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The PCC Faculty Association approved a new contract with an overwhelming vote of 146 to 1 on Friday. The new contract includes a 5 percent increase in faculty salaries that was negotiated with the college.”The voting results affirm the union’s contract. The two things that are most important to me, are that the members said ‘yes’ to the contract, and that this new union did a great job,” said history Professor Susie Ling.

The new union is barely six months old and has already achieved a lot, according to Ling.

Vice President of Instruction and leading District negotiator Jackie Jacobs confirmed the agreement, which is expected to be approved by PCC’s Board of Trustees.
“The three things that we agreed on are the 5 percent increase for part-time and full-time faculty, fringe benefits paid for by the District, and the joint editing and revision of the 2003 contract,” said Jacobs.

The 5 percent increase in teacher’s pay will be retroactive from July 1, 2007.
Everyone should be receiving their check in late April or early May, according to union Secretary Roger Marheine.

At the PCCFA’s meeting on March 20, some audience members were upset with the way part-time faculty are being compensated.
“In all good conscience, it is immoral for the college to do that to our part-time teachers,” said Associate Professor Kay Yee. She was referring to a part-time faculty member who was re-hired based on her experience.

However, her pay was reset to the beginning of the scale because she stopped working at PCC for 40 months.
According to Yee, part-time faculty members that cease to work at PCC for more than 39 months have their pay rate reduced to the scale they began at.

“It’s a shame, we lost a good teacher,” she added.

Sociology Instructor Tony Jugé shared a similar sentiment regarding part-time faculty. “It’s shocking about the hours for adjunct (part-time) faculty. If the college says that they are all about student success, then the students need office hours [from part-time faculty],” said Jugé.

According to Marheine, part-time faculty has no job security, no office hours and no health benefits.

Jugé commented on parity for the part-time faculty. Parity is the concept of equal pay in proportion between part-time and full-time faculty. “The college is not moving forward in reaching equal pay between full-time and part-time,” said Jugé.

The PCCFA’s position on part-time faculty compensation is that their rate of pay is not in equal proportion to that of full-time faculty members.

According to Jacobs, the District wants to make certain that adjuncts are treated fairly and get parity. “Because of the budget situation we can’t guarantee anything on parity as of right now, but we are working towards 87 percent of full-time salary. But it’s going to take awhile,” said Jacobs.

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