A Seat at the Table
It’s been a decade-long journey for full-time faculty at Trinity Western University, but in March 2023, they finally secured CLAC representation. Their success story is a win not only for them, but for the entire TWU community
By Rachel Debling
SINCE ITS FOUNDING IN 1962, Trinity Western University (TWU) has committed to equipping its students for life. The institution’s faculty and administration have long worked together to uphold this goal, and they have done so with a world-class approach to research and scholarship while adhering to the school’s Christian roots and beliefs.
Its three locations—one in Ottawa, another in Richmond, BC, and the last only a short drive from CLAC’s Langley Member Centre—accept students from all walks of life across dozens of schools of study. Its faculty is equally cosmopolitan.
Now, the school’s 170-plus full-time faculty count themselves as part of an even larger community after CLAC was certified to represent them by the British Columbia Labour Relations Board (BCLRB) this past March. But getting to this point was a story over 10 years in the making.
A DECADE AGO, IN 2012, a group of faculty members approached CLAC with an idea: organize its professors so that they can better work with the school’s administration and provide the best education possible.
At the time, they were part of a body called the Faculty Association, which was comprised of fulltime faculty and some part-time faculty. It was a place where they could speak to the school’s administration on working and employment conditions.
The association, however, was an advisory board and not an official part of the decision-making process. They could recommend how they would like the school’s faculty and programs to be governed, but some members felt they had little control in the outcome.
“The faculty would send its concerns, ideas, and advice to the administration, but these could be taken as mere suggestions,” says Holly Nelson, an English professor with TWU for more than two decades. “The significance of the faculty’s voice, therefore, depended on the perspective of those who served on the administration.”
In most academic settings, the faculty expects to be a part of the decision-making. Today, essentially all public universities in Canada have legally certified bargaining representation, whether through a faculty association or through a third-party union like CLAC. TWU, on the other hand, is a private institution.
Holly compares her experiences as a teaching assistant and part-time lecturer at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, BC, where she did belong to a union, with those at TWU.
“The working relationship between management and faculty at Simon Fraser was rather strained,” says Holly. “Faculty tend to focus on protecting academic quality and facilitating the intellectual growth of students while administration is often compelled to dwell on such issues as the economics and efficiency of an institution.
“When both parties are on an even playing field, this relationship can work well, and a balanced perspective ensues. Because Simon Fraser faculty were protected by the union, this balance was far easier to maintain.”
ANOTHER TWU FACULTY MEMBER WHO found herself intrigued by the possibility of labour union representation was Robynne Healey, a history professor who has been working at the university since the early 2000s. It was the variety of denominations within the student body and staff that initially made TWU an attractive career option to Robynne.
“When I started teaching at Trinity, I think that the percentage of students in my classes who were Christian was in the high 90s,” she says. “Now, because we bring in students from all over the world, and there is no expectation that students sign the Statement of Faith or even that they belong to a faith community, we have students who are Christian, non-Christian, and every other faith background. It’s quite diverse.”
Chad Friesen, a chemistry professor and another long-time faculty member who was involved in both organizing drives, felt a similar attraction to TWU based on what it could offer as an employer.
“The thing that drew me to the institution at the time was that they were looking to hire someone to bolster their research capacity within the sciences,” he says. “And since I was in research and development, that was something I was certainly interested in assisting with, in terms of building capacity.”
For media and communication professor Kevin Schut, the school was a perfect fit for him and his family.
“When I came to TWU, I found it to be a really wonderful, ecumenical Christian community, a place for good scholarship,” he says. “I love teaching the students. It’s been a great institution to work at, in many ways, and that hasn’t changed for me.”
Though Kevin found that his career at the university aligned both with his spirituality and his goals as an educator, he also wished there were avenues through which they could more clearly affect decisions made at the top. With limited experience regarding union representation (he was a member of one when working for a grocery chain in his early days as well as during his time as a graduate student), he followed the organizers into their first union drive.
THE FACULTY MEMBERS I SPOKE with all echoed one main reason behind the 2012 union drive: to have a seat at the table when it came to decisions about how board positions were awarded.
“The issue was with the model that the university was using,” says Chad. “In fact, it was what sparked the first organizing drive back in 2012.
“They set up what is known as the Carver model. Under this model, the president is the only person who speaks to the board. And since the board made decisions pertaining to programming, among other issues, some faculty felt they didn’t have much of a say, even though they were the ones most involved with the day-to-day operation of the school.”
The union organizers believed that giving faculty a voice would not only boost the morale of the group but also help them in their work as educators. “It’s certainly worthwhile to get your faculty and staff on board so that we can pull on the same rope,” says Chad.
RECOGNIZING THE NEED FOR CHANGE, and receptive to the message of CLAC, a few enthusiastic professors set forth on starting a revolution of sorts.
With the backing of CLAC, the organizing group set to task spreading their message and handing out information. And in late fall 2012, satisfied they had enough support, they put their certification to a vote.
The group hit a roadblock, however, when the vote was challenged and sealed until March 2013, after another challenge from the university was resolved at the labour relations board. Sadly, when the vote was finally counted, the drive failed by only four percent. Needless to say, it was a disappointment to those who had worked so hard throughout the drive.
FAST FORWARD NEARLY 10 YEARS later to 2021. Now, it wasn’t just the desire to be able to weigh in on board appointments and have their opinions heard that was of concern to TWU faculty. Another issue that had emerged was questions as to how programs were being ranked, which started in the thick of the pandemic.
