History

Faculty members at the Oregon Institute of Technology formed an AAUP collective bargaining chapter in 2018, after a protracted struggle to secure fairer labor practices. We organized in under a year to establish OT-AAUP (the fastest faculty union organizing campaign in Oregon history) and had a large majority of faculty joining union, with 95 faculty signing cards. We began bargaining our first contract in fall 2019 and continued for more than 550 grueling days without reaching an agreement.

In April 2021, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, OT-AAUP went on strike, the first faculty strike in Oregon history. For ten days, our members were on the picket lines—real and virtual—to demand more clearly defined and reasonable faculty workloads, fairer compensation, and more secure benefits. We reached a tentative agreement on our first contract in the early hours of May 4, bringing the strike to a successful conclusion. The contract enshrined our previous instructional workload and included new provisions to protect faculty members from excessive overload teaching. It also established a clear timeline for salary increases and tied the faculty’s benefits to those of the administration and staff.

The lessons learned from this, the first faculty strike in Oregon's history, were recorded in this article for AAUP. 

When we fight, we win! OT-AAUP has won all of the unfair labor practice cases we have submitted to the Oregon Employment Relations Board. 

It is on this strong foundation that Oregon Tech AAUP continues to support our faculty to ensure fair working conditions, adequate compensation, and secure benefits.