (e.g., scaling marks, easy assignments, extra-credit assignments, or other forms of measurement massaging). On top of all this, recall that in the CSU system 45% of faculty have precarious employment, where (repeatedly) failing a large number of students is not likely to result in contract renewal. Under such circumstances, the conflicting interests that can lead to corruption of HE are numerous and serious.(2021)

In PSA, measuring the success of the student is determined by anonymous crowd-source evaluation. This does not preclude professional academics from conducting formative evaluation or being among the crowd of academic peers that does the summative evaluation. That is, all materials that are to be used in the calculation of final grades must be graded by the crowd, who also assign a grade to the evaluation material itself as a measure of it appropriateness and level of difficulty. Secondly, student success (or failure) is tied to the professional academic’s public record of practice performance. This is a record that reveals with student anonymity data such as pass-fail ratios, final grades, student advancement to graduate schools, and whatever else might prove useful to the public when selecting a practitioner for their academic services. This is a system that truly ties student success to academic (faculty) success and so inspires advocacy that, if it exists at all in the HEI model is only there by accident.(2013a, 2014)

Finally, the usual difficulties and sensitivities associated with institutional hiring for limited positions within the HE industry is eliminated, because the Professional Society of Academics does not hire academics, it licenses them to offer their services in independent practice. Risks associated with licensing the wrong person are far less than those associated with hiring the wrong person – on whatever meaning you might like to assign the term “wrong.” Further, by eliminating HEIs, PSA removes the need for distinctions like Historically Black Colleges, while it liberates individuals or groups to exercise professional prerogative and pursue coordinated studies in any non-traditional filed of study that they deem appropriate to their practice, absent the constraints of having to respond to the funding pressures of institutional employers or backlash from institutional co-workers who oppose spending scare HEI model resources on such fields of study. In the end, PSA doesn’t care what color, sex or gender you are, nor what filed of study you would like to specialize in or introduce to the academe, and so the hiring and firing challenges associated with inclusiveness and equity that plague the HEI model are avoided, if not entirely, then to a very large extent. As such, unlike the adversarial HEI model that requires organizations like the CFA to protect against institutional discrimination, PSA is there to offer fellowship and facilitation for “people that look like him.”

(02:26-02:49) The sixth union convert notes that she has been in her department for twenty years as a part-timer, but she doesn’t feel like a part-timer because she has rights secured by CFA. It is revealing that if we compare this to the case of (say) a lawyer or a doctor the subscript of diminished inclusion, respect, value, or legitimacy would not occur. Someone can be a lawyer or a doctor (even a member of the relevant professional society) and not practice law or medicine. Someone can practice what we might call “part-time” or what is better described as their own hours or workload in these professions and no one would consider them less of a lawyer or doctor. Professional prerogative protects these professions from diminished standing, as perceived from within or without the profession. Not so in the HEI model, where “part-time” is a label that licenses derision and dismissal, as adversaries vie for authority. Further, the “rights” secured for this part-time faculty employee are not fought for in the professions, because they constitute the professions; they are conferred by us on us without the need for negotiation with an outside employer.(2018)(2022)

In closing out this commentary, it is telling to note the insecurity unity offered by unions, as the promotional video begins and ends with lecturers encouraging non-members not to be afraid to join CFA – while it is impossible to find a translate for this among the professions.

The commentary provided on this CFA video applies to HE systems in every state, unionized or not. It applies to other countries such as Canada, the United Kingdom, and Australia. No region that uses the HEI model is immune to its serious failings, while all are welcome to the benefits of the PSA model. Change the model, change everything. As always, I invite comment and collaboration.