As IUP opens classes for the fall semester today, the faculty union at the 14 State System schools has issued its most forceful statement yet that in-person instruction should be curtailed, at least for one semester.
Teaming with two unions from Temple University, APSCUF has written a letter to the leaders of the State System and Temple to “change course before it’s too late”. The unions specifically call on the trustees to immediately reduce all in-person classes to only those courses that are legally required to be so, and to honor all requests by faculty union members to work remotely.
In addition to those two steps, the letter asks consideration of four others, including detailing what metrics would trigger a further shutdown of in-person classes; a dashboard with statistics on Covid-19 infections since the start of the semester; a six-point checklist of measures to ensure remaining on-campus worker safety; and including union and local community members in the decision-making process.
The letter from the APSCUF Executive Council recognizes the amount of work and resources that have been put into opening the campuses for the fall, but asserts that if the State System and Temple do not heed their warning, they “will poison the relationship among all of (their) stakeholders for the foreseeable future.”
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