Faculty and Students Need Answers

Colleagues,

TRU faculty and students need answers to the following questions if we are to move forward in a collegial environment with the administration:

1. Is it true that, despite some Deans’ requesting funding for much needed sessional positions, the Provost has refused?

2. Why is TRU administration persisting in allowing course evaluation questionnaires to remain open for 48 hours after class time, when the Memorandum of Settlement clearly states that the questionnaires must be administered “in class”?

3. Is it true that some departments in the Faculty of Arts that deliver service courses for other Faculties and Schools are not having these courses credited to them?

4. Is it true that TRU language labs have been arbitrarily and unilaterally cancelled?

5. Is it true that some departments have lost dedicated classrooms without adequate consultation?

6. In November, the TRU President signed an agreement with Maple Leaf Education Services through which Chinese students will complete their high school studies at TRU and will be given preferential admission to TRU academic programs.  Is it true that TRU will be providing classroom space to this private corporation?

7. Why have TRU senators not been given a detailed breakdown of the $10 million budget for TRU World?

8. All Faculties and Schools have been asked to cut their budgets by 2.48%.  However, why are Deans not supplying Chairs and departmental faculty members with detailed academic unit budgets to work with?  And is it true that the 2.48% budget cut request is being characterized as a result of the faculty salary increase despite the fact that the increase is being fully funded by the Ministry of Advanced Education?

9. Is it true that certain programs like ESL, Horticulture, Culinary Arts, ESTR, and COPE/MECA are being targeted for elimination without invoking program redundancy provisions in the Collective Agreement?

10. After a non-confidence vote by Trades faculty focusing on failures of the Dean, why is the hiring of yet another administrator – an Associate Dean – an appropriate and effective way to address the concerns of faculty members?

11. Is it true that a department appointments committee unanimously recommended the best candidate for a tenure-track position, and the recommendation was rejected?

12. Is it true that Academic Freedom may be restricted by a decision to have an administrator moderate a Faculty e-mail distribution list?  Is TRU administration trying to establish their version of a ‘respectful workplace’ that they were denied in bargaining?

13. Why is TRU administration refusing to implement a department Chair release algorithm?

14. TRUFA has requested that union and employer representatives on the Labour Management Consultative Committee meet more frequently to address a backlog of concerns that have arisen in the year since our last meeting.  Why is administration reluctant to approve this request?

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