Who Came Up With This Schedule?

So we bargained last Friday and have sessions this Friday and next Tuesday. I have been sick as a dog since last Thursday, so haven't had much time or energy for posting. But here goes.

Last Friday: The UO responded to non-economic proposals. I must admit, we were expecting to hear the word "No" a lot more than we actually did. While the UO certainly wasn't saying "Yes" either, they were saying that they could accept a lot of our ideas, but didn't like our language. Without being too positive, but probably being too cryptic, I think we can expect to see deals made on vacation rights for research assistants, a GTFF presence at some faculty trainings, some improvements to the workspace/work environment language, the ability for GTFs to ask for reassignment if they have security concerns, and an improvement to our grievance procedures.

This Friday: The GTFF will hit the UO with our counters to their monetary proposals. A brief recap -- we asked for a 10% raise to the minimum wage over 2 years, they offered an 8% increase over 2 years. We asked for a complete elimination of all fees GTFs currently pay. The UO proposed increasing fees GTFs pay and removing the cap on fees. And on health care the UO offered to extend the deal we currently have and lower the cost of adding children to the plan by $100 a term (instead of a $100 child care benefit). We respond on health care this week.

Next Tuesday: We have to come back on all the non-economic proposals.

This is a busy week coming up. If you can make to these sessions, we'd really appreciate it. The team loves to know that people care about what is happening in bargaining.