The TAUP Nminating Committee is proud to present the nominations for TAUP elections for 2019. Election ballots will be distributed on or about April 15 and voting will close at noon on April 30. Results will be announced at the TAUP General Membership Meeting at 4 PM in a location to be announced and by e-Bulletin.
All terms begin on May 1st, 2019.
Candidate Slate
Officers (2-year terms)
President
Steve Newman (associate professor, English, CLA)
As I near the end my first term as President, I am proud of what TAUP has accomplished the past two years through the efforts of so many members, including:
- winning a first contract for adjuncts that included a 15% raise to the minimum and other gains as well as an extension to the full-time contract matching the largest raise in the contract and no erosion of benefits;
- entering into a coalition with our neighbors in North Philadelphia that has thus far prevented a football stadium from moving forward;
- reversing a decline in membership percentage thanks to a new organizing model that includes a plan for a member-organizer for every 10 members;
- establishing the FAST Fund, which has helped many students stay in school
- defending academic freedom and shared governance, as in the controversy over Prof. Marc Lamont Hill.
It has been my honor to serve with so many dynamic, committed, and brilliant people, and I look forward to continue working with all of you to build on these gains as we enter into contract negotiations.
Vice President
Jennie Shanker (adjunct associate professor, Tyler School of Art)
Serving at TAUP as VP for two years has been an honor. The role has shifted my work from organizing to the development of initiatives, advocacy, and outreach, fostering new relationships with community, union and political allies including:
- Developing Unemployment Compensation workshops
- Coordinating training for members to become facilitators for student debt clinics
- Working with Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s office, forming a Listening Session to inform him of women’s issues in the workplace.
- Communicating, coordinating and strategizing with other Temple campus unions
- Meeting with community leaders to understand areas of mutual interest
- Representing TAUP at Labor/management committees addressing adjunct promotion, job security and office space/resources, at faculty meetings, in the press and at local/national conferences and panels
I’ve witnessed how TAUP is a vehicle for change that may otherwise seem unimaginable. I feel fortunate to be working at a union school, and am compelled to show gratitude through this work.
Treasurer
Norma Corrales-Martin (associate professor—teaching/instruction, Spanish and Portuguese, CLA)
Dear Colleagues,
I respectfully submit my name as candidate for the position of Treasurer of TAUP for the 2019-2021 cycle. I have served on the TAUP Executive Committee since 2013, and as Treasurer since January 2015. I came to the position with very little experience, but I love to learn, and I have learnt a great deal in these four years. Lately, I received training in QuickBooks to help me to better understand accounting notions. During my tenure, I have participated in three contract negotiations including the 15-month Adjunct negotiations from May 2016 to August 2017. Since January 2017, I have administered COPE, The Committee on Political Education, in charge of collecting and distributing your voluntary donations for use in local, state, and federal election activities. For training purposes, I participated in the 2017 COPE Institute from August 18-20, in Shippensburg, PA. In 2018, I also started administering the FAST Fund to help Temple University students stay in school. I have represented TAUP in Regional and National Conferences, like the AFT Political Bootcamp in Albuquerque, NM, from May 1-5, 2018, and the TAUP Organizing Training in August 2018. If past performance is a good predictor of future performance, you can trust I will be a loyal and dedicated officer. Thanks for your confidence.
Tenure Track Constituency Council (3 positions for a 3-year term)
Will Jordan (Urban Education, College of Education)
I am an associate professor of urban education in the College of Education. I am running for re-election to the Tenured/Tenure-track Constituency Council because I view the Council’s work as the best way to help Temple reach its full potential high-quality and equitable university. I have been a faculty member at Temple for 14 years and understand the challenges we face in balancing research, teaching, and service. TAUP plays an essential role in supporting and advocating for faculty and creating a working environment where we can succeed. I wish to do my part in contributing to this effort.
