Scumandvillany t1_j9khtil wrote on February 22, 2023 at 5:22 PM

Edit: some of this was in response to that absurd article from a commie newspaper that was posted and removed

The TUGSA represents the union. To "organize" outside that committee would require electing new representatives for the bargaining committee, which depends on the wording of their contract PLUS there's strict rules as per act 195 as to how that can be done-and when. The elected representatives are the exclusive representatives for collective bargaining purposes. Sometimes you have to offer a contract that you know is unpopular for a vote to move forward in the process.

What I don't know is if these employees are considered "public" employees, which under the terms of PERA/act 195 gives very strong protections for public employees. It also proscribes the process in which impasses are dealt with, starting with the bureau of mediation. Then comes a fact finding panel and another set of procedures. Then the unit can legally strike. But there's also options for voluntary arbitration.

I'm curious, because I'm not sure if they are act 195 employees, as temple has act 195 employees for sure, but none of the other units have had to go on strike as far as I know, and relations with other workers have not been nearly as contentious. It seems that temple has blown past all the steps(if they are act 195) and dug their heels in.

Obviously the workers want to get paid more, and they should.

I do think that higher ed in general, especially public schools like temple without huge endowments are headed for trouble in general. For a couple generations, "college" has been the goal pushed for everyone, but that hasn't been ideal. In my opinion, WAYYYY to many people went to college unnecessarily, and either got art degrees and were like what do now, or ended up loaded down with debt to make 65k at a nonprofit. Some of this is structural in our system, but people are waking up that the trades can give you 100k and zero debt, and the severe deficit of knowledge workers who know how to do critical things that no one pays much mind to is catching up to us. From pilots, to machinists, electricians to mechanics, plumbers, etc-all boomer heavy positions, and a lot of guys retired, plus it's hard to get young people in and stay on task. Much bigger conversation, but in sum I think college enrollments will decline, and more people will look to skilled trades and truck driving etc to get sufficient income.

It's like my mother in law complaining about their elevator being broken. Well, honey, elevator technicians are behind and there's not enough of them, and it's a VERY specific knowledge set, so you have to wait. Boomers.

I mean really, how many art history degreed individuals do we need?

Edit: basically I think temple can see these trends developing, which, plus their abysmal public safety record of late leads them to think, rightly, that enrollment will decline, squeezing the budget. So that's why they are taking a hard line. But it's costing them more imo to not bite the bullet, pay them and figure it out. Maybe not having 5373 vice provosts could help? I dunno.

Inevitable-Place9950 t1_j9mt1sf wrote on February 23, 2023 at 2:24 AM

Hardly anyone gets art/art history degrees. People just pick whatever majors they don’t respect when they want to complain about college grads and usually those are the least common majors to start with.

AbsentEmpire t1_j9l2f5w wrote on February 22, 2023 at 7:27 PM

I don't see why you're being downvoted.

Presenting a contract you know won't be approved is a pretty normal and part of the negotiation process.

Additionally Temple is vulnerable to all the problems and headwinds that are coming at the higher education system in general, in addition to location specific issues they have. Cost containment is absolutely an issue the school faces.

However they're looking at it wrong, the grad students produce actual value for the school, and they should be paid for it.

Where the school can look to cut costs is the bloated administration, which is full of bullshit jobs that should be eliminated. College administration bloat is a well known phenomenon, and adds a significant cost to tuition.

Scumandvillany t1_j9lhray wrote on February 22, 2023 at 9:01 PM

I obviously offended some art history graduates working in the nonprofit space and juggling high debts while having to endure their plumber cousin at Christmas busting out the biggest wad of cash they'd ever seen to pay for fireworks for all the kids

AbsentEmpire t1_j9m7paw wrote on February 22, 2023 at 11:47 PM

Ya probably the same people who get upset at me pointing out the reason housing costs have gone up in Philly isn't because cApiTAliSm bAd, it's directly because of NIMBY zoning policies restricting new housing creation for all the people who moved here.

But that would mean acknowledging that their misguided opposition to development has directly resulted in pricing them out of the location they would like to be in.

Plenty of cheap housing in the badlands, yet these people bitching about lack of cheap housing in Fishtown or Rittenhouse don't consider living there.

In addition most people don't need to go to college, if they do it should be local community college or state schools if what they're doing isn't STEM related. Most degrees are useless debt traps, and unnecessary in the real world. Many companies and municipalities are finally rolling back degree requirements for jobs that only need a high school education and Microsoft Office training.

In addition one of the primary drivers for the increasing cost of colleges is administrative bloat and useless highly expensive infrastructure projects like luxury dorms, which basically treat colleges as an extended adolescence.

All of that can and should be cut and the funds redirected to the core function of academia, research and education. Which means firing whole departments of useless administrators and taking that money to pay grad students, researchers, and TAs.