St. John’s University said it is withdrawing recognition of its faculty unions, ending a relationship that has existed for more than 50 years.<\/p>\n
The private Catholic university has recognized the two unions since 1970.<\/p>\n
A university spokesperson said the decision was not made \u201clightly\u201d but was necessary to advance its \u201corganizational mission\u201d as higher education faces significant change.<\/p>\n
What You Need To Know<\/p>\n
St. John\u2019s University is withdrawing recognition of its faculty unions after more than 50 years
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The university says the move is necessary to advance its \u201corganizational mission\u201d
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The AAUP-affiliated union called the decision a betrayal of the university\u2019s history and values<\/p>\n
\u201cFor over 150 years, St. John\u2019s University has been steadfastly dedicated to its Catholic and Vincentian mission, with our esteemed faculty serving as the cornerstone of our academic community,\u201d spokesperson Brian Browne said in a statement. \u201cAs the landscape of higher education undergoes a profound transformation, our commitment to providing an exceptional and sustainable educational experience consistent with our mission requires us to be agile and innovative.\u201d<\/p>\n
The university said withdrawing recognition of the unions will \u201callow St. John\u2019s the flexibility required to innovate while continuing to support our faculty and, most importantly, deliver on our promise to our students.\u201d<\/p>\n
One of the unions affected is affiliated with the American Association of University Professors.<\/p>\n
\u201cThroughout the negotiations, the SJU-AAUP has consistently sought to arrive at a reasonable contract that would benefit not just the faculty, but the larger St. John\u2019s University as well. We are tremendously disappointed that Father [Brian] Shanley would disregard more than fifty years of constructive engagement with the faculty unions. We remain ready to return to the bargaining table and finish the work to make the University stronger,\u201d said Fred Cocozzelli, lead bargainer and past president of SJU-AAUP.<\/p>\n
Todd Wolfson, president of the national AAUP, also criticized the decision.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis shameful attack on the St. John\u2019s faculty union betrays the university\u2019s history and most deeply-held Catholic values. It\u2019s outrageous that religious leaders are joining in the assaults on higher education that are happening nationwide,\u201d Wolfson said.<\/p>\n
It was not immediately clear how the decision would affect ongoing negotiations or existing faculty contracts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"St. John’s University said it is withdrawing recognition of its faculty unions, ending a relationship that has existed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":145932,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[203,25,67,576,9,24,12,63,122,124,123,27],"class_list":["post-145931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-app-education","tag-app-top-stories","tag-education","tag-erica-brosnan","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-news","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145931"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145931\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}