Step 1: Assess Faculty Support

Faculty conduct one-on-one conversations with colleagues to identify common concerns and challenges, and gauge support for unionization.

Step 2: Build Community & Vision

Faculty meet individually and in small groups to share ideas for improving compensation and working conditions, while simultaneously creating an organizational structure and vision.

Step 3: Engage Legal Process

Activists work to meet the statutory criteria for union recognition or certification. Typically, faculty are required to sign ‘authorization cards’, expressing their desire to form a union.

Step 4: Win Certification

An election or ‘card check’ process is conducted to gain legal certification for the union. Once the union is certified, bargaining of your first union contract commences.