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The AFT is already the largest higher education union in the country. Now we are building strength not just in numbers but in our commitment to the public good: On July 17, the AFT launched Real Solutions for Higher Education, a multipronged, multiyear $1 million commitment to ensure higher education truly serves students and communities, protect and re-establish higher education as a bastion of democratic freedom and opportunity, and refute the attacks of bad-faith actors who seek to disinvest, shatter job security, silence free speech, and put short-term profit over access and affordability.
Kicking off its inaugural year, the campaign is already working to identify and support AFT locals and state affiliates who, through collective bargaining, issue campaigns and legislative efforts, will tackle the “three A’s”:
- Affordability. Students must be able to pursue the educational path of their choice, without a lifetime of debt.
- Access for all. The economic opportunities postsecondary education provides must be achievable for everyone, regardless of geography or demography.
- Academic freedom. All members of the campus community must be able to safely engage in a free, uncensored exchange of ideas.
“Higher education is a vehicle to the middle class, a public good that should offer opportunity without strings attached—but that mission is becoming increasingly imperiled,” says AFT President Randi Weingarten. “At its best, college prepares students with the skills to learn and thrive as citizens in our democracy. But to get there, we need a system that is accessible, affordable and upholds academic freedom.
“That’s why we’re launching Real Solutions for Higher Education. We’re responding to the assaults on free speech and austerity budgets, to fight for a reshaped system. We’re pushing back against precarious employment that requires adjunct faculty to string together five or six separate teaching gigs to get by. And we’re fighting for universities and colleges to live up to their public promise and provide the teaching and learning our students deserve.”
Better working conditions mean better learning conditions
Real Solutions aims to improve employment conditions at colleges and universities, working with state and local affiliates to strengthen and safeguard the basic tenets of higher education. And it aims to increase public funding for two- and four-year institutions and ensure students can access affordable, fully resourced colleges and universities.
The AFT will also tackle threats to academic freedom and free speech, targeting attempts to curtail faculty rights on campus. To safeguard intellectual and academic freedom, educators need meaningful job security and sustainable careers. An end to contingency in higher education will boost dignity at work and provide students with the education they deserve.
“The AFT’s Real Solutions for Higher Education will identify and support the best ways our affiliates can address the crises that have long plagued higher education,” says Todd Wolfson, president of both the American Association of University Professors and Rutgers AAUP-AFT. The AFT and AAUP are affiliated nationally.
“From confronting the threats to campus free speech and academic freedom that present an enormous challenge in ensuring our students and faculty can learn and teach safely and productively, to promoting better job security and ending contingency for the majority of our academic workers who toil under precarious employment conditions, the time is now to confront these issues proactively and decisively,” Wolfson continues. “And at a time when our students, families and communities are faced with a system of higher education that has become unaffordable and difficult to access without incurring tremendous debt, together we must recommit to higher education as a public good worthy of robust investment. I look forward to working alongside my brothers and sisters in this campaign for a better higher education for all.”
Real Solutions for Higher Education will be showcased at the AFT’s biennial convention from July 22 to July 25 in Houston, where delegates will have a chance to learn about and discuss the campaign. Over the next year, the AFT will work with local affiliates to identify specific needs and develop actionable solutions. At the same time, the AFT will also push for a shift in the public narrative to reframe higher education as a public good.
“We have long identified the problems that plague higher education; we must now proactively fight threats to academic freedom, public disinvestment in our colleges and universities, and job insecurity on our campuses,” says Derryn E. Moten, co-president of the AFT Faculty-Staff Alliance at Alabama State University, Local 4866, and co-chair of the AFT Higher Education program and policy council. “This campaign will advance solutions that will truly support our faculty, staff, students and communities.”
The union will work toward developing new tools and resources for members and will push back on legislation that targets higher ed workers and academic freedom, while fighting for legislation that protects those same workers and safeguards that freedom. It will arm local affiliates with the necessary resources to withstand the assault from political extremists and move their colleges and universities in the direction of democracy.
The AFT is building a movement to secure our nation’s economic future and boost social prosperity by fighting for what our students, faculty, staff and communities need. Our collective success will come from the dedicated and steadfast work of our local unions and state affiliates—and our Real Solutions campaign will provide critical support to that end.
[AFT communications staff]