Judge Orders Striking Professors at Central Michigan U. to Return to Work

August 22, 2011, 5:05 pm

After less than a day on strike over benefit and salary issues, 600 tenured and tenure-track faculty members at Central Michigan University have been ordered by a local court to return to work on Tuesday, the Morning Sun, a local newspaper, reported. Judge Mark H. Duthie of the Circuit Court in Isabella County, Mich., granted the temporary restraining order on Monday afternoon after the university’s lawyers argued that a strike by public employees was illegal under the state’s Public Employment Relations Act. Laura Frey, president of the university’s Faculty Association, which called the strike, says that members will return to work but that they will fight the decision in court. A hearing Friday morning will determine whether to make the temporary court order permanent.

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dopefein

Soon, unions will be so weakened in most states that it will be of little benefit to be in one. Let’s all enjoy the race to the bottom — weeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!
panacea

Public employees are generally (and specifically in this case) not allowed to strike. They didn’t have a leg to stand on in regards to a strike.

I support the use of unions and collective bargaining, but you have to follow the rules if you want to keep your credibility.
22259152

Unions have their rightful place. Public employees should not be allowed to form unions.
12080243

If a group’s behavior to accomplish a goal is limited in one direction, the group will find another direction to accomplish it. The courts are corrupt and the ally of big business and administrators of institutions like universities.
phi_rabbit

panacea: it is actually ambiguous whether such a law applies to faculty at the state institutions in Michigan because the state constitution grants them an autonomous status. CMU’s president himself has said in other contexts that CMU employees do not count as “state employees.”
softshellcrab

Boy, I hope you’re right.
softshellcrab

And in a follow up, he declared that lizards are not reptiles, and that Michigan is not a state. It doesn’t matter a twit what he said.
softshellcrab

Public unions should not be allowed to exist. There is no one to fight back. The elected officials just spend our tax dollars to pay them more. Worse yet, many times the elected officials are influenced if not essentially controlled by union funding.
cmufadude

The faculty at CMU would like people to know the following:

1. The language of the injunction–written by CMU attorneys– compares
our job action to Hurricane Katrina in terms of “disruptive force,” and
its impact on an institution of higher education. We feel strongly this
language trivializes the death and destruction caused by the worst
natural disaster in US history. We also feel this comparison is
especially insensitive given that the 6th anniversary of the storm is
imminent. It should be noted that CMU’s president formerly presided over
a university in Mississippi, near the post-landfall track of Katrina;

2. CMU students were physically barred from the library by campus police
during the President’s press conference–on the first day of classes.
Some students who were in the building were permitted to stay;

3. In his press conference, the president referred to the contractual
dispute as a problem “between us grown-ups.” CMU students are incensed
by this remark. The president also visibly lost his temper and his
composure as a result of students chuckling at some of his remarks. He
concluded his press conference by *ordering* students to attend class.

The press conference video is available via the local newspaper website,

http://www.themorningsun.com/articles/2011/08/23/news/doc4e52a1dd55125970715647.txt

Perhaps a CHE staff reporter would like contact the CMU Faculty
Association, or the CMU administration, to follow up on this post. Thank you.

Contact information is available at http://cmufaccc.org/