Higher Ed Conference

Wednesday, March 10, 2021
2021 Virtual Higher Education Conference (Pre-Summit)/NCHE Meetings

10:00 AM – 12:00 PM
NCHE Regular Annual Meeting Session #1 – General Business

12:00 PM – 12:30 PM
Break

12:30 PM – 2:30 PM
NCHE Regular Annual Meeting Session #2

3:00 PM – 5:00 PM
Opening General Session
Hanna Vaandering, NEA Executive Committee, Emcee
Welcome and Land Acknowledgment
Becky Pringle, NEA President
Keynote Speaker: Anat Shenker-Osorio, author of Don't Buy It: The Trouble with Talking Nonsense About the Economy
DeWayne Sheaffer, NCHE President
Presentation of the NCHE Davenport Award
Presentation of the NCHE/NEA Higher Educator of the Year Award

5:00 PM – 5:15 PM
BREAK

5:15 PM – 6:45 PM
Concurrent Workshops:

Self-Care in the Pandemic: Resilience
Facilitator: Suzanne Sublette, NCHE Executive Committee, Wisconsin Education Association Council
Presenter: Peggy Hoy, NEA Board of Directors, Idaho Education Association
Leadership competencies: GOVERNANCE AND LEADERSHIP

As we continue to navigate the demands of virtual education, educator self-care is vital. It allows us to be the best version of ourselves. Participants in this session will leave with strategies to help navigate the four categories of self-care: emotional, physical, psychological, and spiritual health. We will discuss strategies to help you build your own efficacy through resilience and will introduce resources to assist you on your own self-care journey. According to author Elena Aguilar, “Resilient people have a healthy self-perception, are committed to taking care of themselves, and accept themselves more or less as they are.”

The Power of Storytelling: How Your Story Can Help You Learn to Lead
Facilitator: Margaret Powell NEA Board of Directors, North Carolina Association of Educators
Presenter: Kirsten Green, Lawson State Education Association/AEA
Leadership competencies: COMMUNICATION & ORGANIZING

In this session, participants will learn how the art of storytelling can be used to engage members and potential members. Participants will also learn skills and strategies to help them develop their own stories. Your story is powerful, and once it is properly framed and told, it can be an excellent motivational piece for those individuals who may need a personal touch to ignite their interest or passion in a cause. Many individuals know why they are passionate about education but lack the skills to present their personal stories in a succinct manner.

Storytelling can help build the capacity of your local association as well as give a more unified voice to members at the state and national level when advocating for the needs of students and educators. Storytelling can empower individual members, and particularly early career educators, to speak out for their needs and be a catalyst for change. Once you have found ‘your why” and can articulate it for impact, your leadership/membership experience will positively shift.

Moving the Needle: Contingent Faculty Organizing Strategies at a Community College
Facilitator: Vivian Zimmerman, NCHE Executive Committee, Illinois Education Association
Presenter: Sue Nightingale, Bellevue College Education Association/WEA
Leadership competencies: ORGANIZING

At Bellevue College, a predominately two-year college in Washington State, 60 percent of class sections are taught by adjunct faculty, yet the majority of the faculty union’s members and leadership were tenured faculty. While bargaining was theoretically balanced between the needs of these two groups, in practicality few if any gains towards pay or workload equity were being made for adjuncts. In 2013, our local made increasing adjunct membership and involvement a priority focus by instituting some changes to our leadership and prioritizing adjuncts in bargaining wins. We built on this small success to energize adjunct member recruitment, and since 2015 our local has increased adjunct membership by 65 percent, made advances in pay equity (still a long way to go), and have dramatically increased the visibility of the local and also kept a spotlight on adjunct faculty issues.

This session will focus on the strategies and challenges around organizing adjunct faculty, including branding, information campaigns, adjunct leadership within the local, and bargaining with an adjunct equity focus. We will discuss what worked a little, what did not work at all, and where we have found success, as well as where we still need to go. Time will be spent at the end of the session sharing ideas and brainstorming solutions to challenges we face.

