Why Penn State faculty need a union | Opinion

Penn State likes to say it has a world-class faculty, and it happens to be true. And if the university were functioning properly, it would draw on its faculty’s expertise to make Penn State the best university it can be. But as former chairs of the University Faculty Senate, we can tell you that there are limits to shared governance at Penn State. So, this spring, after years of organizing, thousands of Penn State faculty will vote for our faculty union — the Penn State Faculty Alliance, SEIU Local 668.

We know that when faculty have a voice, Penn State can make decisions grounded in the knowledge and experience of our learning community. Over the last few years, Penn State’s administration has made decisions that have shocked and upset many valued members of our university. In 2020, faculty were frozen out of major decisions, with regrettable and sometimes absurd results. University decision-making was not based on classroom knowledge or common sense.

At the outset of the COVID pandemic, the university announced that all classes with enrollments up to 250 students would be held in person with six-feet-apart social distancing. Faculty had to inform our administration that there is no classroom on any Penn State campus that can accommodate more than 130 students with social distancing, and the administration had to walk back the announcement.

Now we’re living with the consequences of a far more important decision by the administration — a decision that permanently changes the university. In 2024, Penn State announced the closure of seven commonwealth campuses. The faculty who actually teach and advise on those campuses, who best understand the impact of the closures, were never consulted about the decision. It was simply announced to them one day, after many years of promises, that campus closures would never be a cost-saving option for Penn State.

Why does shared governance matter? Because outside academe — and, increasingly, inside academe — people don’t understand that faculty aren’t simply “employees.” We’re supposed to be partners with the administration in governing the university. The Faculty Senate isn’t some kind of make-believe body like a high-school Model United Nations, but central administration increasingly treats it that way.

What we have learned over the past six years is that Penn State’s central administration can ignore faculty whenever it likes, even about so momentous an issue as the closure of entire campuses. When we were Senate Chairs, we weren’t obstructionists, and we made sure that, despite the wide variety of viewpoints among the faculty, dealing with the Faculty Senate was not a matter of herding cats. And for the most part, central administration treated us like the experts we are. Like professionals, committed to the enterprise of teaching and learning.

But having a Faculty Senate is not the same as having a Faculty Union. A collective bargaining agreement is a mutually agreed-upon contract between workers and their employer, negotiated through discussion and approved by a majority of members who share stakeholdership. Penn State’s administrative decisions over the last few years demonstrate that the Faculty Senate is not a sufficient counterweight to the administration’s ability to act unilaterally.

The campus closures showed us that we need something stronger than a Faculty Senate, a faculty body that the administration cannot ignore at will. We need a union. We need to learn from the example of our colleagues at Pitt and Temple: a union is the only way to ensure that faculty play a meaningful role in making Penn State the best university it can be. Working with the Senate, a faculty union can make sure that the university has its priorities right — that teaching and research will always remain at the center of our enterprise.

We did not come to this conclusion capriciously; we gave years of our lives to service in the Senate. But we now believe it is the only conclusion that makes sense —for us, and for Penn State faculty throughout the commonwealth.

Michael Bérubé is the Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Literature at Penn State University Park and was chair of the University Faculty Senate from 2018-19. Beth Seymour is a Teaching Professor of Anthropology at Penn State Altoona and was chair of the University Faculty Senate from 2020-21. Both are members of the Penn State Faculty Alliance, SEIU Local 668.