Faculty union accuses St. Charles Community College of rampant union busting

By TIM ROWDEN
Editor-in-Chief

Cottleville, MO – The administration of St. Charles Community College appears intent on breaking its faculty union, a state level representative for the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) says.

Scott Ciafullo, member services coordinator for AFT Missouri, says faculty at the community college, represented by AFT Local 4803, have been under siege since before the start of the school year.

Recent actions led by the school’s President, Barbara Kavalier, Ph.D., and the college’s board of trustees, have included re-organizing the college to eliminate faculty roles – moving instructors out of their faculty positions and into hybrid staff roles so they can no longer be represented by the union.

Union members complain about a lack of transparency and communication from the administration and Board of Trustees. Although the union leadership has repeatedly requested a new organization chart, the administration has not provided one and have referred the union’s leadership to a broken link on the institution’s intranet.

In its latest move, the administration sent 16 union members emails on Oct. 27 implying that the union was under investigation for racial discrimination and mistreatment of a college leader, and calling for them to schedule individual interviews at which they would be asked to sign confidentiality agreements.

“They’re messing with these people anywhere they can,” Ciafullo said, adding that union members are weary and suffering anxiety as a result of the withering attacks.

UNION BUSTING STAFF CHANGES
The vice president of the faculty union was denied union representation when she appealed to the Board of Trustees to reconsider the decision to appoint her to a terminal one-year staff position after serving as an instructor at St. Charles Community College for more than 20 years. She was relegated to a staff position that made her ineligible to be in the union.

One instructor whose program was “deactivated” by the college two weeks before the start of the school year, found herself in the center of a continuing firestorm after students enrolled in the program contacted the Higher Learning Commission (HLC), the organization which accredits the college, looking for answers as to whether they would be able to graduate.

The college responded by launching an investigation, questioning students and union members about whether the students were coerced into contacting HLC and who gave them the information to do so – information one instructor said is readily available in the student handbook and on the college website.

TRYING TO DECERTIFY THE UNION
The college has also threatened to take away AFT 4803’s exclusive bargaining rights for the faculty by withdrawing its voluntary recognition of the union. Union members who were academic program leaders have been replaced by administrators without explanation or trial. Despite grieving violations of the faculty contracts related to denying representation, among other violations, the grievances have been dismissed instead of denied, halting the grievance process.

To reduce the union’s numbers ahead of a possible petition to decertify the union based on its membership, Ciafullo cited the administration’s creation of hybrid positions wherein faculty are made 49 percent teaching and 51 percent staff, effectively removing them from the faculty union. A former faculty member who was reassigned as a staff member with 49 percent teaching and 51 percent staff job duties is teaching 18.5 credit hours; a full-time teaching load is 15 credit hours.

“We’ve never had any problems like this,” Ciafullo said. “I’ve been doing this over 20 years at the state level, and I’ve never had any problems like these at St. Charles Community College. Anything that could go wrong is going wrong here against people who have dedicated their lives to this college.”