To: Wellesley College Community
From: Courtney Coile, Provost and Lia Gelin Poorvu ’56 Dean of the College, and Carolyn Slaboden, Chief Human Resources Officer
Re: Non-tenure track faculty union announces plan to strike; College is committed to negotiations
Date: March 24, 2025
We are writing to update you about the collective bargaining process currently underway at the College with our non-tenure track (NTT) faculty union, WOAW-UAW.
Our most recent bargaining session on March 18 continued weeks of forward movement from both parties on several important provisions of the contract. The College passed counterproposals on Leaves, Insurance Benefits, and Union Rights and Access, and the parties reached tentative agreement on Academic Freedom.
This is more evidence of the substantial progress WOAW-UAW and the College have made, including coming to tentative agreement on nearly 20 articles thus far. WOAW referred to this progress on March 11, when it stated “the College demonstrated serious bargaining movement by packaging some of their proposals together.”
Despite this ongoing progress, and though weekly bargaining sessions are already scheduled for the next several weeks, WOAW-UAW has announced plans to strike beginning Thursday, March 27.
Though a strike can suggest parties are at an impasse, the College does not feel this is the case and sincerely hopes that WOAW-UAW does not decide to strike. At tomorrow’s bargaining session, the College will present new counterproposals that demonstrate our commitment to good-faith bargaining. Most first union contracts take more than a year to finalize, and this kind of back-and-forth is the hard work of negotiation. We believe it is the best way for the College and the union to reach agreement on a fair, competitive contract for our NTT faculty—a goal the WOAW-UAW has stated that they share.
In the event that the union decides to strike, the College’s priority will be supporting academic continuity for our students. We are in communication with our department chairs, who will let students know about any changes to their classes, and we plan to share more information with our community as needed. We invite you to share questions and learn more about the status of negotiations on our dedicated website.