Contingent Faculty of Columbia University

As non-tenure track faculty, we are coming together as a union so we can bargain collectively with Columbia University. We are joining the thousands of NYC academic workers at Barnard, Fordham, The New School, and NYU who are seeking a better future through collective bargaining. We are part of the growing movement in private institutions like Boston University, Harvard, Princeton, Tufts, the University of Chicago, and many more, where unionized faculty have negotiated meaningful improvements to salary, benefits, and working conditions.

Without collective bargaining, we have experienced stagnant salaries, increasing amounts of uncompensated work, vanishing benefits, and threats to job security and academic freedom. With collective bargaining, we can negotiate a binding agreement so that Columbia University cannot change the terms of our employment without our consent. Our students’ learning conditions are our working conditions. When we are able to communicate and negotiate as equals with Columbia University, and as a result live more securely, we will be able to focus more on quality teaching.

We, non-tenure track faculty across Columbia University, have formed a union in order to improve our working conditions and to make the university a more equitable and accessible institution for teaching and learning. Like tens of thousands of faculty who already have unions at institutions across the US, we deserve the voice and respect we gain through collective bargaining.