To add your signature to this dear colleague letter, please fill out our form at: https://forms.gle/yZFCkhoEFq23TBPy9
Dear Colleagues,
On January 17, 2023, you likely received an email from EVCP Camfield that asked faculty, “if you did not perform your work or job duties that you were scheduled/required to perform between November 14, 2022, through December 23, 2022, please download [an] attestation form here and submit it to [academic personnel] .” The email specified that the form should only be submitted by “Senate faculty members [who] exercised their legal right to participate in the strike” by UAW academic employees, and that the form would be used to dock pay for those faculty. The Council of UC Faculty Associations has challenged the legality of these forms, and we agree that no UC Merced faculty have any obligation to submit attestations.
We also write regarding the equivalent forms that have been sent to all fall GSR and TA employees. Specifically, we write to clarify that it is not the responsibility of faculty or department chairs to verify whether GSRs or TAs submitted accurate attestation forms.
In fact, you may recall that EVCP Camfield advised all faculty on November 7 that we should not discuss the strike, including individual participation or non-participation, with any GSRs or TAs. It is thus impossible for faculty to post-facto document such participation or non-participation for the purposes of payroll. Accordingly, we cannot and will not provide such information to the administration.
While the University of California may have certain legal requirements “to align compensation with work effort,” compensation and labor issues are the domain of the administration at UCOP and UCM, not the faculty. The administration, as the sole authority for UC labor relations, must take full responsibility for any accounting issues, and any ensuing financial and legal liability should be assumed by the university rather than falling to instructors or PIs.
Sincerely,
Camila Alvarez, Assistant Professor Sociology
Susan Amussen, Professor of History & Critical Race and Ethnic Studies
Christina Baker, Associate Professor of History & Critical Race and Ethnic Studies
Jessica Blois, Associate Professor of Life & Environmental Sciences
Jeffrey Butler, Associate Professor of Economics
Lindsay Crawford, Assistant Teaching Professor of Public Health
Maria-Elena De Trinidad Young, Assistant Professor of Public Health
Sapana Doshi, Associate Professor of History & Chair of Critical Race and Ethnic Studies
Charlie Eaton, Associate Professor of Sociology
Laura Hamilton, Professor and Chair of Sociology
Colin Holbrook, Associate Professor of Cognitive and Information Sciences
David Kaminsky, Professor of Music and Dance
Sora Kim, Assistant Professor of Life & Environmental Sciences
Petra Kranzfelder, Assistant Teaching Professor of Molecular and Cell Biology
Yang Lor, Assistant Teaching Professor of Sociology
Sean Malloy, Professor of History & Critical Race and Ethnic Studies
Tyler Marghetis, Assistant Professor of Cognitive and Information Sciences
Carrie Menke, Associate Teaching Professor of Physics
Erik Menke, Associate Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry
Emily Jane McTavish, Assistant Professor of Life & Environmental Sciences
Kit Myers, Assistant Professor of History & Critical Race and Ethnic Studies
Whitney Pirtle, Associate Professor of Sociology
David Rouff, Associate Professor and Chair of History & Critical Race and Ethnic Studies
Muey Saeteurn, Associate Professor of History & Critical Race and Ethnic Studies
Christina Torres, Professor and Chair, Anthropology and Heritage Studies
Ma Vang, Associate Professor of History & Critical Race and Ethnic Studies
Justin Yeakel, Associate Professor of Life & Environmental Sciences
Lisa Yeo, Assistant Professor of Management of Complex Systems