Building Blocks of a Digital Campaign
Facilitator: Zena Link, NEA Board of Directors, Massachusetts Teachers Association
Presenter: Justin Conley, NEA Center for Communications
Justin Tzuanos, NEA Center for Organizing
Leadership competencies: COMMUNICATION & ORGANIZING

In this session, participants will be introduced to the research, best practices, and digital platforms needed to implement a strategic virtual component to their campaign efforts. Participants will be led through case studies, take part in interactive exercises around content creation, and learn how to and receive the resources to launch a digital campaign on their campus.

6:45 PM - 7:00 PM
BREAK

7:00 PM - 8:30 PM
Meet Your Colleagues – Networking Breakout Sessions Join your colleagues for socializing, networking, and identifying common interests. The breakout rooms are:

• Part-time/Contingent Faculty
• Graduate Assistants
• HBCUs
• Community and Technical Colleges
• Four-year Colleges and Universities

Thursday, March 11, 2021
2021 Virtual Higher Education Conference (Pre-Summit)

10:00 AM - 11:00 AM
General Session
Higher Education in the Biden Administration
Hanna Vaandering, NEA Executive Committee, Emcee
Kim Anderson, NEA Executive Director
Ronny Lau, NEA Government Relations
Antwan Perry, NEA Education Policy and Practice

11:00 AM - 12:30 PM
Concurrent Workshops:

The Missing X-Factor in Higher Education: Black Males
Facilitator: Marcia Mackey, NCHE Secretary and NEA Board of Directors, Michigan Education Association
Presenters: Karl Anthony Pruitt, Sr., Cedric Burden, and Carlos Morris, Lawson State Education Association/AEA
Leadership competencies: ADVOCACY

As the U.S. student population becomes more racially and ethnically diverse, the need for a workforce of educators that mirrors that student diversity grows more urgent. Currently, Black males comprise only three percent of the full-time faculty at U.S. higher education institutions, and too many Black students fare poorly in our higher education system. At both the undergraduate and graduate levels, Black students have some of the lowest persistence rates, highest undergraduate dropout rates, highest borrowing rates, and largest debt burdens of any group. Additionally, Black students also experienced the widest gender gap of any racial group in 2016, when 62.2 percent of Black undergraduates and 70.2 percent of Black graduate students were women (American Council on Education, 2019). And student enrollment rates in Summer 2020 among Black students decreased overall due to the pandemic.

In this session, a panel of Black male educators will provide their perspectives on growing up in different socioeconomic communities and their impressions of the presence or absence of Black male figures in their education and how it affected their lives.

At the 2019 NEA Representative Assembly, delegates adopted NBI 17, a strategy to identify and increase the number of students of color becoming educators. We will learn more about NBI 17 and what progress has been made. How can we as the NEA and in our state and local Associations further racial and social justice in our K-12 schools and in higher education institutions, including creating systems that nurture educators of color? What is the role of HBCUs (Historically Black Colleges and Universities)? How do we work with our community partners and influence legislators to increase the number of educators of color, especially Black males? How could a notable presence of Black males from K-12 through higher education affect our young men of color—their educational progress and career decisions? Our discussion can prompt some empowering next steps to this ongoing challenge.

Promotion vs. Classification as the Way Forward
Facilitator: Philippe Abraham, NCHE Executive Committee, New York State United Teachers
Presenter: Gretchen Osterman, State College & University Professional Association (SCUPA)/PSEA
Leadership competencies: LEADING OUR PROFESSIONS & ORGANIZING

The difference between promotion and classification is subtle, which is why the terms are often used interchangeably. The misuse of promotion enables power dynamics in the workplace to go unchecked. The Association can be a powerful tool to limit intimidation from others who have (or are perceived to have) more power or status than their co-worker. Classification involves members dedicated to data analysis across units developing measurable systems of evaluation of job descriptions.
In this presentation participants will learn:

• To review past systems
• Why an employer may want to update
• Benefits to members
• Organizing approach
• Measurable results and future data gathering.

