Unprecedented Actions to Reduce Teaching Equivalencies (TE) at Kapiolani CC

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UHPA was notified by Chancellor Pagotto of a significant cut in Teaching Equivalencies (TE) for Spring 2020 due to fiscal problems at Kapiolani CC. These reductions affect a large number of faculty members and is without precedence. TE’s constitute work responsibilities that are part of your compensation and conditions of work. These reductions may impact delivery of instruction and support for students along with diminished employment for some employees. The impact of these measures is not fully known.

UHPA was not consulted before the implementation of TE reductions nor did Chancellor Pagotto request negotiations on changes in compensation and working conditions that are impacted by the action being taken.

UHPA considers this a very serious matter and is preparing to take the necessary steps to ensure that faculty members are protected from harmful employer actions that undermine your job security, compensation and working conditions.

UHPA has requested that the UH System administration intervene immediately to address the fiscal situation and stop the unilateral reduction of TE’s. Further this requires the employer and UHPA to meet and negotiate on these matters. The employer needs to meet its legal obligations.

2019 UHPA Board of Directors’ Election

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In accordance with the UHPA Bylaws, the UHPA Nominations & Elections Committee is charged with preparing a list of nominees for the 2019 Board of Directors’ Election.

On April 2, 2019, all UHPA Active members of the relevant constituency units (Hawaii CC, Honolulu CC, Kauai CC, UH-Manoa & UH-Hilo) will receive an email notice with voting information and instructions on voting electronically.  A link to all candidates’ biographical information and personal statements will also be provided.  The voting period for the UHPA Board of Directors’ Election will run from April 2, 2019 through April 23, 2019.

The Supreme Court tsunami that might take your rights away – A UHPA Gathering is Coming to Your Campus

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If you care about salary raises, tenure, and defending faculty rights, your participation in this UHPA interactive session is vital. See campus-specific dates and times listed at the bottom and also check your email for meeting reminders. Please make time for this.

Why should you attend: To defend the employee rights you have fought so hard for.

The “Janus” case is currently being heard by the Supreme Court and most agree that its outcome will almost certainly be an unprecedented attack on your employee rights. UHPA is working to prepare all members for its impact and to prevail after it strikes.

What will you learn:

  • What is Janus and specifically how is that pending decision threatening public employees?
  • How will Janus affect our ability to defend our employee rights?
  • Discuss the results of your campus survey.

Why you should not miss this

Within a year, Janus will have been decided. Like any tsunami, those that are well-prepared for it will have the best chance for survival. If your rights as an employee matter to you, do not miss this event.

CAMPUS DATES & TIMES:

UH West Oahu, D145
Thursday, November 2, 2017
2:00-3:20 p.m.

Hawaii CC – Manono Campus, Bldg #383, Room #215
Monday, November 6, 2017
11:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.

UH Hilo, UCB 111
Monday, November 6, 2017
3:00-4:30 p.m.

Honolulu CC, Building 2, Room 201
Tuesday, November 7, 2017
10:00-11:30 a.m.

Windward CC, Hale Akoakoa 130
Tuesday, November 7, 2017
3:00-4:30 p.m.

Kapiolani CC, Ohia 118
Wednesday, November 8, 2017
9:00-11:00 a.m.

UH JABSOM, Sullivan Conference Center
Wednesday, November 8, 2017
1:30-3:00 p.m.

UH Maui College, KAA 105CD
Monday, November 13, 2017
12:30-2:00 p.m.

HITS Sessions at:  Hawaii CC-Palamanui Campus, Koali 102;
Molokai 103; Lanai 106; Lahaina Conf.
Monday, November 13, 2017
12:30-2:00 p.m.

UH-Manoa, Kuykendall 101 (Auditorium)
Tuesday, November 14, 2017
12:00-1:30 p.m.
(No food or beverages allowed)

UH-Manoa, Campus Center 308
Tuesday, November 14, 2017
3:30-5:00 p.m.

Kauai CC, Fine Arts 1 Auditorium (Multipurpose Room)
Wednesday, November 15, 2017
2:30-4:00 p.m.