Jeff Solow ( Cello, Boyer College of Music)
When I joined the Temple University family in 1989, I immediately recognized that strong shared governance is essential for us to be a great place for our faculty to teach and our students to learn. Within our CBU, TAUP is the collective voice that legally speaks to the administration as equals, and I would be proud to continue strengthening that voice through the Tenure Track Constituency Council.
Damien Stankiewicz (Anthropology, College of Liberal Arts)
I was recently tenured, but began my time at Temple as instructional (NTT) faculty. I therefore have a keen sense of the complicated dynamics of a multi-tier faculty, and the need for dialogue and solidarity so that we can ALL feel comfortable and secure at Temple. Before Temple I was heavily involved in organizing graduate students at my graduate institution. I believe fair labor practices will only become more important to higher education and other professions in coming years.
NTT Constituency Council (3 positions for a 3-year term)
Max Avener (Math, CST)
I am a non-tenure track instructor in the math department. I have been working with TAUP since I became an adjunct instructor in 2014. I played an active role in the campaign to bring adjunct faculty into TAUP, and have worked hard to increase union engagement in the math department and across campus. Some of my proudest contributions to TAUP to date have
included speaking publically about the impacts of contingency on LGBTQ+ faculty and our students, using math to critique the enormous gap between what our students pay in tuition and what adjunct faculty are paid to teach, serving as an at-large representative to TAUP’s executive committee in the 2016-2017 academic year, and being a member of thenegotiating team during our first adjunct contract negotiations.
After leaving Temple for the 2016-2017 year to work at another college, I returned in fall of 2018 as an NTT. I joined the NTT constituency council in spring of 2019 to replace another member who left, and I hope to continue my work there for another full term. In my first semester on the constituency council I prioritized listening to other NTTs, both in my department and in the union, to get a better sense of the unique issues that impact us. Some of the NTT-specific needs I’m aware of and invested in are gaining transparency around contract renewal, merit, and promotions, and approaching parity with tenure-track faculty on pay for teaching work as well as benefits. I also think it is extremely important that we work in solidarity with adjunct faculty – first and foremost because our adjunct colleagues deserve so much more respect than they get from Temple’s administration, and secondly because we are
all at risk of losing our full-time status and becoming adjunct faculty in the future.
In my previous candidacy statement for the NTT constituency council I wrote about some of my hopes and goals for TAUP as a whole. One such hope was that TAUP would hold open bargaining sessions in the 2019 contract negotiations, and I am thrilled that this is going to happen! Now that negotiations are nearly underway, I think one important responsibility of the NTT constituency council is to ensure that our members have up-to-date information about contract negotiations and attend bargaining sessions as much as possible. I would also like to see TAUP continue to leverage our power as a union in support of the broader Temple University community, our North Philadelphia neighbors, and other Philadelphia-area unions. Temple does not operate independently of the world around us, so it is critical that we work to build the world we want to live and work in both inside and outside of the University.
Alex DeVaron (Music Studies: Music Theory, Boyer)
My desire to serve on the constituency council has three aspects:
First, I’m aware that 15 years ago, being an NTT at Temple was a painfully temporary position. If one did not find a tenure track position here or elsewhere, one was let go. The situation has completely changed. Now, largely because of the union, being an NTT is as valid a career option as being a tenure track appointment: it carries a good benefit package, multi-year contracts, and the possibility of promotion. Serving the union is one way I can give thank it for the stability and quality of the position I currently hold.
If elected, I would be committed to exploring the following question: Can we work with the administration without descending into the rhetoric of a solidified “US vs. THEM” that currently pervades our national culture?
I’m inspired to make sure that the many NTT’s working in the arts have a clean communication pipeline to the union leaders.
Donald T. Wargo (Economics, CLA)
My passion is social justice and I have been working for that in the Temple Association of University Professionals for almost 10 years. I have been a member of the TAUP Executive Board for most of that time and have worked to improve the pay, pension, merit and working conditions for the NTT’s at Temple. Further, as we enter negotiations, I am on the negotiating team to negotiate a new union contract (our current contract is up in October, 2019). I pledge to continue to work for NTT’s betterment and also for all the members of the Collective Bargaining Unit, as we are all in this together.
