Dear Members,
This is an open letter to our Trustees to do the right thing. Click here to sign your name to this letter and tell trustees they need to take action now! Remind them they do not want the downsizing of the college, eradication of vital programs and destruction of educational opportunities to happen on their watch.
In unity,
Malaika Finkelstein
AFT 2121 President
What will your CCSF legacy be? An Open letter to the CCSF Trustees.
Last night, Joe Biden made it clear: the Democratic Party believes in Community Colleges. The Biden administration is committed to expanding access to Community Colleges because, in the words of Jill Biden, “they are our most powerful engines of prosperity.”
So why are CCSF’s Trustees voting to dismantle San Francisco’s Community College, with cuts of 65%? What kind of legacy would CCSF Trustees like to leave behind? An attack on accessible education, equity, and economic opportunity is not what our country or city needs right now. AFT 2121 is calling on the Trustees to remember that their role is to lead the fight to preserve and expand CCSF, not dismantle it.
City College is the economic and jobs engine that students of color, low-income, and immigrants need to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet the District plans to rob over 30,000 students every semester of the educational opportunities they need.
There are alternative paths, and we need CCSF’s Trustees to work with AFT 2121 to advocate for these alternatives. CCSF Trustees must step up and do more to ensure the administration uses HEERF and CARES funds as intended, work with City Hall on WERF expansion, and help develop state legislation for long-term solvency.
As we have worked to secure revenue to maintain programs and meet and community demand, we have come to understand how public trust in the college has been affected by the neglect and closure of neighborhood campuses and deferral of plans to develop new sites in accordance with the bond passed by voters in 2020. This is particularly true in the Bayview, which has historically been under-served by public institutions, and not received its fair share of publicly-funded resources. We urge this board to do everything possible to restore those relationships and maintain the college’s commitment to equity and a presence in San Francisco’s neighborhoods. Our union looks forward to being a partner in planning for the educational priorities and needs of the Bayview community.
AFT 2121 is also particularly alarmed to learn that administration also plans to convert much of City College’s stable, full-time faculty into contingent, part-time workers. CCSF Vice-Chancellor Tom Boegel said, under oath in layoff appeal hearings, that his administration plans to replace full-timers with part-timers. He stated later in his testimony that they would offer assignments to laid-off full-time faculty, who would work “as part-timers.” This would be a violation of the California Education Code. Yet the District’s legal counsel, Kathy Meola, repeatedly argued that the District could maintain programs because positions could be filled by part-time faculty. This is not just wrong–it’s illegal.
If CCSF implements these layoffs, entire departments will be left with no full-time faculty. Our ability to write or update curriculum as required by accreditation standards, work with community agencies, bring in students, or do outreach needed to ensure San Francisco’s black and brown students know about the opportunities City College provides will be severely diminished. Students will lose access to office hours and faculty support. The structure that keeps our college going as an intellectual and community resource will be undermined.
Tenure guarantees academic freedom and keeps educational standards high. Without it, all faculty are reduced to contingent labor, and faculty’s ability to fight for part-time parity and equal pay for equal work is diminished.
These cuts have been framed as inevitable, but this is far from the truth.This board has a choice to make: Will you accept the austerity agenda designed for this college? Will you align with union-busting and keep tens of thousands of working class students, mostly of color, from pursuing their goals and force them into decades of student debt? Or will you doggedly pursue and protect revenue sources by partnering with City government, overseeing the judicious use and maximization of federal funds designed to keep people at work and in school, and undertake efforts necessary to build enrollment?
There is a brighter future and increased investment for community colleges on the horizon. Please help us turn the narrative about this college around. Make the choices now that will position our college to take its place as a leader of the emerging national conversation about the value community colleges bring to our communities.
City College has been in the crosshairs of the fight for accessible higher education before. We fought off rogue accreditors. We created Free City. AFT 2121 will continue to take the necessary and appropriate steps to protect our college and our legal rights. Our union members, along with community and labor allies, locally and nationally, will see to that.
From the PRO Act, to the American Jobs Plan, to free community college for all in the American Family Plan, it is clear that the national Democratic party is working to expand the rights of both students and unions.
Allowing these layoffs will show that CCSF Trustees are moving in the opposite direction. The attack on tenure is an attack on workers, and the proposed cuts represent an attack on students.
You cannot let this happen.
Please take action to stop this.
Follow Us!