Leeward CC, LA-102
Monday, November 27, 2017
1:00-2:30 p.m.

State Senator Kaiali‘i Kahele visiting UH Campuses

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Senator Kahele, Chair of the Senate Committee on Higher Education, will be conducting a statewide higher education tour this fall to visit all 10 University of Hawai‘i System campuses and affiliated education centers. The time, date and location of the meeting on your campus are included in PDF links below.

If your schedule permits, we encourage you to take advantage of this opportunity to provide feedback on the important issues impacting your campus communities.

For questions regarding the meeting on your campus, please contact Ikaika Mahoe at the office of Senator Kahele at (808) 586-6760 or via email at i.mahoe@capitol.hawaii.gov.

Campus-Specific Visit Details (pdf downloads)

Kapiolani CC Chancellor Leon Richards Announces Retirement

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On May 4, 2016 UHPA received a copy of a Kapiolani Community College letter from the Chancellor’s office announcing the retirement of Chancellor Leon Richards from his present position on May 15, 2016 and from UH on December 1, 2016.

Shrinking support for the chancellor

This announcement marks the end of a series of No Confidence votes on the chancellor and public Op-Eds. UHPA Members at Kapiolani Community College embarked on a long and arduous journey to bring about change on their campus and we commend them on completing their quest.

Rate My Administrator played a key role

Results from UHPA’s “Rate My Administrator” survey for Kapiolani CC was  used by their Faculty Senate in their letter to the faculty when announcing the approval of a motion to initiate a vote of no confidence. UHPA Executive director Kristeen Hanselman said, “The recent events by employees and students demonstrated that taking a stand to be treated with respect can make the KCC campus a better place to work and study. This effort by many to speak out and share their common experience is something that others can emulate to demand a better campus environment. KCC employees and students did good.”

Expressing the will of the faculty

UHPA’s leadership will continually explore methods and tools to enable the expression and realization of the will of the faculty in the long-standing tradition of shared governance in higher education. We commend the Kapiolani Community College community in having the courage to voice their views and take appropriate action to improve their conditions.

Document History related to the retirement announcement

Why I voted no confidence on Dr. Richards at Kapiolani CC

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I first began teaching at KCC in 1989. Since then I have moved from being a part time lecturer teaching multiple disciplines to a full professor and the current Chair of the Arts and Humanities Department. I voted no confidence on a personal level because I have watched myself and many of my colleagues shift slowly and inexorably from professionals who joyfully engaged students, sharing our passion for the subjects we teach, to feeling like we must put our heads down, disengage and just treat our profession like a job. The accompanying apathy and cynicism I felt was simply too distasteful.

On a more professional level I have discovered since becoming department Chair of one of the largest units on campus, that I had been placed in an untenable situation due to what seems clearly to be inaction and ineptitude on the part of the KCC administration over many years and across several prior department chairs. The atmosphere I walked into was one of hostility and manipulation. I believe I have been lied to and used as a pawn in the administration’s broader agenda because under Dr. Richards’ leadership fundamental problems, which have been widely acknowledged by virtually all those involved, could not be resolved.

If Dr. Richards is genuinely shocked by the current state of affairs, then he is out of touch with the sentiments of a large body of the KCC “ohana.” He is not the engaged leader he envisions himself to be and those most close to him have served him poorly by allowing him to think he had broad support. The vote of no confidence has been a long time coming. Many efforts over many years have been made to communicate low faculty morale and the myriad problems and frustrations many experience in their daily work life at KCC. These efforts have been met with deflection, derision and dismissal.

Yes, numbers can be manipulated but the consistent 3 to 1 or greater margins registered by all four groups that raised the issue of no confidence sends a clear and unambiguous message to Dr. Richards, Vice President Morton, President Lassner and the Board of Regents. I am proud of what my campus has done. This is not a time to negotiate but to reiterate: Dr. Richards must leave.

