CFA strike begins
As early as 6 a.m. on Monday, the first day of the California Faculty Association (CFA) strike commenced in San Luis Obispo and all CSU universities across California. The CFA and supporters began picketing at the entrances of Grand Avenue, California Boulevard and Highland Drive, impeding traffic entering the campus.
Cal Poly students came out to support faculty and staff striking by sporting CFA-branded T-shirts and red clothing and by raising signs and participating in the picket lines. Many signs read “Faculty working conditions are student working conditions.”
Graphic communications junior Bucky Stewart and aerospace engineering junior Katie Forhan picketed with faculty on Grand Avenue at 11 a.m., chanting “solidarity forever.”
“Our lecturers are the ones there for us and teaching us and making Cal Poly the school I want to go to,” Forhan said. “I chose to go here because the aerospace engineering program is absolutely incredible and there’s so many opportunities and that’s all built on the backs of professors and faculty.”
The march uphill
At 11:30 a.m., picketers headed toward the O’Neill Green Lawn for lunch and prepared for the rally at noon, where former San Luis Obispo mayor Heidi Harmon spoke and showed her support for the CFA.
“To me, solidarity is a verb. That takes action; that takes really showing up even if it’s pouring down rain. I’m here in support of these values,” Harmon said.
Other speakers included San Luis Obispo City Council member Emily Francis and history senior Ethan Gutermann, a student assistant for the Cal Poly Office of University Diversity and Inclusion.
“Striking takes courage and if we care about making SLO a place where people of all backgrounds can not only survive but thrive, we need to make sure there are high-quality jobs that compensate people fairly for their labor,” Francis said. “We get into these generational patterns in our country where we keep discovering and forgetting the importance of unions. Right now, unions are having a moment again. People are seeing the value of collective bargaining playing out right in front of us.”
As president of the CFA-SLO chapter and temporary lecturer of 26 years, Lisa Kawamura led the rally and the following march uphill through the Cal Poly campus to the Administration building. Strikers surrounded the building, chanting protests to the CSU’s response of a 5% pay raise after the CFA had demanded a 12% pay increase, pay equity, manageable workloads and an increase in benefits.
“You know it must be important if people are going to come out on an ugly day like today, but what comes after the rain is sunshine and that’s where we’re going to be,” Kawamura said.
The tentative agreement
After one day of striking, the CFA reached a tentative agreement as of Monday at 9 p.m. and ended the strike across all CSU campuses. Cal Poly’s Emergency Operations Center emailed the campus community notifying the end of strike activity and classes canceled by the strike to be resumed.
The major components of the agreement include a 5% general salary increase for all faculty as well as another 5% wage increase that relies on base funding to the CSU. The lowest paid faculty will have an additional $3,000 increase on July 1, as well as the $3,000 increase from July 1, 2023, according to the CFA’s website. A four-week increase in paid parental leave, more access to gender-inclusive restrooms and support for lecturer engagement were also included in the tentative agreement.
“We can live with those things,” Kawamura told Mustang News. “I’m not[let down], it shows that it was enough pressure that the chancellors office felt like they needed to capitulate.”
After the CFA announced the tentative agreement and the end of the strike on their Instagram, the reaction online was filled with disappointment, and commenters were unhappy with the CFA’s decision to accept the terms that the Chancellor’s office offered.
“This is incredibly disappointing. We must hold the line and refuse this appeasement contract,” one commenter said. “Our faculty and our students deserve so much more than this. There was nothing about workload or mental health services in the email. This is complete garbage and a massive failure from CFA.”
Earlier in the day, the CFA’s strike schedule on Instagram had a second rally scheduled for Tuesday at 11:30 a.m. and picket line schedules from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. until Friday.
On the Instagram post about there being an agreement, one user asked, “What happened to 5% is not enough?” in reference to one of the chants the CFA used while picketing.
CFA members will vote on the tentative agreement in the upcoming weeks and the official agreement will be shared with the public beyond the highlights, according to an email from the CFA.
This is an ongoing story. Mustang News will continue to update this article as new information arises.
Kathryn Clark and Matthew Muren contributed to the reporting of this story.