There is a a core team of nine senior faculty that organized our union pledge form drive on campus. More than 58% of full-time faculty submitted pledge forms.  Several of us have been talking union on campus since early December 2022. So if you think you’re alone, you’re not.

Our faculty union would be entirely our own. While we would be affiliated with both MSEA and the NEA, the infrastructure of our union would be entirely built by faculty, for faculty (just like this website), meaning that all decisions would reflect the will of our voting members. Whatever help we received from these two affiliated agencies would be at our request, and they would have no say over our election of officers, writing of by-laws, strategic priorities, or budget. Indeed, if we have clear term limits for elected officers, we can ensure transparency, equity, and collegiality, so faculty can maintain autonomy and control. No outsiders are coming to campus to exploit, manipulate, and agitate us to further their own agenda(s).

The Maryland State Education Association is the largest union in our state, was the principal lobbying body for the pledge form drive clause, and is the only union with teeth on Delmarva.

Joining MSEA would knit us closer to public school teachers in a local crisis and is far less ideological than the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), whose explicit leftism would turn off many of our friends; moreover, they have historically regarded the plight of community colleges as an afterthought since their biggest draw is large state universities. Other industrial unions may have national prestige, but research shows that trade unions and teachers just don’t have the same problems or concerns, and when it’s been tried, it’s mostly failed.

When we put this same question to our MSEA rep, his one-sentence answer sold us: “We are 75,000 educational professionals strong, we have lawyers, we were part of the coalition that got this new law passed, and we have our own building in Annapolis.”

MSEA is the only union who will legally protect pledge form signees at this early stage, and the only union that we could call over breakfast that would arrive with suits and lawyers by end-of-business.

Finally, one last HUGE benefit of joining MSEA: they’re aligned with the National Education Association (NEA), so joining grants us dual membership and dual protection.

For the 2023-2024 academic year, MSEA dues (which also include NEA dues as well) will be $562, or roughly $23 per paycheck. No Wor-Wic faculty member will pay dues until the first contract is negotiated. The new collective bargaining law allows for dues to be taken out of direct deposit, so no dues would ever be paid in advance, and we would have complete control over our elected officers, bylaws, and budget, meaning that we could set dues to keep them as low as possible.

Our union is only for full-time faculty.

One of our faculty has provided this website for us. It's secure, it's private, and everything we do on here is logged. If you have any questions or suggestions, click the Support link to send a message.

It's simple!  Just click the menu option at the top to join.