Grievances and Disciplinary Actions: CINDY HILL is our Grievance Officer
https://andromeda.ccv.vsc.edu/Learn/SearchSections/
Intro: These are two distinct things; our members are entitled to union representation in each.
A. DISCIPLINARY ACTIONS: Weingarten Rights
--What constitutes a disciplinary action or investigation?
Investigative interviews; any meeting at which terms of employment might be discussed or changed;
class evaluation beyond what's in the contract;
actions taken in response to student complaints, etc.
--Issues that arise:
Need for prompt response;
confidentiality and need to respect FERPA,
medical privacy,
not intimidate witnesses,
potential criminal or civil liability by our members,
how to conduct our own investigation.
--Once disciplinary action is imposed, action is grievable,
within the time frames of grievance filings imposed by contract.
If disciplinary action is declined, check the personnel record and grieve for removal of the record.
--Important that we all communicate and keep clear records on these disciplinary actions to look for other potentially grievable patterns
-- for example, discriminatory pattern of disciplinary actions or investigations.
--Ideally, you as site stewards should get the call from one of your faculty members first; be sure to contact a member of the leadership team promptly.
B. GRIEVANCES
--What is a grievance?
A complaint that we as the union file asserting violations of our contract with CCV.
These can be in regards to violations pertaining to a single faculty member,
or be in regards to more general issues affecting all faculty at CCV.
--Ideally, the faculty members at your site will contact you regarding potential grievances.
We have tight timelines for response to these,
so it is important to do a quick vetting of the grievance on-site,
then contact a member of the leadership team promptly
so that we can all decide together how to best approach the problem.
--Many times a potential grievance can't be supported by the present contract language;
we're maintaining a file of issues to be discussed in the next negotiations,
as well as issues for which we can do information requests or take other steps on now.