Organizing High Turnover Locals
Facilitator: Nandi Riley, NCHE Treasurer, Florida Education Association
Presenters: Adela Ghadimi, FSU-GAU/UFF/FEA; Danielle DiRocco, URI-Graduate Assistants United/NEA-RI; and Randall Miller, City Colleges Contingent Labor Organizing Committee (CCCLOC)/IEA
Leadership competencies: ORGANIZING

Building a strong, effective union requires consistent, yearlong work. Association chapters with high turnover populations have special challenges to reach their members and potential members, ensure constant and growing membership, guarantee institutional memory, and develop a resilient leadership and steward structure. In this session you will hear from graduate assistant and part-time faculty leaders. The stories and strategies of these locals have broader relevance for all of us during the pandemic when many more faculty and staff are working from home or are on campus only for limited hours.

Legal Update
Facilitator: Deborah Williams, NCHE Executive Committee, Kansas NEA
Presenters: Jason Walta, NEA Office of General Counsel
Leadership competencies: ADVOCACY

While the Trump administration did provide some support to sectors of the higher education community (e.g., AI research), higher education employees, students, and institutions were also harmed by executive orders, regulatory actions, and NLRB decisions in the last four years. Besides the lack of a federal COVID control program and delays in funding for state and local governments, the Trump administration also limited or ended visa programs and diversity programs; gave more rights to the accused in campus sexual assault cases; abolished collective bargaining rights for certain private sector higher education employees; and refused to help borrowers caught in abusive student loan programs. Seven weeks into the Biden administration, we will discuss what’s changed so far, what NEA’s higher education priorities are, how you can be involved, and what the impact will be on your campuses.

12:30 PM - 1:30 PM
Lunch

1:30 PM - 3:00 PM
Concurrent Workshops:

Faculty Research and Collaboration for Effective Recruitment and Retention Strategies
Facilitators: Erika Taylor and Marissa Puckett Blais, NEA Center for Enterprise Strategy
Presenters: Arlene King-Berry and Brenda Brown, University of the District of Columbia Faculty Association (UDCFA)
Leadership competencies: LEADING OUR PROFESSIONS

Faculty and student retention is a challenge for Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs). At the University of the District of Columbia, data reported by the Office of Admissions over the past two years has demonstrated a significant decrease in student enrollment related to student retention. A similar decline is noted for faculty. These challenges must be addressed in a manner that will promote excellence, social justice, equality, and student success.

Faculty scholarly activities are often limited due to the unavailability of funds to fully support travel to present research papers and posters at regional or national conferences. The inability to document these opportunities may adversely affect annual evaluations, tenure, or promotion. Additionally, the pandemic has presented challenges to researchers and research grant applicants.

This session is an opportunity for participants to share their research interests and current projects regarding recruitment and retention, discuss avenues to present their findings, and explore ways to collaborate with each other and involve our local, state, and national associations to advance faculty professional development, education transformation, student learning, and equitable access to opportunities.

The Growing Weight of Evidence: What We Can Learn from Research on Teaching
Facilitator: Alec Thomson, NCHE Vice President, Michigan Education Association
Presenter: Laura Cruz, Penn State University
Leadership competencies: LEADING OUR PROFESSIONS

Whether you call it the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL), discipline based educational research (DBER), pedagogical research or teaching as research, or something else; all these forms of teaching and learning scholarship share a common focus on enhancing our understanding of teaching and learning in higher education. The recent shift to remote
instruction under COVID-19 has challenged our existing evidence base, however, which has served to illuminate new lines of inquiry, develop more inclusive methodologies, and reconsider the relationship between teaching and scholarship.

In this interactive session, you will spend time getting (re-)acquainted with current research; considering the bigger questions scholars in the field are now asking, and determining what role this vibrant, incisive, and multi-faceted research might play in your on-going work as a teacher-scholar or someone who supports teacher-scholars. As this emerging research turns a new chapter, we will consider how this field can empower us to become institutional change agents, foster thriving communities of teaching and learning on our campuses, and support our on-going adaptability as we face an unknown, but hopeful, future.

