University types

stressederic · December 2, 2008

The Associate Tutors (essentially PhD students who teach seminars) at Sussex Uni have been locked in a pay dispute with the University management. Essentially the University has put all of us on Pay Grade 5 (which is not an academic or teaching grade) which means we only get paid for one hour of preparation (can you read Das Kapital in an hour?), one hour of marking, and in our seminars are not paid to demonstrate any original knowledge or thought and have to work from a prepared script (pretty rubbish if there is a script even worse if there isn't).

Here's the background:

Background:

A number of Associate Tutors were recently sent a series of documents known as 'role profiles'. As far as we know, no proper explanation of the documents was provided, and no context given.

Role profiles are generic documents intended to assist in determining the pay grade applicable to different roles. They are part of a complex set of descriptors which were agreed as part of the wider framework agreement
negotiations. The full published set is available on the HR website (see left hand menu: http://www.sussex.ac.uk/humanresources/1-2-20.html ) There are 18 non-academic profiles, 12 Academic role profiles and 3 profiles
relating to ATs. That's 33 in all, of which the university is looking at just 3.

The academic profiles are all based on nationally agreed profiles which are published on the UCEA website (UCEA is the employer organization: (www.ucea.ac.uk) and agreed with UCU. Sussex profiles had minor modifications to take account of local practice and terminology (again agreed with UCU as part of the pay framework negotiations), but are broadly compatible with the national position, an important element of delivering transparency and mobility within the sector. Taken together the profiles and grade descriptors provide a basis for delivering pay equality across all roles, based on consistent criteria.

This leads to the first concern we have which is that amending one small sub-set of the profiles - without reference to the other profiles to which they are related - risks undermining equal pay principles. We are unaware
of any cross-referencing between the proposed AT revised profiles and other parts of the profiling structure. Nor has there been any equalities checking by management in the process thus far.

While it is perfectly reasonable for the university to develop policy on the deployment of Associate Tutors as part of broader teaching and learning policy (indeed it's good practice to do so) anything that impacts on terms and conditions of employment has to go through formal negotiating processes with UCU. So these can't be imposed without negotiation with the union, but we do need to take them seriously.

Our initial analysis - and I stress that it is initial, but we've had precious little information to work on - suggests that the role profiles are being modified in order to create job differentiation between different groups of ATs, including reducing aspects of the role in order to 'validate' the use of a grade 5. This is important because as part of the pay framework the University undertook to establish grade 6 as the default grade for Associate Tutors. This was in the deal everyone voted on. We have repeatedly objected to the University's exclusion of DPhils from this principle, making the point that the rate of pay for the job must relate to the requirements of the role, not to the personal status of the individual doing it. That's the basis of equal pay. It's not clear how the proposed revised profiles address this basic pay inequality.

On the specifics, we note for example that there seems to be an attempt to remove some assessment from some of the AT roles. This presumably will result in additional work for permanent faculty. We don't think this is workable, and we also think it potentially may damage your future career progress by removing an important element of the role.

If you mark work that contributes to classification you'll be paid at grade 6. If the work doesn't contribute to classification (ie first year courses), then the pay is grade 5. This is a basic breach of equal pay principles since the work is essentially the same, and moreover may potentially undermine the agreed incrementation principles built into the framework.

In other areas you risk being reduced from active colleagues within the faculty structure (including the right to attend 'relevant' meetings). The revised profiles limit you to attending only 'course and programme' related
meetings. So presumably you are excluded from departmental meeting.

The concept of professional development is undermined (the clause 'reflect on practice and the development of own teaching and learning skills' has been deleted). Why?

We're puzzled why grade 5s shouldn't show consideration to others?

The difficulty we have with all of this is that there is actually no policy context into which to match the proposed changes. The key document we need is the one on AT deployment, but that is conspicuous by its absence. As it
stands, we think that agreeing to these profiles without any commitment on how Associate Tutors will be deployed is akin to writing a blank cheque on your pay and your future. We won't do that.

This issue has been building for over a year and we've finally managed to get our Union to start doing something about it, so we can force the University to realise what would happen if all the ATs did work to their paygrade and Seminars came to a grinding halt.

We don't want this to go to industrial action, so this Wednesday we're holding a rally on the University campus.

However bearing in mind that we have a fair few academics here and a good number of people who like to support this sort of thing, should anyone feel moved to sign our online petition and help us earn above the minimum wage then I'd would be extremely grateful.

You can get to the petition from here

Ta!

Dee · December 2, 2008

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