The Ohio University Chapter of the American Association of University Professors (OU-AAUP) stands in solidarity with the faculty of Wright State University (WSU), who are striking to demand a fair contract.
We express alarm at the WSU administration’s decision unilaterally to impose a contract on full-time teaching faculty represented by AAUP-WSU.
The financial data that are publicly accessible indicate that WSU’s budget problems are self-inflicted. The problems stem primarily from the failure of the Board of Trustees to manage resources, competently. Compensation and benefits of the full-time teaching faculty comprise just 17 percent of the university’s budget. Expenditures on faculty hiring are not the source of WSU’s budget problems, and faculty should not be made to bear the brunt of fixing them.
The WSU faculty have nevertheless indicated a readiness to bear some of the burden of solving the budget disaster that the Board of Trustees and the administration have produced. They are offering a range of financial concessions.
The WSU administration has disregarded this offer to meet halfway and instead has forced a punitive contract on the faculty. The rationale provided is the very crisis that the administration and the Board of Trustees have created.
We urge the WSU administration to retract this decision to impose a contract and instead return to good-faith negotiations with the WSU faculty to achieve a just resolution.
We urge our OU-AAUP chapter members to post individual expressions of support to their WSU colleagues at the following links:
- https://www.facebook.com/AAUP-Wright-State-University-636430523091526/
- https://twitter.com/aaupwsu?lang=en
- https://www.instagram.com/aaupwrightstate/
Loren D. Lybarger
President, OU-AAUP
American Association of University Professors 