Bargaining Survey Series: Professional Development Report

Thank you to everyone who filled out LEO’s Professional Development & Faculty Support Survey! 198 Lecturers from 75 different units (50 Ann Arbor units, 13 Dearborn, and 12 Flint) responded. We will not be sending a survey during Spring Break. Monday March 9th we will send out a survey that will explore issues that are now being classified as “Bargaining for the Common Good” (BCG). For more about this concept, check out this page. GEO’s current bargaining demands that UM publicly commit to a carbon neutrality date and divest from fossil fuels are good examples of BCG: they would benefit most GSIs and would also directly benefit people not in their bargaining unit. More on this in the intro to the next survey. 

We have kept all of our surveys open, so if you did not have the chance to fill out the previous surveys, you still can: Workload, Reviews, and Professional Development.

The report of the Professional Development survey results is below, and the full quantitative results are here. If you want to work on any of the issues identified in this survey, or any issues that could be addressed through the collective bargaining process, please indicate your interest by sending an email to matt@leounion.org. 

The winner of the $50 Kroger gift card is Edward Williams from the Dearborn College of Business!
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Because we are highly-dedicated professionals, Lecturers are keenly interested in opportunities for professional development. Over two-thirds of the respondents had applied for funding, and most of those applications were successful. It seems that there are routinely more applicants than available money for the professional development fund in our collective bargaining agreement. The total pool for that fund per academic year is currently $28,000 in Ann Arbor and $13,000 in each Dearborn and Flint; an individual Lecturer can receive up to $1,000. Many Lecturers stated that the individual cap for this fund usually means that it does not cover all the costs of presenting at a conference. With the funds having only one or two application deadlines per academic year, Lecturers have missed opportunities because of timing. Numerous respondents wrote that more deadlines or rolling deadlines would allow them to utilize these funds more effectively. 

Lecturers reported that units on all three campuses provide baseline faculty support (office, desk, computer, etc). The support of newly hired Lecturers, however, seems less robust. While a majority of respondents received an orientation or unit policies, there were three times as many informal mentorships as formal mentorships, and almost half answered that they did not remember or received no new hire support. Over a third of Lecturers stated that they do not receive information about unit policies.

Lecturers think that the working title of Teaching Professor would have mostly positive impacts on our working conditions. The majority of respondents marked “Substantial Positive” or “Small Positive” for all five of the categories we listed. Lecturers think that Teaching Professor would have the largest positive impact on the feeling that the university values our work and units’ ability to attract and retain Lecturers. Professional development, relationship with students, and relationship with tenure-track colleagues were split mostly evenly between Substantial Positive, Small Positive, and No Impact.