Let's Bring Back Mediocrity
These so-called “informational picketers” were distributing leaflets to students urging them to support the PSC’s contract demands and “stand together for a better CUNY!” Why should students back the PSC? Because the union has “been at the forefront of the struggle” to “defend Open Admissions” and to “protect SEEK” (the functional equivalent of senior-college remediation). While consistent with the union’s ideology, the combination of open admissions and remediation at the senior colleges badly devalued CUNY degrees in the late 1970s and 1980s. It’s hard to see why students would rally behind an illegal strike that promotes an agenda that will devalue their degrees.
The “informational” flyer explains that the union has “rebuilt CUNY as an outstanding university.” That’s certainly news to anyone who’s observed CUNY matters over the last few years, since the union leadership has opposed virtually every major initiative to bolster quality at CUNY. The PSC opposed creation of the CUNY Honors College, which has brought in hundreds of Ivy League-caliber students to CUNY over the past five years, contending that the Honors College violated CUNY's mission. The PSC opposed the abolition of remediation at the senior colleges, falsely predicting that the number of minority students in the senior colleges would diminish. The PSC opposed extending the tenure clock from 5 to 7 years, arguing that giving more time for junior faculty to produce scholarship before tenure might dangerously increase expectations for research. The PSC opposed filling all new faculty lines through competitive national searches, demanding that some lines be confined to applications from current or past CUNY adjuncts. And the PSC has opposed anything resembling merit pay, resulting in a pay scale based solely on seniority, so that a senior professor with, say, 12 pages of publications for his career and 30-plus years of seniority receives the same salary as a professor of roughly equal seniority who has 8 books and multiple teaching awards.
Dashing the union's hopes, a variety of students from around CUNY have spoken out against the PSC’s threat to break the law—most recently in a Metroarticle (scroll to p. 3). The piece also referenced the letter signed by 130 CUNY faculty (including me) affirming our commitment to uphold state law regardless of the union’s decision.
The Metro article provoked a response from PSC activist and Brooklyn Sociology professor Alex Vitale, last heard from arguing that his department should be chaired by someone who deemed all people of faith “moral retards.” Vitale penned a letter to the Metro editor and forwarded the document to the PSC Yahoo group. Vitale's letter is reproduced below, with commentary; all spelling and grammatical mistakes were in the original.
Dear Metro,It’s curious to see how Vitale conflates criticizing the PSC’s policies with being “ideologically opposed to unions”—a little like saying those who attack Bush’s policy in Iraq are ideologically opposed to the United States. And while perhaps calling for upholding state law could be considered a “conservative” position, by this definition of “conservative,” around 95% of the country is conservative.I am writing this letter in response to you [sic] October 13th article,"CUNY profs split on contract negotiations," [sic] This article provides a biased and somewhat inaccurate presentation of the current labor dispute. The fact that a few conservative students and faculty, who are ideologically opposed to unions, oppose this action is largely irrelevant. The decision of your paper to run a story that almost completely ignores the arguments in favor of the union's efforts is a distressing development.
Workers have very few points of leverage against intransigent employers other than withholding their labor. This has been a central truth of labor relations since the begining [sic] of the industrial area. Almost all important advances for workers including the 40 hour work week, paid vacation, on the job safety enhancements, and due process protections have been won through strike actions or the threat of strikes.This is not to say that all strikes are successful in all situations. Many strikes fail because of strike breakers, government intervention, employer violence, or a divided work force in which some segment of the workers either identify with managment [sic] (as is the case at CUNY) or are so desperate that they are willing to sell out their fellow workers for a fleeting sense of security in the face of employer repression.
I’d suggest that a third group of dissenters exist at CUNY—those who neither “identify with managment [sic]” or “are so desperate that they are willing to sell out their fellow workers,” but who instead favor a contract that would deal with workload and salary issues without the political and ideological baggage associated with the PSC.
It is important to note the the [sic] PSC has not relied solely on the threat of illegal work stoppages in its efforts to improve CUNY for both students and professional employees working there. Unlike the previous leadership of the union, the current leadership has invested significant time and resources in cultivating the support of political representatives across the state. Through endorsement proceedures [sic], campaign contributions, lobbying, and voter education efforts, the PSC has become a force in Albany and at City Hall.
The PSC is as much “a force in Albany and at City Hall” as the AFL is a force in the Bush White House. Endorsing the losers in the 2001 mayoral race, 2002 gubernatorial contest, and 2005 NYC public advocate primary, as the PSC has done, seems like an unusual way of “cultivating the support of political representatives.” I guess the union believes that “political representatives” are more favorably inclined toward those who denounce them in vitriolic fashion.
The last several years have seen a number of important legislative efforts to improve funding for CUNY that is of direct benefit to students as well as faculty including capital spending and enhanced financial aid.These efforts, however, have not been effective in motivating a republican [sic] governor and mayor to better finance higher education in New York State. The present state of funding lags significantly behind other states. Pataki and Bloomburg [sic] are much more concerned about providing tax breaks for the rich than supporting higher education for poor and immigrant students.
How many editors would take seriously a letter from a New York City college professor who can’t even spell the name of the city’s mayor?
CUNY provides an avenue of opportunity for these students and, as such, is important for the future of the City of New York. It is in such situations, in which the general public supports enhanced spending but political leaders refuse to respond, that work stoppages become an important tool to place pressure on government leaders.
This is striking rhetoric coming from a union that has previously contended that the “general public” has no right to comment on CUNY matters. I guess the PSC wants public input only when such an approach is perceived as favoring the union’s agenda.
While students and others may experience some short term inconveniences if a work stoppage occurs, the continuing decline in support for CUNY is a much greater threat to their future.I’m not sure that those students who find awarding of their degrees delayed, with associated loss of salary or job opportunities, will be comforted by Vitale's assurances. But this is the same union whose strike rally featured a professor who lamented how she couldn’t afford to live in the city’s most luxurious neighborhood on her $118,000 salary, so I suppose we should expect such bizarre rationalizations.