After a long and drawn-out striking process, the University of Windsor’s faculty association has ratified a collective agreement.
Voting 65.8 per cent in favour of a three-year contract, students and faculty can now focus on the months ahead. While the details of the contract have not been released, the contract will last from 2014 to 2017.
The voting date was set after several months of negotiation between the Windsor University Faculty Association (W.U.F.A.) and the University of Windsor’s board of administration. While students were told that a full strike was planned for October 1st, a tentative agreement was made on October 2nd after the strike was postponed over the weekend. Negotiations began in July, with W.U.F.A. claiming wages were a major issue in the discussions that occurred between the faculty and the board of administration.
A voting session by the Windsor University Faculty Association (W.U.F.A.) indicated that the faculty was 95% in favour of a strike if an agreement was not made between themselves and the administration. Due to a mediated meeting, a tentative agreement was finally made on October 2nd.
According to their website, W.U.F.A. set the faculty’s ratification meeting for a 4:00 p.m. registration, followed by a 4:30 p.m. meeting, on October 21st. The ratification vote then occurred after the meeting. Both the meeting and the vote took place at Winclare Auditorium in Vanier Hall. Once the voting process was complete and the votes were counted, results were released to the students through WUFA.
The three-year agreement was made effective for July 2014.
Students at the university are relieved as midterms approach. Cacey Edmondson, a first-year Digital Journalism and Communication, Media & Film student commented upon the vote’s results. “In the middle of the term, I didn’t want to find out that our classes were going to be cancelled and we were going to have to wait a strike out. I’m really glad that it’s turned out in the way that it has. I think everyone is.”