Building a Member-Driven Union: United Faculty of Florida’s Organizing Fellows Program
Facilitator: Lauren Byers, UFF/FEA
Presenters: Andrew Gothard, UFF-FAU/FEA, and Nicholas de Villiers, UFF-UNF/FEA
Leadership competencies: ORGANIZING

In August 2018, United Faculty of Florida launched the “Organizing Fellows Program.” Since then, chapters across the state have transformed their union by building strong steward structures, organizing around issues and politics on campus, and achieving majority status (over 50% membership). UFF Fellows (part-time, paid member organizers) from Florida Atlantic University and the University of North Florida will share how UFF chapters build successful organizing campaigns, and what steps YOU can take to build a member-driven union on your campus.

Organizing ESPs for Power & Respect: The Massachusetts Higher Ed Classified Staff Union Project
Facilitator: Peggy Hoy, NEA Board of Directors, Idaho Education Association
Presenter: Leslie Marsland, University Staff Association/MTA, and Miles Stern, MTA
Leadership competencies: ORGANIZING

Education Support Professional (ESP) locals from all five UMass campuses (Amherst, Boston, Dartmouth, Mefical School, and Lowell) recently banded together to address the need for power and respect across the University. To address the unique challenges and opportunities inherent among higher education classified staff, leaders and members from the different locals, including AFSCME and AFT locals, formed the UMass Classified Units Coalition Project. With support from the MTA, and working with union staff and the UMass Labor Centers, these local leaders explore tools and ideas for organizing together, coalition work, and training to better develop leadership, communication, and community across higher ed ESP worksites.

We will explore some of the reasons that prompted these eight locals to come together and some of the outcomes they seek, including respect and power. Whether it is structural classism, racism, and sexism on every campus every day, the disparity in leverage relative to professional staff and faculty units, or the isolation on campus and regulated work time, the symptoms looked similar across the units: privatization and outsourcing of work, lower benefits, outdated job classifications/descriptions, and concerns about health and safety, among others. What are the opportunities and pitfalls?

3:00 PM - 3:15 PM
BREAK

3:15 PM - 5:00 PM
Concurrent Workshops:

Organizing on an HBCU Campus
Facilitator: DeWayne Sheaffer, NCHE President, California Teachers Association
Presenters: Kirsten Green and Karl Anthony Pruitt, Sr., Lawson State Education Association/AEA and Denise Roy, Alabama State University Education Association/AEA
Leadership competencies: ORGANIZING

A worldwide pandemic has completely changed the way colleges and universities operate. Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) have been uniquely impacted by COVID-19. Organizing around campus/policy issues can be challenging when not all faculty and staff have the protection of tenure. It may also be more difficult to recruit members in this environment. Organizing can be a daunting task on a higher education campus but it can be even more challenging when trying to establish/maintain a chapter on an HBCU campus. During this session, participants will share best practices and brainstorm about targeted HBCU organizing issues and learn about opportunities with NEA’s HBCU Institute for Leadership Development, Professional Growth, and Organizing.

Building a Formative Faculty Evaluation System: Can a Better System Build Power in Our Locals?
Facilitator: Andrew Sako, NCHE Membership Chair, New York State United Teachers
Presenters: Doug Hurst, Scott Gevaert, and Emily Neal, St. Louis Community College-NEA/MNEA
Leadership competencies: GOVERNANCE AND LEADERSHIP

The purpose of any faculty evaluation/post-tenure review system is to facilitate and promote life-learning among the faculty. This can lead to continuous improvement in teaching and service. Unfortunately, the old paradigm, driven by administrators, focuses on a “summative” approach to evaluation. Following this approach is a threat to higher education faculty and students.

With the changing demands in higher education and the needs of all stakeholders, does a faculty evaluation system need to be formative in its purpose and outcome? If we are building the foundation for collective action, the answer is YES! In 2017, St. Louis Community College-NEA spearheaded a new faculty evaluation system. Lead by members of the STLCC-NEA executive council, this novel approach to faculty evaluation allows for the growth of a thriving Association while empowering, motivating, and fostering a pipeline of diverse faculty leaders. The session will provide a process overview, from building a task force, influencing the “cultural shift,” developing documents, training, and evaluating the final plan. This will allow participants to see firsthand how to use the power of the local to influence and unite members: Our Democracy Our Responsibility. Our Time!