Adjunct Constituency Council (2 three-year terms, 2 two-year terms)
Carla Anderson (English, CLA)
I’ve been a part of Temple since 2013 as a graduate student in the English PhD program. In Fall 2018, I started teaching at Temple as an adjunct and joined the union. As a graduate student, I joined the Graduate Student Association and served as the social events coordinator and learned how to advocate for graduate students, and I hope to do the same for my fellow adjuncts now. After teaching at other colleges for the past four years, including ones that do not benefit from any union for adjuncts, I’m amazed to see what a strong union can do. I am running for the ACC because I believe that building solidarity and a sense of community is paramount to keeping the union strong and active, and I want to be a part of it.
Jay Bagley (Physics, CST)
I have been at Temple as an adjunct for 6 years. I would like to help other adjuncts as well as myself to get better working conditions. The vision for the union would be to be able to fulfill the effort in getting better working conditions and plans for adjunct professionals and others as well. The skills that I have for the leadership position are as a Certified Principal in the Philadelphia school district, Department leader for 20 years in the Philadelphia Board of Education, Current and Past President of the American Association of Physics Teachers. I have been a union member for 30 years, so I believe in and am sure of the benefits that a union can bring, and I am a team player.
Milca Dubon (Spanish & Portuguese, CLA)
Are you getting a higher pay in comparison to two years ago? You’re welcome.
Do you have the option of getting health insurance through the university? You’re welcome.
Are you reaping the same benefits as paying-dues-members even if you are not paying yours? You’re welcome.
We at TAUP are working hard year-round to get better and more fair working conditions for the whole community of Academic Professionals including Librarians, Tenured and Tenure-Track Faculty, Non-Tenure-Track Faulty, and Adjuncts. During the last three years that I have served in the Adjunct Constituency Council, I lost count of how many colleagues have signed the TAUP card to become members through my recruiting. On top of this basic duty I joined the Promotions Committee last year and look forward to it to bear its fruits as soon as this new contract coming up. I have done so with joy and with your vote I am willing to dedicate another 3 years to the efforts of strengthening our working conditions.
“May The Force be with us”
“May we BE The Force”
Andrew Dudenbostel (Film and Media Arts, Center for the Performing and Cinematic Arts)
If elected to the Adjunct Constituency Council, I will bring enthusiasm and dedication to my role within the union. I see my union work as integral to my career as an educator: even before teaching my first class, I had joined the union and attended one of the organizer trainings during the summer. I have experienced first-hand how working as an adjunct can be an isolating experience at times, and I aim to bring a passion for one-on-one, boots-on-the-ground organizing to ACC as a way to help build power and solidarity among adjuncts and all our other colleagues.
Alex Schechter (Painting/Drawing/Sculpture, Tyler)
I’m running for the adjunct constituency council because I believe in fostering an education community that honors and values its individual members and promotes dignity in higher learning. For the last two years I have worked as an adjunct in the Tyler School of Arts. While my time in the classroom has been rewarding, I have felt both personal and communal discomfort in the precarious professional positions that adjuncts inhabit, seeing an increase in the responsibilities expected while simultaneously decreasing the certainty of their employment. Organizing with TAUP has been a place to push against that precarity and collectively assert that educators, across discipline and seniority, are neither disposable or interchangeable. I’ve spent time fostering relationships with other adjuncts in my department and found commonalities and solidarity in our frustrations and aspirations. I look forward to bringing my skills reaching across communities and disciplines to listen to and advocate for the needs and aspirations of all adjuncts. As a member of the ACC, I would continue to foster human, interpersonal relationships in order to assure the best understanding of professional dignity, academic integrity and labor security for all members of our community.
—