“The administration wanted to review all the departments in terms of the number of students that would be enrolled in those programs to see how financially fit they were,” says Chad. “They came up with kind of a grading, or ranking, system for each of the faculties and schools. We were told that it would be used for developing strategic plans to see what departments needed additional support.”
Some of the staff felt that this new system was being used to weigh certain programs unfairly, resulting in some disappearing from the roster altogether.
“During this time, the university decided to cut a couple of programs,” says Chad. “And some of the programs they were cutting weren’t on the bottom end of the rubric. It didn’t make logical sense.”
The faculty members who had initiated the drive back in 2012 were left wondering about the reasoning behind these cuts, with no answers. And so the passion that stoked the fire of the original drive reignited in full force.
THOUGH THE PANDEMIC HAD MADE certain aspects of their jobs more difficult, the opposite turned out to be true for the faculty’s second organizing drive. The most difficult part was locating the personal emails of faculty members to communicate their plans outside of work. Virtual meetings were a blessing in disguise, as it allowed professors with often erratic schedules to carve out time, whenever and wherever, to discuss future plans.
This time around, the momentum grew quickly. But unlike the first drive, the need to limit organizing efforts to full-time faculty was immediately apparent.
“The big thing I recall for us as an organizing group was that we wanted to open it up to everybody,” says Robynne. “But once we started signing cards, it became a bit untenable. All these positions started coming out of the woodwork.”
Within the span of a few months, they were in a position to vote. Emboldened by the support they had received from their coworkers, they did so with hope in their hearts.
But the faculty were dealt another blow. In October 2021, the university challenged the appropriateness of the bargaining unit description with the BCLRB. Until the labour board ruled, the ballots would remain sealed.
It took over a year and three hearings at the board for a decision to be made. Finally, on March 10, 2023, after years of trying to become certified, the board issued that the vote was valid, and the ballots were counted: 64 percent of full-time faculty had voted in favour of CLAC!
The news was welcomed with tears of joy for many of those who had been with the university since the first attempt to unionize 10 long years before.
For Holly, being represented by CLAC was never about trumping the administration’s wishes. It was about creating an environment where faculty, students, and staff could thrive.
“I do not view our unionization as a win for faculty and a loss for the university—I see it as a win for the entire organization,” she says. “I believe that the vast majority of people who work at TWU, or who help oversee it, want the university to flourish and are willing to engage in meaningful and transparent dialogue to achieve this goal.”
Kevin agrees. “We think all the stakeholders should have a voice in how the university runs,” he says. “Students are a big part of that, faculty are a big part of that, the staff, the administration obviously, alumni, our donors—all these people contribute to the community that is TWU and to its day-to-day operation. They all matter, and they should all be a part of the process of running the university.”
THOSE INVOLVED IN THE DRIVE recognize that this is the first step in a process that will take some time, culminating with the ratification of their first collective agreement. More than anything, they are happy to finally have a union that will help them navigate the issues they have been wanting to address for a decade.
“So many faculty and staff members have sacrificed a great deal to work at the university because they believe that a healthy, inclusive, and diverse faith-based educational institution has an important part to play in a distinctly Canadian context,” says Holly. “I believe that CLAC will help us to accomplish this end.”
Robynne agrees. “The feeling is that we now have access to folks who can help us, who will answer questions, who will support us,” she says. “It’s not that we can do whatever we want. But it feels like we now have a resource at our disposal that will change the work environment for faculty going forward.” The legacy that these faculty members are leaving their colleagues is immeasurable.
Thanks to their new representation, they are already feeling more empowered and readier than ever to continue the good work they do in shaping the minds of future leaders in the arts, sciences, and beyond.
Welcome to CLAC!
A Rich History of Enriching Minds
Trinity Western University (TWU) was created with the dream of providing students with the foundation for a “full and meaningful life.” It offers a liberal arts core, encouraging students to participate in an interdisciplinary style of education to better prepare them for active engagement in their community and their workplace.
In 1957, the idea for TWU was first pitched by a small group of people, including church leader David Enarson, who wanted to offer the nation a distinctly Christian accredited university. After purchasing the Seal Kap dairy farm in BC’s Fraser Valley, and following much planning, Trinity Junior College opened in 1962.
Two name changes later (to Trinity Western College in 1972, then to Trinity Western University in 1985) and the school is thriving. Recognized nationally for its scholastic offerings and consistently ranked high in Maclean’s annual survey on universities, TWU is home to more than 5,000 students, nearly 60 percent of whom are international students hailing from more than 80 countries. Approximately 30,000 people count themselves TWU alumni.
Source: twu.ca
First-Class Programs
Trinity Western University offers more than 60 areas of study online and through its Langley and Richmond, BC, locations, including
• Arts, Media, and Culture
• Biotechnology
• Chemistry
• Game Development
• Gender Studies
• Kinesiology
• Marriage and Family Therapy
• Philosophy
• Psychology
• World Languages and Cultures
Its Ottawa location offers a live-in extension program through the school’s Laurentian Leadership Centre. The program is intended for third- and fourth-year students or recent grads of all majors and includes three upper-level courses, community living in a historic mansion, and a field placement. Students who have participated in this program have gone on to work with members of parliament, at nongovernmental organizations such as the Red Cross, at embassies, and at the Canadian War Museum, among other high-profile careers.
Source: twu.ca