Gown AND Town: Bargaining for the Common Good in Higher Education
Facilitator: Dale Templeton, NEA Center for Advocacy
Presenters: Marilyn Sneiderman, Rutgers University; Joseph McCartin and Sara Myklebust, Georgetown University
Leadership competencies: ORGANIZING

Bargaining for the Common Good (BCG) is a process whereby union and community members partner around a long-term vision for the structural changes they want to see in their communities. They use union bargaining as a critical moment in a broader campaign to win that change. In this session we will discuss why higher education is a sector particularly well-suited to BCG and provide examples.

In November 2019, our organizations partnered with local leaders and union staff from five national/international unions—NEA, AFT, SEIU, CWA, and AFSCME—for a conference about BCG in higher education. We will discuss the follow-up to the conference and invite NEA members who participate to share their thoughts and progress.

The Road to Retention and College Student Success: An Attachment Theory Perspective
Facilitator: Philippe Abraham, NCHE Executive Committee, New York State Teachers United
Presenter: David Schneider, Saginaw Valley State University Faculty Association/MEA
Leadership competencies: LEADING OUR PROFESSIONS

College student success is rooted in factors well beyond academic preparedness. Learn about evidence-based research that describes constructive student behaviors, addresses productive instructional practices, and identifies institution-wide initiatives associated with college student retention and degree completion rates. Learn about attachment theory (Bowlby, 1973) and about how this may be related to student success. Engage in discussion centered on pedagogy designed to improve student success in your classroom as well as best practice initiatives, for those who work with students outside of the classroom, that could be adopted at your institution.

5:00 PM - 5:30 PM
BREAK

5:30 PM - 7:00 PM
Concurrent Workshops:

Virtual Organizing
Facilitator: Nandi Riley, NCHE Treasurer, Florida Education Association
Presenters: Michelle Gutierrez and John Donaghy, NEA Center for Organizing; Rodolfo Palma, Michigan Education Association
Leadership competencies: ORGANIZING

In this workshop we will share best practices and strategies on how to successfully organize in a virtual environment. We will look at how to adapt foundational organizing skills to a virtual environment while also looking at how our adaptations during the COVID-19 pandemic have yielded strategies that we can use over the long term.

Is It Safe?
Facilitator: Suzanne Sublette, NCHE Executive Committee, Wisconsin Education Association Council
Presenter: Nilka Julio, NEA Center for Organizing
Leadership competencies: ADVOCACY

How to co-create safeR spaces for Black, Brown, and White people. In this session, the goal is to share and learn together, with the guidance of the community norms, as we acknowledge the past and strive for a better future. Physical and virtual spaces can be a place where people can come, as they are, to discover, assert, and empower their voices and to encounter and listen deeply to the voices of others. Spaces are safeR when we take responsibility for what we say, feel, and think to the extent that we can and if we cannot—we can admit that. SafeR spaces require ongoing work and, in an instant, a seemingly safe space can turn unsafe. How we handle those moments is what really determines the safety of the space. Are you ready to listen as if you might be wrong? I am!

Navigating the Student Loan Repayment Journey
Facilitator: Margaret Powell, NEA Board of Directors, North Carolina Association of Educators
Presenter: Susan Rutherford-Estes, NEA Member Benefits
Leadership competencies: ADVOCACY

This workshop will serve two types of attendees: those with student loans and state and local higher education leaders. We will begin with a general demonstration of an online student loan evaluation tool that analyzes personal information to provide borrowers with a complete list of the best loan repayment and loan forgiveness programs for them. Then we will focus on how state and local higher education leaders can use this tool to recruit and engage members and show the value of membership. Time will be given during the session to access the tool. Participants with student loans should have their login information for their loan servicer(s) so they can plug into the tool and see what repayment plan works best for them.