Sharon Rowe, PhD, MFA
Professor of Philosophy
Chair of Arts and Humanities
Member of the KCC ‘Ohana

E-Portfolio Pilot Project Plan underway for Community Colleges

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Two Years in the Making

A joint “E-portfolio Committee” composed of Community College administration and UHPA has been engaged in a planning process since Spring 2014 to upgrade the current paper-based technology in the tenure and promotion process to an electronic, paperless process that will support rich media (e.g. video & audio) among other features in the dossier.

A Pilot Project Starting this Summer

The committee is planning to start a pilot project this summer which will take a representative sampling of UHPA faculty from community colleges who would normally be submitting an application in the fall.   Relevant administrative and TPRC members will be trained to use the system. This group will then evaluate the performance of the entire project from start to finish in a real-world setting with a genuine application process.

A pilot project, not a full scale implementation

It is important to note that this is a true pilot project, meaning it is “…a small scale preliminary study conducted in order to evaluate feasibility, time, cost, and adverse events…”.  Once the process has concluded in the spring of 2017, community college faculty participating in the process will submit their report on the experience along with a “Go/No-Go” recommendation going forward.

Pilot projects allow UHPA faculty to fully evaluate the system in a real world setting, providing the most accurate portrayal of what others will experience if a full implementation were to go into effect.

Clear, simple evaluation principles

Our committee members established these foundational principles during discussions over the past 2 years that will guide us in evaluations going forward:

  • The system cannot adversely change the existing portfolio evaluation methods.
    • Any policies currently in effect will not be changed.
    • We are changing the technologies used, not the policies that guide them.
  • Faculty must have complete control over the content submitted after the review process has completed to the same degree they do with today’s procedures.
  • Administration must provide adequate staffing, training, and equipment enabling faculty to adequately complete their e-portfolios.

 

Three sides to the pilot project evaluation

It is important to note that in addition to evaluating the suitability of the software, the pilot project will evaluate two other critical elements as well: the faculty and administration.

The three sides of this pilot project evaluation include:

  • The software and its vendor in terms of end-user experience, features, usability, support, performance, cost, and benefits.
  • The faculty in terms of acclimating to electronic document production (e.g. PDFs), using online forms, executing a different production process and acquiring the necessary skills to operate in a digital environment.
  • The administration in terms of providing clear leadership in transitioning to e-portfolios, supplying the necessary support structures in terms of IT-related resources and training, and acclimating to an environment involving online collaboration and electronic workflows.

UHPA believes it is important that all three sides are clear that everyone’s respective performance will incorporated in the evaluation. When UHPA delivers its findings about the pilot project experience in Spring 2017, our report will encompass the experiences reported as they pertain to each of the three sides.

This project is really about the ability to execute

This pilot project is more about the UH Community Colleges ability as a whole to execute on a complex project with deep implications more than it is evaluating the features of a software program and it is key that all stakeholders take this into account as they prioritize their resources to execute this project.

Tenure and Promotion Activity Published

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Thanks to the input and concerns of UHPA members and board members and the cooperation of the UH Office of Human Resources, we have published tenure and promotion activity from 2010-2015.  “Making this data available online is consistent with UHPA’s values of publishing objective data” said Kristeen Hanselman, Executive Director of UHPA, “in our pursuit of making UH a better place to teach, research and serve the community”.  UHPA plans to update this data on an annual basis.

Review Tenure and Promotion Data

Acclaim for JN Musto from UH Maui College

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The UH Maui College Academic Senate honored UHPA Executive Director JN Musto at the May 2, 2015 Board of Directors meeting.  Dr. Nani Azman presented him with a framed and signed resolution recounting his many victories in support of University of Hawai‘i faculty as he negotiated contracts and battled budget cuts across four decades.

The UHMC senate felt the excellence of Dr. Musto’s leadership and wisdom in his thirty-five years of service warranted a formal accolade.

UHMC faculty wish Dr. Musto a heartfelt aloha a hui hou in his retirement.

UHPA director and UHM Professor Brent Sipes in the News

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Kudos go to Brent Sipes who was on camera in a KITV story “UH professors seeing red over greenhouses” and bringing visibility to a sad renovations project on the Pope greenhouse complex that has become ensnared in delays keeping them out of the facility for over five years now.

We’ve started a thread on Facebook  on this story and invite you to join the conversation!