The full-time faculty contract under the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh’s Unit Local 38061, which began in September 2021, expired on June 30, 2024.
According to Karen Dwyer, a full-time professor of creative writing and lead negotiator for the Newsguild’s bargaining team, the administration is legally obligated to honor all terms of the old contract until a new contract is negotiated.
The Newsguild is composed of two units, she said. One half is Point Park’s full-time faculty, and the other is the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, which will be on the second year of their strike in October.
“For clarity, the part-time faculty of Point Park is also unionized,” Dwyer said. “Their contract is with the Steelworkers. Staff at Point Park do not have a union at this time.”
The Globe also reached out to Natalie Rice, vice president of human resources for Point Park and main negotiator for the contract on the administration’s side, but didn’t receive a direct response.
“Out of respect for the process, university leadership will keep private the details of the negotiations,” Louis Corsaro, vice president of public relations, said in a statement.
He said that the university looks forward to negotiating a fair contract that will continue to allow the university and its faculty to provide Point Park students with a world-class education.
Ronald Kubilus, a sophomore criminal justice major, said that he supports unions because his dad is a part of one for sanitation in New York. He said that he believes everyone should have a choice and say in their pay and that being a part of the union gives that to the full-time faculty.
Associate Professor Mark Voortman of business, a faculty negotiator, was not available for an interview but said in an email that one critical issue in the negotiations for him is high inflation.
He said that other full-time faculty would like to see that reflected in their new contract.
“Our peer group accepted a lower wage increase than what we would have liked to have,” John Hines, vice president of the union and professor of social justice studies said.
When talking about the Newsguild’s old contract that was negotiated while the university was recovering from low enrollment rates and inflation, Hines said, “We wanted to say that we did our part by accepting less of an increase last time for congeniality.”
According to the previous contract, the wage for full-time faculty increased by 3.5% in 2021, 3.75% in 2022, and 4.25% in 2023.
In a three-year contract, percentage increases are not at a set rate but are agreed upon for each year as they will be decided in the new contract.
Associate professor of sociology, Marion Dixon, said that the full-time faculty are salary workers and are paid on a monthly cycle.
Dixon said her main points in negotiation are to improve retirement, healthcare, workload and other benefits like faculty benefit funding, or money faculty receive to attend conferences and workshops out of state.
Right now, each faculty member can use $700 of “professional development funds” to pay for the expenses it might take to go to these conferences and workshops.
They can apply for up to $1,300 in funding that at least 25% of faculty members can receive. Dixon hopes for this stipend-like funding to be negotiated to a higher amount for the new contract.
The two parties have been negotiating the new contract since it expired this summer. Their schedule for negotiations was fairly irregular, Hines said, but they tried to set up a meeting every week.
With the start of the fall semester, the parties negotiate on Fridays inside classrooms when faculty negotiators are available.
Although at first, he said he thought it might be exciting to negotiate a contract, Hines said that the negotiations are “fairly mundane.”
At the negotiations, each party has a lawyer present, according to Hines. The lawyer for the union is Steven Winslow of Jubelirer Pass and Intrieri law firm.
According to Corsaro, the lawyer for the administration is Matthew Robers of Steptoe and Johnson PLLC.
Hines said that in the negotiations the administration is trying to “significantly” change their healthcare benefits and that the union leaders are trying to convince their faculty that it is in their best interest to make sure any healthcare changes aren’t extreme.
Three years ago, the full-time faculty union took to the streets to demonstrate during their previous contract negotiations. Hines said that the point in time to do that again might come soon.
Nick Mauro, a second-year cinema productions major, works part-time at Market District, a grocery store in Murrysville where he and his coworkers are unionized. He said that he is in full support of the full-time faculty being able to negotiate their contract.
Although he pays $20 for union dues on each paycheck, he said that the extra $2 the union negotiated for his and his co-worker’s pay is worth it.
“Unions save lives, they give us weekends, they give us pay,” Mauro said. “They’re very important to our society of workers and society as a whole. Good on them, hopefully they, [the full-time faculty,] get whatever they want out of it.”
Hines said that one of the most rewarding parts of his professional career has been his ability to be a part of a union at Point Park and negotiate a fair contract. His co-worker and co-union member Dixon feels the same.
“It’s exciting to have a voice at the table and to be a part of the decision-making process at the university,” Dixon said. “We hope that we’re going to get a fair contract soon, I feel confident.”
