A Seat at the Table The Quest for a Faculty Union at TWU

In October 2021, the full-time and sessional faculty of Trinity Western University held a vote to determine whether it would join a union. While not the first attempt at faculty unionization in TWU’s history, this particular union drive was fueled by a series of actions by TWU administration in recent years, including the controversial Institutional Prioritization Process (IPP) which led to TWU’s decision to close the theatre program and the Master of Arts degree in teaching English to speakers of other languages (MA TESOL) program. According to the organizing committee, the lead group of faculty who have spearheaded the unionization drive, the main concern is that faculty have largely been left out of the university’s decision-making processes and that the newly formed union would give faculty a “seat at the table.”

The university challenged the union’s proposed bargaining unit, causing the case to go to the B.C. Labour Relations Board (LRB). Finally, seventeen months after the initial vote, the LRB approved the bargaining unit, the votes were counted, and the full-time faculty secured a union. From CLAC’s knowledge, TWU’s faculty union is the first certified faculty union at a private Christian post-secondary institution in North America.

Having a unionized faculty at TWU is bound to raise concerns and questions from TWU’s students, alumni, administration, and community members with a vested interest in the school. To better understand the unionization effort, Mars’ Hill engaged with faculty members involved in organizing it to provide some history of the quest for faculty unionization at TWU, the causes behind the current unionization effort, and why forming a union supports the community of TWU. At their request, comments within this article have been left anonymous to protect the identities of faculty members.

In 2012, TWU faculty launched a drive to join the faith-based labour union, the Christian Labour Association of Canada (CLAC), following the termination of one faculty member and the subsequent lawsuit between that faculty member and TWU. According to some faculty, their relationship with the administration was rather precarious, especially when it came to legal issues. With a union, faculty would have legal standing with administration and would be able to access additional resources, such as expertise in labour law and legal representation. While the TWU Faculty Association has existed since 1979, it serves only as a “recommendation body” which, according to the organizing committee, gives it less power and official status than the TWU Student Association (TWUSA) and the TWU Alumni Association (TWUAA).

The 2012 union drive did not ultimately prove to be successful––by a remarkably small margin. In May 2013, the Vancouver Sun reported that 46 per cent of faculty voted in favour of joining CLAC with 54 per cent voting against it.

After what those involved in current unionization efforts call a “near miss,” the TWU administration enacted policies to make the voices of faculty members more prominent in high-level decision-making. Under the leadership of former university president Robert Kuhn, the university established the Faculty Work Environment Committee (FWEC)—which allowed for members of faculty and administration to regularly meet and discuss faculty concerns—and added five new “constituency members” to the Board of Governors— including the Faculty Association chair, the University Senate chair, the Staff Association chair, the Alumni Association chair, and the TWUSA president.

However, a statement from organizers noted that these efforts for greater faculty inclusion have largely been stalled since the appointment of the new president in 2019.

“We are back to the same place,” the statement said, “where arbitrary and aggressive decisions by the administration leave faculty with no recourse but leaving or hiring a lawyer—both of which have happened in the last two years.”

According to faculty organizers, much has happened in the last few years to renew the cause for unionization.

“For 10 years, faculty have tried as hard as possible to work through workplace and employment issues through [FWEC],” said the organizing committee, “but despite all these efforts, the results were mixed.”

They said that changes to programs have been suddenly implemented without input from faculty; often these program changes negatively impact students’ ability to complete their degrees in a timely manner. Furthermore, department chairs are discouraged from taking up their grievances with the administration.

The organizing group also mentioned that the promises made by the administration to address faculty concerns in the wake of the unsuccessful 2012 union drive have stalled.

“The efforts of the university administration . . . are open to interpretation. Whether those efforts were sincere or not, there are many issues that were never resolved. Pay was definitely increased, although it is still short of targets agreed upon by the Faculty Association and the administration. A dispute resolution process was created, but it’s not clear how useful it would be for a real violation of labour law committed by the university administration.”

Organizers continued, “Over the last several years, the administration and Board [of Governors] have taken steps to remove faculty and staff voices from any consequential decision-making . . . Faculty requests to be more transparent were explicitly rejected.” The selection of the current president was a completely confidential process, preventing faculty and staff from meeting with the candidate—or even knowing who it was—during the hiring.

In faculty organizers’ view, one of the most notable examples of faculty being left out of TWU’s decision-making processes is the Institutional Prioritization Process (IPP). Beginning in Fall 2020, the IPP was a university-wide review of programs conducted by the administration of TWU to determine their future viability.* The organizing group claims that “faculty participation in the controversial [IPP] was controlled through a requirement for confidentiality by faculty representatives on the IPP committee, and faculty feedback after the process was essentially ignored.”

