The Launch of Article Committees: A note of thanks AND an invitation to our members

By Jessica Silver-Sharp

It was with both excitement and trepidation that I met with our local’s new Executive Director Chet Lexvold in his second week of work to break the news: AFT would be forming article committees of faculty for each of the ten areas of our contract that faculty prioritized through a Fall 2024 contract survey.  Not only that, but his work would begin immediately, and he would be in charge of creating our first ever structures for documentation, meetings and other communications to make it all work. Oh, and did I mention? He would also be running it. And by the way, we’d never really tried this before on this scale. 

Very fortunately for our local, Chet did not run out the door. He rolled up his sleeves and got to work. Three very long months later, with many good lessons learned along the way, we are excited to report that much of the communal work of committee meetings, research and proposal writing has been accomplished, with more than 25 rank and file union members representing all three campuses and many divisions participating. 

A growing number of faculty have also joined Friday afternoon zoom bargaining sessions with AFT and District negotiators to watch and participate in the work of convincing the District to accept our important proposals for a fair contract. However, observers do more than watch; when we caucus, faculty support our negotiators in real time contributing to the formation of our responses to the District’s often dismissive counter proposals that frequently fail to reflect the reality of our daily work with students

Lastly, we are grateful to our negotiators for all of their preparation work and time at the bargaining table, to Chet for the aforementioned and continuing hard work, and to Cañada College AFT Chapter Chair and Chemistry professor Camille Kaslan for her “big picture” vision and outstanding ability to turn ideas into action.