Budgets reveal priorities, as the saying goes, and Miami management salaries have increased 42 percent since 2016 – a rate three times higher than faculty and librarian salaries. The football coach’s salary is up by more than $200,000. Miami has increased its spending on upper administration by more than 30 percent, yet faculty and librarians have had an average raise pool of just 1.8 percent. They have the money to pay us fairly–Miami’s surplus over the past 10 years has averaged $109 million – they simply refuse to. By refusing to bargain in good faith with our union, the Faculty Alliance of Miami, management is trying to cement the power imbalance that has enabled it to suppress our wages even as they pad their own.
In a five-month period last year, more than 60 percent of Miami’s legal budget went to union-busting law firms. The university spent $400,000 on “labor advice and negotiations” and nearly $1.5 million on all legal counsel rather than investing in the educational mission of the university.
Librarians and faculty are the heart of the university’s educational mission. We do the daily work with students to prepare them for their lives and careers and build relationships with them, often over four years—yet this Miami management has weakened our job protections to the point that we can be fired or non-renewed at the whim of the Board of Trustees for any reason. We no longer truly have academic freedom, job security or shared governance.
As we have seen in Texas and Florida — states where post-tenure review and other tenure-weakening measures are in effect — this leads to mass exodus of quality faculty and librarians and a state-sponsored propaganda education for students. That is not the educational mission that tuition and alumni contributions pay to protect.
It has also disinvested in us for four years or more. Our salaries have not kept up with inflation or the cost of living and are lower than our peer institutions in Ohio and across the nation. But Miami management has rejected the union’s salary equity language entirely and wants to lower current promotion increases. They have proposed an average annual raise of just 1.4 percent — a number less than the 2 percent raise offered to the rest of its non-union employees in 2023.
Our union has compromised with management on many key issues, from discipline and discharge to elements of academic freedom. But they have not shown a similar willingness to compromise, instead insisting on their “management rights” that ingrain a gross imbalance of power. Instead of being a partner at the table with a shared goal of preserving the key educational mission of the university, management has shown that it is willing to burn that educational mission down in its attempt to bust the union.
Faculty and librarian working conditions are student learning conditions, and management is causing both to suffer. It’s time for management to commit to a fair contract and a fair compensation package. We’ve waited long enough, and we’re ready to take action if they don’t.
Theresa Kulbaga, John Schaefer and Cathy Wagner are professors at Miami University and members of the Faculty Alliance of Miami (FAM-AFT/AAUP).
