SUPPORT CCSF FACULTY & STUDENTS

Our colleagues at AFT 2121, the City College of San Francisco faculty union, need support. They have been battling layoffs and course cuts that would decimate CCSF. City College faculty agreed to big sacrifices, including progressive salary reductions from 4% to 11% to prevent the layoffs of 163 full-time faculty and to prevent the loss of hundreds of classes taught by adjunct faculty.  They are fighting not only to save jobs, but also to preserve the institution that has given so many individuals pathways into new careers and new lives in the Bay Area.

Watch AFT 1493 Skyline Part-Timer Rep. Tim Rottenberg deliver a solidarity message to CCSF faculty from SMCCCD faculty at a CCSF support rally on Saturday, May 8 at S.F. Civic Center:

Please join CCSF faculty’s fight by taking the following two steps:

  1. Write to San Francisco City Leaders and tell them you support finding short term and long term funding solutions to make sure CCSF can serve San Franciscans who rely on us. Rap and contact info here: https://tinyurl.com/pr24r8rk
  2. If CCSF has had an impact on your life, your community, or the communities you work with, please share your 90-second CCSF success story here: https://hope.xyz/ccsf

For more details, read AFT 2121’s full email to the CCSF community below:

Dear CCSF Community,

AFT 2121 faculty have sacrificed and stood together to preserve classes, jobs, and programs. AFT 2121‘s bargaining team reached a tentative agreement with with City College administration early Saturday morning that saves CCSF from the threat of devastating cuts. The district has agreed to rescind the 163 pink slips issued to full-time CCSF faculty members and to preserve almost all part-time faculty assignments. This is an important victory for our students and our college–these cuts would have fundamentally undermined the historic role of CCSF in our city. There is no doubt that we would not have achieved this outcome without the pressure you helped us to collectively build. 

However, our bargaining team was able to reach this agreement with the district only by agreeing to big sacrifices, including progressive salary reductions from 4% to 11% for faculty already struggling to afford to live in the bay Area. We did this to buy time, so that City College can survive in the short term and with the expectation that we will all fight to ensure a long term solution that will bring revenue to the college. AFT 2121 members are voting on the agreement this weekend and will have a final decision before the Trustees meet tomorrow.

This agreement is a short-term solution that, if ratified, will be a testament to the commitment CCSF’s faculty has for its college. Now we need to see the same commitment from CCSF’s Trustees, administration, and from our political leaders on the local, state, and federal level. 

It is not enough to talk about the essential role of community colleges in addressing racial, gender, and class inequality. We need stable, long-term funding. For CCSF, the budget problem remains. There will continue to be a gap between what the state is willing to provide and the demand for classes and services what San Francisco’s residents need. And our work must continue to restore and protect programs already damaged by cuts and still at risk of further cuts in the Fall like ESL, Nursing, and Disabled Students Programs and Services. AFT 2121 is committed to working with political and community allies to find a real long-term solution to the chronic under-funding of City College and to our community college system more broadly.

The truth is we’re only getting started. This is a fight for accessible higher education, and that’s what our communities need now more than ever to find the skills, jobs, and hope needed to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Join this fight by taking the following two steps:

  1. Write to San Francisco City Leaders and tell them you support finding short term and long term funding solutions to make sure CCSF can serve San Franciscans who rely on us. Rap and contact info here: https://tinyurl.com/pr24r8rk
  2. Share your 90 second CCSF success story here: https://hope.xyz/ccsf

In solidarity,

TEAM AFT 2121

 

P.S. Definitely, check out on TwitterFacebook, or Instagram an amazing video made by Anjali Sundaram, Shella Cervantes, and Alexi Lacey–it’s promoting our Open Letter to the Trustees. Sharing this video is a great way to ensure Trustees get a new surge of emails in the lead up to their meeting tomorrow at 4pm. We need them to ratify this agreement and then start stepping up much more aggressively to fight for the CCSF San Francisco deserves!