Organizing High Turnover Locals: The College of DuPage Adjuncts Association Story
Facilitator: Andrew Sako, NCHE Membership Chair, New York State United Teachers
Presenter: Bonniejean Alford and Cheryl Baunbach-Caplan, CODAA/IEA
Leadership competencies: ORGANIZING

Building a strong, effective union requires consistent, year-round work. Association chapters with high turnover populations have special challenges to reach their members and potential members, ensure a constant and growing membership, guarantee institutional memory, and develop a resilient leadership and steward structure. The stories and strategies of member outreach and growth go beyond simply getting them to join, especially with hard-to-reach members, such as those faculty who teach online-only (an increased reality in a COVID-19 world). In this session, you will hear from part-time faculty leaders about the struggles and successes of massive growth in a local community college over two years and the slow but steady overcoming of the challenges in a third year due to COVID-19.

7:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Meet Your Colleagues - Networking Session

Friday, March 12, 2021 2021
Virtual Higher Education Conference (Pre-Summit)

10:00 AM - 11:00 AM
Budget Hearing with NEA Secretary-Treasurer Noel Candelaria

11:00 AM - 12:30 PM
Concurrent Workshops

Talking Race: Grounding Our Understanding to Effectively Talk about Race and Racial Justice – Part 1
Facilitator: Marcia Mackey, NCHE Secretary and NEA Board of Directors, Michigan Education Association
Presenters: Hilario Benzon, NEA Center for Social Justice, and HaSheen Wilson, Youngstown State University-Association of Classified Employees (YSU-ACE)/OHEA
Leadership competencies: ADVOCACY

This session introduces and defines the levels of racism and its impact on institutions and systems. We will outline why a race equity/justice lens is critical to our work. We will introduce activities and tools to support the development of a racial analysis as well as basic tools to engage in constructive discussions about race.

Stories from the Field: Taking Statewide Collective Action
Facilitator: Hanna Vaandering, NEA Executive Committee
Presenters: Max Page and Maria Hegbloom, Massachusetts Teachers Association; Karen Morian and Jaffar Ali Shahul-Hameed, United Faculty of Florida/FEA
Leadership competencies: ADVOCACY & ORGANIZING

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented new challenges for higher education employees, students, and communities and has exacerbated or accelerated adverse decisions such as layoffs and program closures. In this session, MTA leaders describe their legislative and public relations campaign for proper investment in higher education, and United Faculty of Florida leaders detail their fight for safe campus reopenings based on science not politics. What is working, what’s not, and what are lessons learned for continuing this work?

Data, Data, Data! Faculty Salary Data and Other Interesting Bits
Facilitator: Deborah Williams, NEA Board of Directors, Kansas NEA
Presenter: Sue Clery, ASA-Research
Leadership competencies: ADVOCACY & ORGANIZING

This session will provide an update of the status of compensation in academia. The presenter will review historical trends in salaries and how they are related to funding streams, salary differences across types of faculty, where the big “winners” are, and those who may not feel as flush. To make a case of collective bargaining, a focus will be on the salary differential between faculty and institutions with and without collective bargaining agreements. Salary and tenure opportunity differentials between women and men will be presented, along with findings regarding the erosion of tenure, and which states are experiencing large funding declines and how it relates to faculty salaries. The presenter will also review early findings from new research on part-time faculty compensation; a historical account following HBCUs’ development and enrollment patterns as related to political trends and funding challenges; and the effects of disinvestment in higher education.

A CUDAS (College and University Data Analysis System) tutorial will also be provided. CUDAS is NEA’s online data-rich bargaining tool that allows users to quickly produce reports for an institution and a group of peers. Data include faculty and staff salaries, a view into how institutions spend their money, and the changing streams of revenues, including appropriations compared to tuition. CUDAS’ new disinvestment tool will be demonstrated, along with ideas for how to use CUDAS reports for collective bargaining purposes.

Organizing and Engaging Adjuncts: Best Practices
Facilitator: Vivian Zimmerman, NCHE Executive Committee, Illinois Education Association
Presenters: Heather Clemens, New York State United Teachers (NYSUT), and Laurel Morton, Adjuncts United Syracuse University/NYSUT
Leadership competencies: ORGANIZING

Adjuncts make up an increasing portion of academia. Some surveys indicate that as many as 2/3 of all faculty identify as adjunct or contingent faculty. Adjunct and contingent members are often teaching at more than one campus and rarely have access to dedicated space or time for office hours. Working to effectively communicate with adjunct members on campus is a priority for all locals, but creating strategies to successfully engage these members takes time and practice. This session will focus on best practices for organizing and engaging adjuncts presented by NYSUT staff. It will also focus on plans that have succeeded and those that have failed to engage presented by a local leader who has engaged in these endeavors on a private sector campus. The aim is to create stronger bonds between the local and new and returning adjunct members.

