Part-time faculty win health insurance coverage from SMCCD

Certainly the most historic win from our union’s last contract campaign was an MOU for District-sponsored health insurance for part-time faculty working 40% or more of full-time including across multiple community college districts. This benefit was rolled out by the District during a very brief 11-day open enrollment period in October 2024. 

As this benefit was finally codified last summer, during a time when union membership meetings were on pause and many members off contract, our union acknowledges a missed opportunity for celebration!  Regardless, we are both proud and grateful to our union’s negotiating team for their skills and perseverance, and to our courageous members who turned out repeatedly to speak to the Board, to the more than 1,000 people who signed AFT’s petition for a fair contract, and to our sibling unions and CFT leaders who also spoke out in person and by zoom in support of our part-time faculty’s access to affordable health insurance.

A long and hard-fought battle

As far back as 1994, when student journalists from CSM announced AFT’s demonstration “to protest the district’s refusal to provide…benefits to part-time faculty,”  inviting faculty to pack the board room for their rally, securing insurance for our part-timers has been a high priority. 

The recent victory was achieved in two main phases. The first involved drafting the bill and lobbying to get the legislation, known as AB190, passed. (AB190 provides for state-sponsored insurance whereby our district can be reimbursed 100% of their spending on part-time insurance costs, meaning the benefit comes to our district for free). 

Right away, our union joined the California Federation of Teachers (CFT’s) Part-Time Healthcare Campaign (PTHC), attended a union organizing conference in Santa Clara, and participated in Lobby Day, where union rank and file members and leaders met with legislators in Sacramento to share our personal stories of life without affordable health insurance. See AFT 1493 reps attend CFT’s conference and lobby day supporting “Equity for Contingent Faculty” (May 2022). 

Once AB190 passed in March 2023, phase two involved stepping up our local activism by speaking out to the District’s Board of Trustees several times. At their March 2023 meeting, a strong group of speakers urged the Board to direct District negotiators to agree to a contract that included affordable healthcare for all faculty. See “15 speakers present strong case to Board of Trustees for Part-time Parity and Part-Time Faculty Healthcare.” 

The next action in April 2023 included gathering more than 1,000 signatures on a petition demanding part-time healthcare and presenting that to the Board. Yet another significant action in April 2024 focused specifically on securing vision and dental insurance for part-time faculty, a benefit we’ve not yet won. With an understanding that faculty working conditions are directly tied to student learning experiences, students also showed up in support. 

Beyond the activism

Here is how things played out contractually: our District was in its second year of stalling to implement AB190. This meant many eligible part-time faculty had already lost out on a year of insurance benefits and missed savings of $3,000 or more, when AFT’s negotiators, tackling insurance as one of our union’s contract “reopeners,” were able to convince the District to offer the medical insurance benefit through December 2026. 

Their next challenge, also successful, was convincing the district not to scrap, as they intended to do, the previously negotiated reimbursement option (stipend) for part-faculty wishing to keep their non-District insurance plans. (In August 2023, the union had won another MOU that substantially raised these stipends to up to the 100% of the single party Kaiser premium rate).

Work to do

Despite our 30 years of activism, our work is not done. This is because the health insurance benefit only extends through December 2026, and because it does not include dental or vision insurance for part-time faculty, a benefit granted to full-time faculty which our board members (as part-time employees) also enjoy. 

While the union succeeded both at temporarily securing the insurance and retaining the reimbursement, the unexpected consequence was that the reimbursement will now be taxable as income and be paid out every six months rather than quarterly. Additionally, part-time faculty eligible for our District sponsored insurance, but wishing to stay on Covered California, no longer qualify for Covered CA’s subsidized rates. 

Future enrollment

Faculty interested in enrolling in the Spring term or earlier due to a qualifying event should reach out to George Sampior, Jr. in Human Resources at sampiorg@smccd.edu for eligibility and enrollment help. The union gratefully acknowledges Mr. Sampior’s patience and hard work during this first-ever, very brief enrollment period.

Solutions going forward

This year the California Federation of Teachers (CFT) will propose new legislation that would require CalPERS to offer annualized eligibility to part-time faculty such that eligibility does not need to be reconfirmed every six months. Some districts who don’t use CalPERS already have negotiated annual coverage. The College of Marin is an example of a district that offers identical health care between full-time and part-time faculty with a reimbursement currently up to $2600/mo., (almost double ours). Our union will continue to advocate for enhanced health benefits for part-time faculty. Clearly there are models our District could follow.