Dozens of students from Pennsylvania’s 14 state universities (PASSHE) walked the picket line with 500 unionized professors at today’s Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education Board of Governor’s meeting. The union representing the faculty — the Association of Pennsylvania State College and University Facilities — has been working for over 465 days without a contract and they have set 5:00 AM October 19th as the deadline for a faculty strike.
The strike would be the first in the union’s and the state system’s history and the issues revolve around cutting the salaries for adjunct professors (who are protected under the same contract as tenured professors), increasing the ratio of adjunct professors to tenured professors (from 25 percent to 30 percent) teaching on the university campuses, increasing the overall workload for adjunct faculty, increasing online education and massive online courses and allowing professors to teach classes outside of their disciplines.
At today’s Board of Governor’s meeting, over a dozen students delivered a petition to the Chancellor of the State System and the board members. The group entered the room towards the end of the meeting, and stood silently with their petition — containing the signatures of 1,200 students supporting their professors — and a solidarity fist held in the air. After the closing comments, students yelled at the Chancellor’s recent pay raise while trying to cut the salaries of adjunct members by 20 percent. Students then chanted “STUDENTS FOR FACULTY” as the Board of Governors and the Chancellor ignored the requests of students to talk to them about the possibility of a faculty walkout. This demonstration comes days after Chancellor Frank Brogan told PASSHE students on Facebook Live that they must cross picket lines and attend classes if a faculty walkout occurs.
Video of the students presenting the petition and a short recap of today’s events can be found HERE