Update Sunday, November 19

OPSEU Local 415

OPSEU Local 415 is the democratically-run body that represents Algonquin College full-time and partial-load faculty (professors and instructors), cousellors, and librarians.

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Adele Yamada and Neil Hunter – their interviews regarding the return to work legislation on CBC Friday “All in a Day” show

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/programs/allinaday/back-to-work-reactions-1.4408202

Personal items left in the trailers
We collected a number of items from the three trailers on Friday. They will be available for retrieval from the Union Office (C215b) this week.
 
Letter to the editor: Response to the Ottawa Citizen editorial that appeared in Saturday’s edition
The editorial “Grading the Strike,” does a great disservice to the faculty of Algonquin College. While on the one hand the editorial says in a most off-hand manner  ”the union may have had good reasons to reject the offer “ (without articulating what those good reasons might be, and there were quite a few as reported in your own paper over the past five weeks), it then characterizes the response of faculty upon hearing news of the 86% vote to reject the employers’ atrocious offer as “unmitigated glee,” “celebrating the fact the students might well lose their term.”
If the nameless, faceless authors of this shameless piece of tabloid journalism had taken the time to review the facts as reported in the past five weeks by their own reporters, they ought to have known that no single faculty member has ever expressed the false sentiment the editorial claims.   
The moment captured by your photographer was one of relief: relief that a terrible offer that would not have addressed any of the issues that were at the root of the strike had been resoundingly rejected. Relief that the five weeks (although it should have only been three weeks had the employer acted responsibly and finished negotiations rather than walking away and prolonging the strike with their ill-conceived forced offer vote) of walking in rain, cold, and wind for quality education were not in vain. Relief that, for the many students who had walked the lines with us, sent us messages of support, and identified with the fight against precarious work, we did not abandon our principles and take a bad deal. And relief that, for the many members in our local community who are also struggling against the gig economy and who saw our strike as part of a larger social movement to put an end to precarious work, we remained resolute in our efforts to firmly reject a future where precarious work is the norm rather than an aberration.  
In short, if one were to apply the editorial’s grading system to the editorial itself, it would have received an unqualified F. Perhaps after faculty are back in the classroom where we want to be, the authors of the editorial might avail themselves of our Journalism Program where critical thinking and objective reporting are taught.  
Jack Wilson, Professor and
Proud Member of Algonquin College Faculty and First VP of OPSEU 415
Monday – return to work (the legislation HAS passed)
 The legislation may be found at this link
 

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