12:30 PM - 1:00 PM
BREAK/Quick Lunch

1:00 PM - 2:30 PM
Concurrent Workshops

Talking Race: Grounding Our Understanding to Effectively Talk about Race and Racial Justice – Part 2
Facilitator: Marcia Mackey, NCHE Secretary, and NEA Board of Directors, Michigan Education Association
Presenters: Hilario Benzon, NEA Center for Social Justice, and HaSheen Wilson, Youngstown State University-Association of Classified Employees (YSU-ACE)/OHEA
Leadership competencies: ADVOCACY

This session introduces and defines the levels of racism and its impact on institutions and systems. We will outline why a race equity/justice lens is critical to our work. We will introduce activities and tools to support the development of a racial analysis as well as basic tools to engage in constructive discussions about race.

In Search of Professional Respect and Equity: A Deeper Dive into the NEA Higher Education Faculty and Staff Surveys
Facilitator: Alec Thomson, NCHE Vice President, Michigan Education Association
Presenters: Erika Taylor and Marissa Puckett Blais, NEA Center for Enterprise Strategy
Leadership competencies: ADVOCACY

A number of studies suggest that institutions of higher education are using contingent faculty at an increasing rate, as these positions are less costly than full time, tenure-track positions. Further, there is evidence that suggests a marked increase in women and people of color in contingent faculty positions in recent years. As a result, increased levels of diversity in terms of gender and race/ethnicity may be concentrated in positions that offer less financial stability and fewer resources for research and other activities that lend themselves to career advancement in academia.

While the issue of faculty of color is beyond the scope of this presentation, this session will supply a more detailed exploration of the contingent faculty members who complete the NEA Higher Education Faculty and Staff Survey. The survey, conducted in late 2018, asked members to provide information regarding their current working conditions, campus climate, compensation, and resources for teaching and research. As there is a lack of recent national data on contingent faculty, this information will provide additional context to many of the issues that contingent faculty members face.

This session will also include discussions about the effective use of these data for advocacy and bargaining purposes. It is the intent of the presenters to use the survey findings as a framework for strategic efforts to advocate legislative policies that have a positive impact on the quality of life for our contingent members. Providing supports for their development as scholars may ultimately have a positive impact on students.

Strategic Research for Successful Organizing and Bargaining Campaigns
Facilitator: Zena Link, NEA Board of Directors, Massachusetts Teachers Association
Presenters: Susan Nogan, NEA Center for Enterprise Strategy, and Justin Tzuanos, NEA Center for Organizing
Leadership competencies: ADVOCACY & ORGANIZING

Higher education locals typically use their institution’s financial data in developing campaign strategies and communications. A more comprehensive research approach can uncover alternative sources of revenue, conflicts of interest among decision-makers (e.g., trustees or donors), and opportunities to engage community allies in areas of common interest. Participants will learn what these other sources of publicly available information are and examples of how to use them.

Self-Care for BIPOC Leaders
Facilitator: DeWayne Sheaffer, NCHE President, California Teachers Association
Presenter: Candace Shivers, NEA Board of Directors, Massachusetts Teachers Association
Leadership competencies: GOVERNANCE AND LEADERSHIP

This workshop is targeted to both emerging and established Association leaders who are part of the global majority. How do you become more involved in your union/Association chapter, and once involved, how do you stay at the top of your game to be an effective advocate and leader? This workshop will give best practices for self-care for BIPOC leaders who are often disproportionately called upon to represent BIPOC students, colleagues, and their institutions regarding racial and social justice issues.

2:20 PM - 3:20 PM
Closing General Session
Hanna Vaandering, NEA Executive Committee, Emcee
Princess Moss, NEA Vice President
Breakout rooms for discussing commitments about next steps with our locals and in our states.
Adjourn