SALEM — Salem State University students have circulated a petition that calls on SSU President John Keenan to rescind three weeks of staff furloughs planned for spring 2021.
The petition, which has received over 1,500 signatures, was drafted by third-year psychology student Olivia Setzer and says the burden of the furloughs would fall upon the students, who are already struggling with higher fees and the stress of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The professors would normally use the furlough time to go over new research and look up things that are relevant to our course. With the furloughs that would be technically illegal,” said Setzer. “So really we’re not going to be getting the quality of education that we’re paying for.”
The staff furloughs were announced Nov. 6 in a unilateral decision from the administration that members of the Massachusetts State College Association, Salem Chapter (MSCA) decried as illegal and unnecessary.
President Keenan proposed five-week furloughs over the summer that were agreed to by APA, AFSCME, and non-union employees.
He characterized the action as an issue of fairness towards other APA, AFSCME and non-union employees, and as a matter of necessity due to a budget gap.
“It was something that was required as a result of our financial circumstances. It’s not just at Salem State. COVID has impacted higher education like nothing else has,” said Keenan. “We want to deal with it in the way that’s least impactful for our campus and our community.”
“President Keenan has said to us that it’s only fair for faculty to share the pain with the other employees that are on furlough,” said Joanna Gonsalves, vice president of MSCA. “The people that are really sharing the pain are the students. They’re paying more for less services and for less accessibility with their professors and their librarians. Our students need their faculty and staff more now, not less.”
MSCA representatives reported that they had refused to negotiate the proposed furloughs when they were presented to them over the summer because they fell outside of the normal contract negotiation process. Keenan argued that it was more appropriate to negotiate the furloughs separately.
The MSCA filed an unfair labor practices complaint with the state Department of Labor Relations in response to the furloughs.
According to Keenan, there is a mediation planned regarding this decision on Dec. 14.
The language in the petition was based on that of a letter sent to President Keenan and the Board of Trustees this Tuesday, signed by 75 School of Social Work students.
Setzer got ahold of the letter, and decided to adapt it into a petition that could be signed by more people. She was surprised by the massive response it received.
“I pictured that maybe a few hundred students and professors would sign,” said Setzer. “When we passed 1,000 it blew my mind.”
Instead of furloughs, the petition calls for the administration to either use their $25 million to $30 million of emergency reserve funds to pay campus employees — or to stand in solidarity with students and staff in “demanding the federal and state funding that high quality public education truly requires.”
“Other schools have used emergency funding to make up for the deficits this year,” said Setzer. “I feel like we’re not asking for anything that impossible. It’s just whether or not (President Keenan) values students the way that he says he does.”
“You generally want to use that funding for major one-time investments, not operational costs,” said Keenan. “And we wanted to keep that money for potential emergencies. This COVID financial impact is not going to be over in 2021.”
Gonsalves said that she believed most of the university’s budget concerns stem from inadequate state funding.
“Only one-third of our support comes from the state,” said Gonsalves. “Twenty years ago, the state paid two-thirds and students only had to pay one-third. We need to reverse the slow privatization of Salem State. We need to be affordable and accessible, and the only way we can do that is to fight hard to have the Commonwealth return to the level of funding we once had.”
Keenan was not optimistic about the possibility.
“I was very pleasantly surprised that they were able to level fund the budget this year,” said Keenan, who went on to describe how much of their ability to fund higher education at current levels came from one-time sources. “I don’t know how they could do more than they’ve already done.”
“I very much appreciate the input from our students,” said Keenan of the petition. “I’m very proud, and happy to talk with them. But we’re not able to rescind the furloughs.”
Guthrie Scrimgeour can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter at @g_scrimgeour.