According to the LRB, a bargaining unit is “the group of employees represented by a union, or the employees the union is proposing to represent when it applies for certification.”

Further, faculty voices on the Board of Governors were suddenly removed in the summer of 2022 without any consultation. Instead, these former faculty voices were replaced with several “Standing Committees.” Faculty said that admission to these committees requires “rigid and unquestioning acceptance of institutional affirmations.”

In July 2021, following the announcement of the closure of the theatre and MA TESOL programs, the Faculty Association delivered a vote of non-confidence in the President-initiated IPP. The Aldergrove Star reported that 71 per cent of faculty agreed with the motion, 9 per cent abstained, and 20 per cent opposed. Without the backing of a union, however, the result of this vote did nothing to sway the administration.

While organizers cite these changes as the biggest and most obvious concerns, they claim that “in many smaller interactions on a daily basis, it has become exceptionally clear that not only is faculty input in the running of the university not desired, it is actively viewed as problematic and something to be suppressed.”

The Christian Labour Association of Canada is a multi-sector, non-partisan labour union started in 1952. According to their website, CLAC currently has over 60,000 members nationwide in a variety of fields including “construction, education, emergency services, healthcare, retail, service, transportation, manufacturing, and more.”

From the perspective of faculty, one major case in point was a series of “fireside chats” the president engaged in with TWU’s various schools and faculties as part of a “listening tour” in the fall of 2021. These events were promoted as opportunities for faculty to get to know the president and vice versa. But rather than facilitating open exchange, faculty found the conversation to be tightly controlled so as to avoid any controversial topics—which were, naturally, what faculty truly wanted to be addressed.

“Most public declarations by the administration follow this pattern: appearance of openness is more highly valued than actual substantial openness. The results of this approach are evident at all levels of the university. Numerous high-quality faculty, staff, and administrators have either left, been fired, or are in the process of leaving. As always, there are many reasons for any individual’s decision, but the climate created by the current administration is a significant factor for many.”

Many faculty members were also afraid of how the administration would react to open criticism of their decisions. “In spite of guarantees of academic freedom that TWU subscribes to,” they said, “there is real fear among faculty and staff about speaking openly and offering criticism of decisions or the general direction of the university. People who express concerns about leadership are in danger of being targeted with reprisals. Long-time, loyal TWU staff have been let go at such times and in such a way that other employees reasonably worry if they would be next.”

Yet the fear of reprisal did not sway the organizing committee from pushing for a unionized faculty. The union drive officially began in August 2021 as faculty began to return to campus.

On March 10, news came that the LRB had rejected TWU’s challenge to the bargaining unit and the results of the vote were finally announced. 64 per cent of faculty voted in favour of the union. There were 110 votes in favour and 62 in opposition.

In response to the vote, TWU administration directed Mars’ Hill to the statement available on their website. “TWU respects the democratic process and the decision of the LRB,” the statement read, “and we commit to working together with all faculty to advance a healthy and productive working relationship. It is important to note that there are no immediate changes for employment contracts with full-time faculty.”

“TWU faculty demonstrated incredible patience waiting for the results of this vote,” said Nathan Matthews, a Provincial Representative for CLAC, in a media release. “We are very pleased to deliver positive news.”

The organizing group addressed concerns that the current bargaining unit only represents full-time faculty. “At most Canadian universities, different types of instructors are represented by different unions because, while they share many conditions of the workplace, they do have different interests. . .

. There is no desire to discriminate against parttime faculty. If part-timers wish to be unionized, they will either be welcomed into the union membership in short order, or CLAC will assist them in forming their own bargaining unit that takes into better account their unique employment situation. Different unions can work in partnership with each other and with the university so that everyone benefits—including students.”

With the union drive now concluded, CLAC, faculty, and the administration now begin the first collective bargaining discussions to form a first collective agreement for faculty and the university.

Mars’ Hill spoke with Matthews shortly after the announcement of the results. He said that early conversations and interactions with TWU’s administration have been “positive” and that he, along with CLAC and faculty, is “looking forward to working together.” CLAC has begun preliminary meetings with the administration and will be conducting in-depth meetings with representatives from all of TWU’s schools and faculties.

“Our goal—and the approach of CLAC in general,” said organizers, “is to create a workplace culture that benefits all the stakeholders of the university. The current decision to concentrate all meaningful power at the university into the hands of the senior administration and the board is dangerous and unhealthy for the university. Institutions whose leaders have little to no accountability are institutions that are heading for failure. Faculty want to work with administration for the success of TWU, not under the command of the administration. Healthy organizations are ones with open critical discourse, even when that gets uncomfortable. For many of us faculty, a union seems to be the only way to get to that place.”