These are interesting times indeed. They are forcing higher education to reexamine the very heart and soul of its institutions. The education unions can, and must, play a pivotal role in meeting these challenges head-on. In fact, these interesting times are ripe for a renaissance of unionism. They present us with a unique opportunity to organize and position education unions as the guardians of quality and professionalism.
Teachers are the largest group of unionized knowledge workers in the United States.
Yet, there are vast populations who have yet to be organized, particularly temporary faculty and graduate students, who are increasingly carrying the workload at colleges and universities. By organizing them along with tenured faculty, we can insist that employment within higher education become more stable and better paying, for all staff. Better to bargain together than to beg alone. Ironically, we can organize using the very technology that is changing our lives in the first place. NEA surveys have found that virtually all higher education faculty have access to a personal computer, e-mail, and Internet on campus.